# Starting a 9 Week old Puppy in Agility?!



## MysticRealm (May 30, 2007)

Haha, so obviously I'm not actually going to be starting a 9 week old puppy in agility, but I'd love to know what you serious agility competitors do with your young puppies to give them the best base for agility until they are old enough to actually start in agility classes?
Also, what age is the best age to start in agility beginner classes? 
I'm doing a beginner agility class right now with my pom but it does have some jumps (usually on the lowest possible setting) and we did an a-frame this last week (I think it was our 4th class). At what age is that much impact ok?
Thanks!


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## elrohwen (Nov 10, 2011)

Many classes don't allow puppies in beginner classes at all until 6 months. Other facilities have puppy specific classes that you can start at a younger age. So ask around. I wouldn't put an 8 week old puppy into a typical beginner class that is introducing obstacles and requires some basic obedience commands like sit and stay. But if it was a puppy specific foundation class then I'd sign up.

I start foundation stuff right away, but there is zero equipment or anything that really looks like agility. We work on body awareness, like walking over boards that tip a little bit, putting front feet up on a bowl, pivoting on the bowl, pushing things around to make noise. We work on toy play a lot with retrieving, tug, and out skills. We work on play and engagement in new places. We work on retrained recalls. Shaping puppy to go around a cone in both directions. Stay/wait.

There is a ton of low impact foundation stuff you can do from the first day the puppy comes home. I would wait to start introductions to "real" equipment until 6 months probably, and then only at low levels (jump bumps, baby height dog walk, low table, etc).


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## MysticRealm (May 30, 2007)

THanks so much!! Some great things to work on!


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## MrsBoats (May 20, 2010)

You can start building your foundation for performance at this age. I'm going to recommend you a bunch of books and DVDs to help you.

Building Block for Performance - http://www.dogwise.com/itemdetails.cfm?ID=DTO211

Clean Run's Ebook that focuses on puppies - https://www.cleanrun.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=product.display&product_ID=4507&ParentCat=175

Foundation Fundamentals - https://www.cleanrun.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=product.display&product_ID=2625&ParentCat=175

The Focused Puppy - https://www.cleanrun.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=product.display&product_ID=2502&ParentCat=175

Salo's Puppy Jumping DVD (you could start this when your pup is 4 months old) - https://www.cleanrun.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=product.display&product_ID=2083&ParentCat=175

That should get you started.


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## MysticRealm (May 30, 2007)

Thanks! I'll look into those!


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## crysania (Oct 1, 2010)

Our instructor does a ton of things with puppies as young as 8 weeks.

1. Tug games to teach drive and impulse control.
2. It's your choice and crate games (check out Susan Garrett's stuff!) to teach them to think and make the right choices.
3. Wobble boards to get used to movement under their feet.
4. Target games (often on the end of a dog walk or off a plank) to get started on 2on/2off for contact obstacles.
5. Shaping games (101 things to do in a box, shaping them to put their feet in a box or on a perch, etc.)
6. Recall games. Some for speed and drive, some for relationships, and we eventually do things like add blind or front crosses.
7. Handling on the flat or on jump bumps. So we're already working on crosses as the puppies are growing up but aren't ready for jumping.
8. Tunnels. Tunnels are fun!
9. Pause table behaviors (pause table just set on the ground).

We also do this with ANY new dog to agility. My dog (who was about 1 1/2 to 2 when we started) went through all of this too and I'm so glad he did. We didn't actually start sequencing (on low jumps) until we'd been at it for about 9 months.


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