The idea of obedience is to help meld you and your dog into a working team. This should be fun for both you and your dog, and will make him a better pet and you a better owner in the process. Because it demands precision, your dog must be fully tuned into you when he's working. People who really enjoy teaching their pups and dogs how to listen and respond to them will do well in obedience. Of course, your pup or dog will have to want to listen and respond, or yours will be a challenging journey.

You will discover how well you and your puppy can work as a team when you start taking basic training classes, which teach you how to communicate with your dog. In formal obedience, the idea is to be able to train your dog so that he can eventually comprehend and act on commands regardless of distance or interference. There are three levels that increase with difficulty: Novice, Open, and Utility. Each has its own requirements. In any trial, the dog must score 170 or more of the possible 200 points to earn a title. Novice exercises include standing for examination, heeling on lead, and a long sit off the lead (and more). In Open, your dog will need to do a marked retrieve, go down in the middle of being asked to come to you (a drop on recall), and sit for a long time off lead with you out of sight, among other things. At the highest level, Utility, your dog has to discriminate scents on objects, clear hurdles away from you while you direct him with hand signals, and other challenging exercises designed to truly test his competency.

You can learn so much about your dog and yourself through competitive obedience, and it is a very popular sport. You and your dog will truly become a team while you work through the demands of advancing to greater and greater challenges.