Introduction
When I got my first dog I had a romantic idea in my head of what our relationship would look like. I envisioned long walks over shady trails, playing in rolling waves, training together in open pastures, cuddling by the fire and of course enjoying many games of fetch. In my imagination, fetch is a wholesome activity which deepens the bonds between human and animal; but there can be a dark side to fetch and increasingly pet owners fall victim to “Fetch Fall-Out”. In this article, I want to highlight the poor health and behavioural outcomes associated with fetch, and how to avoid them.
Healthy Fetch
Before I make you strongly consider throwing your ball in the donation bin at your local pet shop, let me tell you that fetch can be a wholesome activity if practiced mindfully. The hallmarks of a healthy game of fetch are as follows:
· The human is playing, too! If you’re tempted to use your phone in one hand and lazily lob the ball with your other, just stop. Get your butt off the park bench and participate! This is time when your dog can bond with you so don’t squander it by being mentally absent.
· Fetch sessions are brief. Fetch is a high intensity work out so keep it short and sweet. This prevents accumulating wear and tear on your dogs’ front legs as they land and turn heavily on their front end when playing.
· Ball is not life. Healthy fetch should be high intensity and focused, but your dog should still be able to take breaks to pee, drink water and pay attention to the environment around them. If your dog cannot eat a treat or drink water during a game of fetch, I’d be concerned. Another red flag is when your dog is unable to settle or calm down long after the game is over.
· Fetch is polite! Every time you throw the ball, you reinforce the behaviour your dog is doing. Savvy fetch players know this, and only throw the ball when their dog is polite and following cues. You can take this a step further and use fetch as a training aid – I often ask Percy for some tricky heelwork before throwing the ball for him. This keeps him mentally engaged and enhances our heelwork all at once! Be wary of throwing the ball if your dog is pushy, as you will just encourage this unwanted habit.
Percy and I typically play fetch 1-5 times per week for 10 minutes at a time. For us, it’s a great way to train and play together.
Fetch can be a useful training tool! I use fetch to reward complex behaviours, such as this short trick routine.
Why Do Dogs Fetch?
This article wouldn’t feel complete without describing why our dogs enjoy fetch in the first place. All dogs, to varying degrees, have an innate desire to practice the core behaviours required for hunting prey. Predatory behaviours evolved thousands of years ago and are deeply rooted in our dogs’ normal behavioural development. Fortunately, our dogs can sate their predatory instincts through play behaviours (though there is some overlap between the desire to play and harassing the local wildlife). Predator behaviours occur in a sequence as follows: Search; Stalk; Chase; Bite (grab, shake-to-kill); Dissect; Consume.
Some dog breeds were selectively bred to retain the whole predatory sequence – for example terriers make good ratters because they’ll follow these steps instinctively when presented with prey. Other breeds were selected to focus on single portions of the sequence, for example border collies love to stalk, greyhounds are big on chasing and beagles enjoy the search. Fetch plays on the Stalk and Chase components of the predatory sequence and so appeals to many breeds, but is a special favourite for dogs originally bred to herd, race or retrieve.
Fetch as a Band-Aid
Before we get into the real dark side of fetch I want to point out how fetch can sometimes be used as an inappropriate band aid for other issues. If your dog is destructive, anxious, won’t settle at home, or reactive you may find that the problem symptoms diminish with physical exhaustion. Well meaning owners will bring out the ball and use high intensity fetch sessions to manage the symptoms of poor behaviour. After all, fetch is one of the fastest and least demanding ways for us to tire our dogs out. Unfortunately, as dogs get fitter this management technique becomes less effective as well as harder on our dogs’ bodies. If you’re playing fetch for hours every day in all weather just so you can have peace in your home, please re-assess your need for behavioural modification training to address the underlying issue.
Fetch can be part of normal enrichment activities for dogs, but it should never be the sole enrichment option - if you’re using fetch as a cure-all solution to meeting the needs of your dog, I highly recommend broadening your horizons. There so many great, stimulating things out there! Choose a variety of activities with differing energy requirements and focus on meeting both the physical stimulation and mental stimulation needs of your dog. Not only will your dog be happier, but you’ll avoid many of the “Fetch Fall-Out” issues I am about to describe.
When meeting the mental needs of your dog, ask them to solve a problem, find a scent or treats, or learn something brand new. You can try trick training, puzzle toys, snuffle mats, “find the hidden treat” or even participate in active training disciplines like obedience, tricks or scent detection. Mental enrichment exercises are brilliant option for those days where excessive heat, rain or cold keep you indoors.
When meeting the physical needs of your dog, consider their bodies. You wouldn’t go to the gym and only squat the heaviest weight you can, or only ever try to beat your best 5km time – so why should your dog’s exercise regime be the exact same high intensity workout every day? Vary the physical tasks you ask your dog to do such that they develop a range of physical skills including speed, endurance, hind end and core strength, proprioception and balance. Check out Canine Conditioning groups for more information on the different physical conditioning tasks your dog can do.
Daily walking with pace changes and lots of time for sniffing and exploring is one of the easiest ways to meet your dog’s mental and physical enrichment needs.
Fetch Fall-Out
Fetch Fall-Out is my term for the collection of poor health and behaviour outcomes associated with playing fetch. In loose order of severity these are: Poor Dog Park Etiquette, Ball Stealing, Keep Away, Fetch Obsession, Resource Guarding and Choking.
Poor Dog Park Etiquette
This is a poor behaviour outcome associated with the human rather than the dog. Rude fetch players often don’t appreciate that Fetch Fall-Out is very real for their fellow park-goers and act without forethought or compassion when playing. Poor etiquette can exacerbate or precipitate very serious problems in surrounding dogs (typically by producing a ball without warning when there may be a ball guarder at the park). Many fetch players don’t realise that by simply existing they make the park completely unsuitable for dogs with fetch-related problems. Affected dog/handler duos will often hover around the fence line waiting for fetch to end, or they will simply leash up and leave when the ball comes out. Please be considerate when playing fetch at the dog park by playing at off-peak hours, finding a secluded corner in which to play and asking first before bringing a ball into the park environment. Some dog parks do stipulate that no toys are allowed to prevent these problems and make the park fairer for all users.
Ball Stealing and Keep Away
Ball Stealers will take balls from other dogs, and may play Keep Away such that nobody (dog or human) can retrieve the stolen ball. Stealers do this because they love the attention they get when they take a ball and they enjoy being chased around when they have it. To deal with a ball stealer, you have to cease reinforcing the unwanted behaviour (no attention, no chasing) and heavily teach and reinforce good behaviour (strong recall, strong drop it). It’s difficult because even if the humans stop reinforcing the stealing and keep away, it’s hard to keep the other dog(s) from engaging with the stealer. Without intervention, stealing and keep away problems tend to get progressively worse. Ball stealers often ignore recall cues from their owners, making it unsafe for them to be present in the park especially if it is not fenced in. Further more, ball stealers can cause other dogs to develop or practice resource guarding. Despite Stealing and Keep Away issues seeming playful and innocuous, they can become so pernicious that owners of ball thieves may avoid the dog park all together on the off chance somebody produces a ball and they cannot recall their dog for the next 2 hours.
Resource Guarding
Resource Guarding is a serious behavioural issue where the guarding dog acts aggressively towards dogs and/or humans who approach them when they have a ball. They do this because they (often correctly) assume that the oncoming dog or person will take their ball away… and they really want to keep it! Dogs who mildly resource guard balls may retreat or play Keep Away when approached, or may growl when asked to relinquish the ball. In moderate cases the resource guarder may growl or snap and if left untreated resource guarding may become severe enough that the guarder bites the approaching dog or person, or even swallow the ball to prevent it from being taken. Owners of dogs who guard balls at any level usually avoid dog parks all together. The risk of using the park far outweighs the reward.
Fetch Obsession
Fetch obsession is when your dogs love for the ball tips into an unhealthy obsessive habit. If your dog can’t function normally when a ball is in sight, and/or cannot calm down when it’s put away, they may have become obsessed. Assess your dog for ball obsession by checking whether your dog is able to do the following when a ball is present: eat, drink, follow simple well-known cues (e.g. sit, down, shake), notice environmental stimuli and take breaks to socialise or relax. Also watch to see if your dog is capable of calming down once the ball has been put away – does your dog act normally minutes after the ball is gone, or are they over-excited for an hour?
When a dog enjoys fetch, expect to see some mild to moderate versions of these behaviours. Fetch is fun! Of course, they’d like the ball back! It only becomes obsession when the ball-seeking behaviour becomes detrimental to your dog’s health and functionality. For example, if they cannot calm down afterwards, if they cannot function when a ball is present (even if it is not theirs!), if they cannot assess their environment effectively, or if they are willing to play fetch to the point of exhaustion or dehydration.
If your dog is unable to focus on anything except the ball, they will be less likely to respond to recall cues, less able to interpret hazards in their environment (e.g. they may run into trees, cars, bicycles and other dogs as they are not watching where they are going) and more likely to be startled. Startled dogs may lash out in surprise, so be wary of this potential outcome.
Fetch obsession may be worsened if the dog does not have access to adequate enrichment options, or if fetch is used as a coping mechanism for behavioural issues as discussed above.
Choking
Choking on the ball happens when the fetcher is playing with an inappropriately sized ball. Always choose the correct sized ball when playing with your dog and go up in size when required as your puppy is growing. Unfortunately, even the best-intentioned fetch player can fall foul of choking when playing at the dog park. Owners may leave balls lying around, many of which will be the wrong size for your dog. If you are playing fetch with a small breed dog, do not throw your small sized ball anywhere a larger dog may catch and swallow it. At best, a swallowed ball requires surgery to remove it from the oesophagus, throat or lungs and at worst the ball can block the airway and cause rapid asphyxiation.
Fixing Fetch
For most of our Fetch Fall-Out issues the easy answer is to avoid balls, avoid the dog park and thus avoid the issue. With plenty of healthy and stimulating enrichment options available, the avoidance route is not to be scoffed at! There’s nothing wrong with changing up your routine to cut the problem out of the picture and doing this can often lead to big improvements in health and behaviour outcomes for both dog and human - especially if poor behavioural habits have already become ingrained.
If you’d like help with fixing fetch, consider hiring a reputable dog trainer to help teach you how to overcome guarding, keep away or ball stealing issues. Trainers can also show you how to build polite habits during play sessions, and how to use the ball as a reinforcer to get the most out of your playtime.
If your dog is obsessed with fetch or you’re using fetch as a band aid to mask a more severe issue, look for a trainer who specialises in behaviour modification. Together, you can work on a steady program of desensitisation and foundation skills with distractions until your ball obsessed dog is able to listen and engage even if balls are present. Underlying anxiety, destruction, fear or aggression issues are also treatable with the right training programme and/or the right adjustments to lifestyle, nutritional or medicinal factors.
Conclusion
There’s nothing inherently wrong with fetch but mindlessly chucking your chuck-it day in, day out could lead to fall out down the road. Keep an eye out for rude or unhealthy behaviour and seek help early before it can develop into a real problem!
