Hank vs. Agility

As many of you know, Hank is my little agility man. What began as a way to exercise my too active dog, has turned in to a bit of an obsession. We are currently taking 4 classes a week, 2 at Port Chester Obedience Training Club and 2 at Morris K-9 Campus.

Dog agility is much more complicated than I expected when I took my first class. Hank is really amazing (when he can focus), I struggle with my handling. I would like to compete someday, but we need to work on more than a few things before we even consider that.

Here's a look at where we are these days:

Hank vs. Anal Sacs

Do you express your dog's anal sacs? Did you even know that your dog has anal sacs and that they might need to be expressed?

The canine anal sacs are two organs around the anus that secrete small amounts of fluid that has a smell specific to your dog. The liquid is secreted during a normal bowel movement, urination and dog greetings (hence, the butt sniffing). If there is fluid build up in the sacs, dogs can often express them himself. When you see your dog scooting his butt on the floor or licking the area, he might be taking care of those glands.

However, if the sacs do not fully drain on their own (or with your dog's help) they must be expressed manually. Many people never need to know anything about this because their groomer will take care of it during a typical groom. Some dogs need their sacs expressed frequently and some never need it done.

Hank is low maintenance so he never gets professionally groomed. But, he clearly needs to have his anal sacs expressed right now. How do I know? For the past 2 days he has been licking his rear and he stinks. I mean he really stinks. He's been banned from the bedroom and on the trip to agility class yesterday he brought a really unpleasant odor to Lisa's car.

So it's off to the vet's today to get this taken care of. It is something that an owner can take do herself and their are plenty of videos online to teach you how to do it. I, however, do not have the stomach for it and can't even bring myself to watch one of the videos. I will probably look away when they do it.

I will bring hot dogs for Hank in an attempt to alleviate his stress, but knowing him it will be more stressful for me!