Skyhoundz Feature Articles

For years, titling regimes have existed for canines. “Challenging” might be the operative word to describe the myriad canine training tasks in which a canine can title. However, for canines, the word “drudgery” might be a bit more on point. After all, how interesting can sitting still for a whole minute, walking in figure eights on a short leash, carrying a metal object in your mouth, or heeling, be for an athletic and intelligent canine? Has anyone ever seen a canine “smile” when performing any of the aforementioned tasks? We checked with our 8-ball prognosticator on the matter and it responded with a hearty “my sources say no.”

Author—Jeff Perry

“Butterlips,” “The Drops,” “In-and-Out Syndrome,” “Brick Jaws,” “Rejectus Mouthus,” whatever you may call it, missed discs are the scourge of disc dog enthusiasts. For many disc doggers, the onset of “The Drops” is gradual, while for others, it may seem to happen overnight. Most canine disc enthusiasts experience it at some point in the lives of their canines in varying degrees. If you are one of those folks with a disc dog that misses often, and you’ve tried everything in the book to fix the problem, to no avail, your salvation may be closer than you think.

An excerpt from Disc Dogs! The Complete Guide by Peter Bloeme and Jeff Perry, Co-founders of Hyperflite, Inc.

Getting started in canine disc sports means finding the perfect dog. If you already have a dog, then congratulations are in order. Your family pet is a perfect companion for canine disc play. That may seem like a surprising statement. But, if you are like most dog owners then right at your feet sits a loving companion that wants to please you and likely prefers your company to just about anything with notable exceptions reserved for food, water and an occasional romantic inkling toward the opposite sex.

Now is the winter of our discontent — surely Shakespeare must have been a disc dogger. The approach of cold weather is a sad thing indeed for those who desire to bond with their canines via a well-thrown flying disc. You may think that it’s pretty much the same with all disc sports, but disc doggers actually have a more difficult time of it when old-man winter squats on the playing field. Why? Let me paint a picture for you. Imagine that it’s midwinter in Chicago and there’s a breeze blowing off the lake.

A national pastime is a sport or game that is considered to be an intrinsic part of the culture of a nation — so says that vast storehouse of collective knowledge called Wikipedia. Almost every country has a national pastime even if they don’t always officially declare one.

Not surprisingly, in Norway, where there’s snow aplenty, the national sport is cross-country skiing. In the Bahamas, where there’s water around every corner, sailing is the official sport of the masses. In China, the sport of billions is table tennis. Canada has two sports. It’s hockey in the winter, and lacrosse in the summer.

Maty, the amazing three-legged wonder dog, belonging to Troy Kerstetter and Lynne Ouchida, of Bend, Oregon, is coming to a theater near you… that is, if you vote for her! The two-time Skyhoundz World Finalist, and animal shelter spokescanine from Bend, Oregon is lobbying for a role in a movie called Lucky and Rich. If successful, Maty will play the role of Scrap in a cinema treat directed by Geoff Talbot. Do your part and help Maty make it to the silver screen. To see images of Maty in action, click here. Click here and select Maty as your favorite. But hurry, voting ends on July 31, 2009.

There is nothing like a little scare to pull your head out of the clouds and make you focus on more important things. And so it was just a few days after the Hyperflite Skyhoundz World Championship that we learned that one of the canine disc competitors who competed in the 2010 Worlds, Mark Muir (the 2009 Skyhoundz World Champion in both the Open and Sport Divisions) had suffered a mini-stroke, known as a TIA. Fortunately, Mark, a firefighter, fell ill at work and was immediately attended to by folks who deal with such situations for a living.

What in heck is a Thundershirt? No, it’s not the preferred garment of the latest cinema superhero, or a body builder’s lifting uniform. What it is might surprise you…especially if you have a dog that is terrified of thunderstorms, fireworks, and other loud noises. In fact, if the Thundershirt performs as advertised, it might just make life with your “canine coward,” a bit more tolerable when nature rumbles.

Myth 1: Food treats are the only way to teach a dog to play with the disc.
Truth: Food treats are almost never used to teach a canine to catch and retrieve a flying disc. The only reward your dog will need…is another throw from you!

Myth 2: Flying discs are expensive and don’t last long.
Truth: In the early days of the sport, discs were viewed as disposable, but that philosophy proved costly for many enthusiasts. Owners of the hardest-biting dogs might go through hundreds of discs per year. However, with the introduction of Hyperflite’s Jawz disc — the world’s toughest canine competition disc — even the toughest biting canines can now enjoy canine disc play affordably.

Walter Frederick Morrison, 90, inventor of the plastic version of the flying disc, passed away on February 9, 2010. He was 90-years old — or 19 in dog years. Every kid who has ever thrown a disc in a park owes a debt of gratitude to Mr. Morrison for his foresight. But many dogs owe him much more. You see, the ubiquitous flying disc — known to many as the Frisbee — is much more than a toy to millions of eager canines. It is, a profound source of joy, an object of desire, and the glue that has cemented the bond between canine and human for decades. Morrison may not have realized, as he hawked his plastic discs on California beaches, that canines would come to revere the plastic flying disc even more than humans. Today, no person of reasonable intelligence would deny this truism.