How bad is ball chasing for labs hips ?

[babyblackbird]

My working lab is nearly 16 months. We've been very careful with his exercise, stairs , adhering as much as possible to the 5 min rule, etc But recently he has been chasing a tennis ball thrown from a ball launcher for the whole of his first off lead walk of he day ( about an hour). He absolutely gallops after it and skids , turns, and flips in his effort to catch it. I've begun feeling uncomfortable about it and the effect on his hips. Although we took all precautions ie hip scores of both parents, and all the things mentioned above I'm wondering if this is bad for him, but he loves it SOOOO much that he would feel very hard done by if I withdrew the ball.

Is this bad for his hips or am I just being a worry wort for no reason .....?

It's not great for his hips, nor the rest of his joints ... It's also not giving him any mental exercise and you could end up with a complete ball-obsessive who's not interested in anything else.

A bit of ball throwing is fine but I'd keep it to a few throws at a time and not every walk at that. We do lots of hide and seek games - I get my dog to stay, then hide the ball in long grass or undergrowth and tell him to 'find it' - he absolutely loves that and it tires him out much more effectively than just manic chasing after a ball. Personally I'd ditch the chucker too - it's much better to keep him near you than to encourage him to go haring off into the distance

Thanks for reply. I know you are right. Sadly I have slightly resorted to the chucker mainly because that is the only thing that keeps his interest on me. He is such an independent boy, hide and seek games don't seem to interest him and although he's never completely absconded he's quite happy to wander quite far .So recently I Introduced a ball to try and keep him focussed on me but now I'm worrying....

And you're right, I've noticed he's not interested in much else,although I have a lot of sympathy for him with that as he has been attacked badly twice as a young pup and even now growled and lunged at regularly that I think he's not interested in other dogs unless it's very obvious they are non threatening.

..... But despite all the shit he's taken from other dogs he's still got the most amazing temperament and even when growled at lunged at and pinned down he won't react and will submit or run away rather than pick a fight or defend himself.... So no wonder he'd rather chase a ball but don't want him to end up with knackered joints.

How about making him sit (hold collar if you need to) then chuck-it the ball before releasing him?

My boy loves his ball .But I tend to use it as a treat eg if been working round shops take his coat of and then has play with

Or recall treat found for him works far better than food

Very bad also really bad for his teeth. It will grind his teeth down like sand paper. Ball chasing tends to cause a huge adrenaline rush in dogs which is hard for them to deal with.

However if he is a good retriever you could do train gun dog retrieves to a dummy and hidden still target. Making him use his brain to retrieve rather than just running to a moving target. Teaching him directionals, stop commands etc to find the dummy will keep his mind going and also not be so hard on his joints.

Look up gun dog classes near you - he will love it