Obedience is as competitive as you make it. It can be practiced as something to keep dog and handler busy during the winter months or as serious as travelling to many trials per year to accumulate points towards national obedience dog rankings.

Purebred dogs can compete in many registries, but they must be registered with that organization to enter. See the Books & Links page for their websites.

CKC Obedience has several levels, from Pre-Novice to Utility.

The majority of the titles are awarded by gaining three qualifying scores at each level before progressing to the next. At the Master and Grand Master Obedience Champion levels, points must be accumulated in both the Open and Utility rings.

Heeling is on-leash and off-leash in Novice
(Marsha Meier and 'Torchy')

The next level is Open (Companion Dog Excellent - CDX). In addition to off-leash heeling, they retrieve a dumbell, drop on command on the recall and perform the sit and down while the owner is out of the room, or out of sight.

The last level is Utility (Utility Dog - UD). The dog performs more complex tasks such as retreiving a dropped glove, selecting scented articles, crossing the ring to sit and face the handler to take jumps as directed and performing a long, complicated heeling pattern taking only signals as commands.

Other non-required transitional levels are also available. They are Pre-Novice and Novice Intermediate, which is a step between Novice and Open.

Dogs must retrieve
two scented articles in Utility
(Donna LaHaise's 'Gambler')