# what are good alternatives for a prong collar?



## Phoebes (Jul 14, 2012)

I'd like to follow a recommendation to give my dog a break from using a prong collar, and would like to get some suggestions on what might have the best chance of working out. 

My boy has his moments where he's good but he gets distracted easy and gets pretty rowdy. He's a 9 months and 75lbs GSD. He has his moments where he lunges forward and pulls like crazy. Different things set him off, it could be a dog, it could be a leaf... and sometimes he jumps on people, like my mom. He jumps on her repeatedly like a crazy ninja pup, I think trying to get her to play but he really needs to learn thats not ok. I need to work on his attention, his focus... There's a lot I need to work on, it's a long daunting list, so I need to get my hands on better tools. 

I've been told to try a martingale and I was looking at the easy walk harness and the gentle leader headcollar online.

He will pull even with the prong, sometimes he ignores it's on, though it may be that the way his ex-trainer fit it was wrong, she left it on pretty loose. 

My guess is he'll ignore the martingale (because he will sometimes ignore the prong) so I'm leaning on the easy walk and would like to hear what you guys think or if there's some cons or if it could cause harm to my pup in anyway that I should look into anything else.


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## gsdraven (Jul 8, 2009)

I would go with the martingale and easy walk together to give you more control if he really does lunge and pull that much.

With a martingale, you can hook your leash to both the martingale and the front hook on the easy walk. He would feel most of the pressure on his neck which will help move toward getting off the easy walk but the added control have the easy walk controlling his front end.


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## Jag (Jul 27, 2012)

Please don't put a head collar on a dog that's acting like that. It could damage his neck. Take some links out of your prong to make it fit snugly. I also use a martingale, but ONLY when he's not acting like a fool. I think the main problem is you've never been using the prong correctly, so you've never really seen the benefits of it.


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## gsdraven (Jul 8, 2009)

Jag, you were one of the ones who suggested in the OP's other thread to give the prong collar a break. The OP needs to focus on rebuilding the trust between themself and their dog and right now, the corrections will not do that since an inappropriate prong correction is what caused the issue to begin with.


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## Phoebes (Jul 14, 2012)

Jag said:


> Please don't put a head collar on a dog that's acting like that. It could damage his neck. Take some links out of your prong to make it fit snugly. I also use a martingale, but ONLY when he's not acting like a fool. I think the main problem is you've never been using the prong correctly, so you've never really seen the benefits of it.


I thought so. I've seen it on dogs often and I read what the package says but kept picturing it on and didn't like the idea of it. 
I'll get help on how to fit this thing right, maybe that'll do it...


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## Phoebes (Jul 14, 2012)

gsdraven said:


> Jag, you were one of the ones who suggested in the OP's other thread to give the prong collar a break. The OP needs to focus on rebuilding the trust between themself and their dog and right now, the corrections will not do that since an inappropriate prong correction is what caused the issue to begin with.


thanks for clearing that up for me.


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## Jag (Jul 27, 2012)

gsdraven said:


> Jag, you were one of the ones who suggested in the OP's other thread to give the prong collar a break. The OP needs to focus on rebuilding the trust between themself and their dog and right now, the corrections will not do that since an inappropriate prong correction is what caused the issue to begin with.


Oops! :blush: My short term memory issues are showing. Sorry. Ignore my other post, except when you go back to the prong just make sure it's fitted properly. I do like the martingale, though.


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## JakodaCD OA (May 14, 2000)

I get my martingales from 
The Ultimate Leash

He is now a vendor here, and I absolutely LOVE my martingales from him..clip on vs over the head, nice designs, sturdy..


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## Jag (Jul 27, 2012)

That's where I got mine, too. I really like the metal buckle. Of course, when I went to the website I found I REALLY needed to have the Ultimate Leash, too!


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## doggiedad (Dec 2, 2007)

i think you should find a trainer.


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## Phoebes (Jul 14, 2012)

gsdraven - I'm very impressed you caught that!

Jag- yes definitely, I figured that's what you meant  

Jakoda - thanks! so now they have a new customer! 

doggiedad- yes, not getting a new trainer isn't an option. But I still need to interact with my dog while I get that sorted. In the meantime I'm working with a stressed out, fearful dog due to having hired a very old school trainer the first time around. I'm not tackling anything crazy with him: just focus work, socializing & practicing in a group obedience class, some nosework games, walking (because really we need that for everyday) and reviewing the commands he already knows.


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## doggiedad (Dec 2, 2007)

i didn't know you had a trainer. outside of class how much
time are you spending on training? are you usuing distractions
when training? i'm thinking whatever it is your dog is reacting
to incorporate that into your training as a distraction.


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## MadLab (Jan 7, 2013)

How about a good regular leather collar. You don't need better equipment imo. You need to learn how to control a young excited dog. 



> he jumps on people, like my mom. He jumps on her repeatedly like a crazy ninja pup


Can i rephrase that. You let the dog repeatedly jump on your mother.

Like many others you observe you dogs behavior rather acting to control it. Generally an experienced handler would not let these problems arise. You basically need to learn much more about working breeds, pack structure and how to train dogs. You got the GSD now you need to learn how to control it. I recommend reading some books on dog training. You will hopefully learn how a dog thinks/learns and then satisfy it's needs and your own needs a lot better.


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## JackandMattie (Feb 4, 2013)

There are far more experienced trainers on here. What am I saying, I'm not even a trainer. I'm a rescuer and my dogs are primarily pets.

That said, they travel with me and I have a pack of three, so I have to be able to control them under all types of circumstances.

I had my dogs on prongs, which is what we had always used on all the GSDs we had while I was growing up. We had raised and trained all of them from pups, though. My current dogs were all adopted after they were grown, or at least into adolescence.

The prongs just weren't working. It had worked with my weimaraner when she was my only dog, but when I added the two GSDs it became a constant pulling match, and I only weigh about 125, whereas they weigh over twice that all together. Talk about chaos.

I swallowed my experienced dog owner pride and sent the two younger ones off to a 3-week residency training clinic that uses an e-collar.

There is an awful lot of criticism out there, and I'm braced for it. But for my dogs and me, it has been an excellent solution.

My Jack contantly pulled and choked himself on the prong, but a quick tap of the vibrate function on the e-collar works a charm with him. He is so averse to the stimulation that I never even have had to move the dial up or try the shock button. One quick tap and I have his attention. Now, that's not to say that we still don't have a long way to go with our training, but I have a gained a great deal of peace of mind.

And I'm not contantly tangled up in leashes any longer, lol! That was a nightmare. They all walk into new hotels off-leash, wearing their backpacks now, and it's quite a sight. People love it, and the dogs *love* the attention they get for being so well-behaved!


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## TxFig (Feb 26, 2012)

I don't know who it was above who said "find a trainer" - but this was excellent advice. Not to train your dog - to train YOU (don't be offended, 90% of all training is training the person).

Your problem is not the collar type (IMHO, you're using the correct one), but rather, in how you are using it.


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## Moshamoon (Jan 10, 2013)

I have a 2 year old GSD, and have struggled with finding the correct tools. The easy walker harness was a bust. My girl would get so excited when she saw a person, she would pull and the harness would squeeze her shoulders (as it is designed to do). One time she jumped up and when she came down she fell because she did not have good control of her front legs with the squeezing.

I used a pronge for a while, but it became an irritant to her mainly because I did not time my corrections well. I am now using a martingale, and I love it. I am also doing more engagement training at the same time. I was thinking of a haulty collar, but I think that would really bother her since she doesn't like having her muzzle messed with. Any thoughts? Thanks.

Person in training!


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## Phoebes (Jul 14, 2012)

Doggiedad - It's ok and thanks for your advice. Outside of class I work with my dog 3 or 4 times a day, a little bit more on weekends but I do short sessions. I do distractions but with mixed results, so maybe I may be doing something wrong there. It's very much a work in progress. 

MadLab - I can safely say that you're making some wrong assumptions here. I'm reading books and watching videos and that's part of why I'm here - to learn from other's experiences about what works and what doesn't. Ironically, our ex-trainer told us that my dog's mouthing and jumping are just a phase and we just need to wear protective clothing and wait it out. I've wanted to be proactive about it so I looked for different ways to discourage these unwanted behaviors. You can't rephrase it, my dog jumps on my mom repeatedly but I think the only time I let him jump on her was when I recorded a video of it. We've tried different things, and will continue to do so until he learns. Hopefully his new trainer will help us figure out what to do to get through to him more effectively.

JackandMattie - your experience counts for a lot.  I was just commenting with a friend about trainers we've dealt with who promote disposable dog practices. My extrainer would tell people to get rid of their current dogs and talk them into buying a puppy from one of her contacts instead of helping them. She lost major points with me and my friend says his trainer would do the same thing so I hope it's more coincidence than a common practice but I take my hat off to rescuers. I have 2 rescues but they're small dogs and easier to handle. The GSD is my first real dog challenge. Actually I really appreciate your words about the e-collar and they are very well timed. That's what the new trainer I spoke to recommends using in our case, like you do on vibrate mode. The extrainer would talk about starting dogs out on the ecollar on the highest shock setting and that wasn't sitting well with me so I'm glad to hear you have good results with it. I'm in a similar boat with my dog, he's 75lbs and growing and I'm 110lbs 

TxFig - you're absolutely right. That's what I learned the hard way. I hope there's a sticky note somewhere about how important it is to have a trainer teach us how to handle our dogs. Our extrainer wanted control over all the training and would refuse to answer questions. I practiced him against her instructions. I didn't realize how stressed and exhausted that was making me until I fired her.

Moshamoon - oh I don't know! well someone further up below on this thread told me the haulty collar is a bad idea on these strong boys because it could hurt their necks. If your dog is fairly mellow then maybe it would be ok? But if she's really excitable as she sounds she is, it might cause her harm just from the way it makes them turn their head.


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## frillint1 (Sep 2, 2010)

I found this video it may be of some help. I do not use a prong collar, but most people I know just stick the collar on and go for a nice long walk. This seems like a good way to introduce it. Maybe I am wrong. Just thought I would throw it in there. For my puller I use a regular collar with a sensation harness and I clip the collar and harness together.


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## Thesilentone (Jan 5, 2013)

I know there are wrong ways and then the correct way of using a prong collar. Personally, I am getting one for my own dog as I think he will respond better to one. It all depends on how you have the prong collar on and how you use it. I found this to be pretty insightful: Leerburg Dog Training | How to Fit a Prong Collar I've seen these collars used incorrectly before, one time I saw an Akita wearing one that was way too loose around it's neck and the owners had no clue that the links came off so you could adjust it to your dog's neck size. That's why they aren't effective because many people don't know how to use them on their dogs.


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## LuvMyDog_Worldwide (Jul 23, 2011)

Thesilentone said:


> I know there are wrong ways and then the correct way of using a prong collar. Personally, I am getting one for my own dog as I think he will respond better to one. It all depends on how you have the prong collar on and how you use it. I found this to be pretty insightful: Leerburg Dog Training | How to Fit a Prong Collar I've seen these collars used incorrectly before, one time I saw an Akita wearing one that was way too loose around it's neck and the owners had no clue that the links came off so you could adjust it to your dog's neck size. That's why they aren't effective because many people don't know how to use them on their dogs.


 
Don't assume because there's a video it's right..........


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## Thesilentone (Jan 5, 2013)

LuvMyDog_Worldwide said:


> Don't assume because there's a video it's right..........


I wasn't assuming anything, I was just mentioning how i've seen the prong collar used incorrectly.. I didn't need a video to see that. I also think the prong collar effectiveness will vary per dog.


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