A dog training collar is a solution to three critical problems you may encounter with your dog, amounting to housebreaking, incessant barking and command disobedience. It may be time for a training collar when you find some unacceptable behaviors with your puppy require eradication or critical voice commands do not work with your adult dog.
How do dog training collars work? Dog training collars in able hands are tools that work by helping you teach your dog to take bathroom breaks outside, not to bark relentlessly at unimportant things and to listen to your unquestionable commands once and obey.
Dog training collars are part of the negative reinforcement methodology of dog obedience training, which does inflict some level of discomfort (positive punishment) to the dog, withdrawing the discomfort (negative stimulus) the moment that the dog complies, thereby encouraging positive behavior.
We’re going to take a look at a variety of dog training collars that you could incorporate into your training routine to curb the above critical dog problems.
What Is A Training Collar For Dogs?
There are 7 different types of training collars, each with a behavioral vice it is designed to correct. They include the following: choke chains, prong collars, nylon collars, harnesses, Halti collars, shock collars and e-collars.
Choke Chains
These training collars are intended for training purposes only and not for daily wear. They are collars designed to teach your dog how to walk on a leash or to heel and obey your voice as the dog paces next to you. When your dog errs, you suddenly and softly tug the chain leash. The engineers designed this collar quickly to grasp the dog’s neck.
The grasping sensation alerts the dog to a critical change in its environment, which improves only through the dog’s obedience. This collar should not be used when leaving your dog unattended, as the dog may strangulate itself if caught somewhere and pressure around its neck is not released.
Prong Collars
These may appear cruel, but they are a significant improvement on a choke collar. Prong collars are more effective at evenly grasping a dog’s neck all along the circumference, thus to avoid misplacing pressure on the dog’s most delicate area around its throat. They are excellent for taming stubborn dog behavior.
Just like choke collars, you control prong collars using a leash. They have generated much controversy. The reason for the controversy is that prong collars consist of a series of flat-headed probes that close in on a dog’s neck, whose tightness cannot be measured and in extreme cases of abuse may be fatal. Consequently, they should be used only by trained hands when the dog is in sight.
Nylon Collars
This is a standard dog collar and it comes with a buckle or a hook to stay safely on a dog’s neck. They are usually fashionable and will show off your dog’s unique style. For a dog that is already responding to commands and being trained using a clicker or treats, it is ideal.
Make sure you use broad stripe, as too narrow a collar may cut into a dog’s skin if pulled too hard. In correcting the critical problems with your dog using a nylon collar, you can pull the leash and the collar should give only slight discomfort to your dog to tell it that whatever it is doing is not acceptable conduct. They, however, give a dog the chance to pull the leash and ultimately choke itself. Use only for moderately obedient dogs.
Harnesses
Harnesses lie across a dog’s chest and abdomen and they come in two types, the front clip harness and the back clip harness. The leash is placed at the top of the harness. Harnesses are perfect for dogs with long necks, a tendency to pull or a medical condition, such as spine injuries. You can pull the leash to get your dog’s attention, that it may obey your commands. However, they are not as effective as the average collar at training a dog, since they give a dog the freedom to pull.
Halti Collars
The Halti collar looks a lot like a saddle on a horse. It goes over the dog’s mouth and locks in tightly behind the head. The Halti collar is efficient in controlling a dog’s barking in that it turns the dogs head in the most unnatural way, causing the dog to behave properly to avoid the abnormal turn of events. However, this unnatural movement of the head can be an issue in untrained hands.
Shock Collars
These look like the standard nylon collar, but they are furnished with sensors which send vibrations and, in extreme cases, electric shock to a dog via remote control. The shock collar has vibration settings and is very effective in solving severe problems in overly excited dogs that have serious challenges concentrating.
If your dog goes to the bathroom right in your living room or barks uncontrollably, you press a button in a remote control device to activate probes in the collar that vibrate the moment your dog is in the act. If your dog doesn’t desist from this behavior, you set the vibrations one step higher until you begin to see the sought reaction. In untrained hands, however, a shock collar may cause unnecessary negative stimulus and the dog may become aggressive.
E-collars
E-collars are much like shock collars, except for the degree of control you have over a dog with them. They are more sophisticated and gentler on your dog. The e-collar is furnished with Wi-Fi and GPS tracking to help you monitor your dog location. They work as a virtual fence that can stimulate the dog to stay within a certain radius and not run away. They also have sensors that can tell you when there’s a change in your dog’s behavior. You will pay a hefty price for all these features. Here you can learn more about the difference between e-collars and shock collars.
What Are The Alternatives To Dog Training Collars?
Over the years, veterinary medicine has evolved and with it the argument that the use of discomfort-based aversive methods such as prong, chains and shock collars in dog training causes more harm than good. How else, however, could you get your dog to act acceptably, you may ask?
With an aversive method, you will get prompt responses to the basic ‘Sit’ ‘Stay’ commands. But can you achieve the same without using negative stimuli? Your dog, much like humans, will want to avoid grief and return to safety quickly, if it knows how. So, when it realizes the reason for any uncomfortable feeling is obedience to your commands, you will not need to carry on with your use of discomfort. Removal of reward is such an incentive.
However, if you do not want to use the proverbial whip on your dog, here is a few things that you can do.
- Ensure that your dog be not triggered by certain stimuli in your environment, such as passing cars, other animals, etc. This way you do not have to correct a behavior that may be avoidable.
- You can employ the use of harnesses, head halters or basket muzzles when your dog’s barking doesn’t stop. They come with user manuals and are quite comfortable for your dog. With practice and consistent commands, soon your dog will realize why its mouth is covered and stop the act that precipitates it. But this will take active training on your part.
- Enlist the help of a professional dog trainer. If your dog is full of fear or reactive, you may want to consider getting a professional dog trainer to show you the ropes and guide you on the best non-aversive ways to train your dog. Bear in mind, nonetheless, that not everyone who self-professes to be a professional dog trainer got trained from reputable institutions. Some got their training off the Internet and some others from dog movies. In that case, you will do better doing your own research.
- Take out time to study and learn dog behavior. There are many books and training DVDs and online courses dedicated to the use of positive and negative reinforcement techniques, even by dog breed. Many reputable authors have books that will teach you how to handle specific dog behaviors.
- Finally, speak to your veterinarian about changes that you notice in your dog’s demeanor. Your dog could be aggressive because of an infection or ailment that shows no symptoms. Similarly, your vet is more likely to direct you to a professional dog trainer when your dog’s aggressive conduct is cause for serious concern.
How To Use A Dog Training Collar Appropriately
By now you may have realized that you have the option to use non-aversive as well as aversive training to secure the behavior from your dog that you wish. Your pet may require nonetheless some aversive techniques if it is very stubborn and positive reinforcement proves too onerous for you.
But how do you reinforce good behavior without breaking the trust your dog has for you? Well, first you begin by understand not just what a training collar is but what is a good dog training collar. Then, you keep in mind the following.
Public outcry may have biased some negative reinforcement techniques, yet aversive methods do work for specific critical circumstances. Your dog needs a mixture of both dog training methods to turn into an obedient fellow. For this reason, use the training collar as instructed and do not deviate from the technique that the quality manufacturer describes for you to follow to make the training effective.
Dogs are creatures of passion. For example, when your dog is barking rather loudly, it will most likely not hear your command to stop. With a training collar, you can get its attention. It will react to you through negative stimuli in a way that your shouts won’t make possible. A dog training collar is only one instrument in a variety of tools that you may wish to consider using at a specific stage of your dog’s education process.
In itself, negative reinforcement is not evil. Aversion has its value in teaching a dog how best to behave, even while not being the only alternative. If you want to housebreak your dog, teach it to cease barking on command or to start listening to your instructions about jumping on anyone, running away or fighting with other animals, then a dog training collar is a worthwhile device to learn to use correctly to train your dog with it.