Making an informed choice about using a headcollar with your dog

Introduction

Talking about headcollars can be a touchy subject with some Reward Based Trainers as they can be seen as aversive or a punisher.  So, for what it’s worth here are my thoughts on the matter.

Every dog and handler pairing are different and come with different skills and limitations whether physically or, particularly with juvenile male dogs, mentally and emotionally limited.  The part of a dog’s brain that deals with impulse control and being able to ignore distractions isn’t fully physically formed until after 18 months of age.  So, for a large proportion of a young dog’s life we are trying to teach walking on a lead while they don’t have all the hardware to be able to deal with the situation.

In an ideal world we wouldn’t have to put a dog in a situation that we haven’t trained for, which would mean that we could train loose lead walking (LLW) with only a flat collar and clip lead all the time whilst building up the behaviour slowly at a rate that the dog can deal with.  We would also be able to start all puppies as soon as they are able to learn and build very slowly to the point where they are LLW geniuses.

In reality this is not possible all of the time for the vast majority of dog owners, myself included.  I have deadlines, other dogs to deal with, a full-time job, family commitments, household chores to deal with, and I also need some time for myself and to let my brain decompress.

We don’t all start from the same place with our dogs.  Some dogs come with issues and this makes LLW training much more challenging.  Some dogs are taken on at an older age and so have a lot of ‘unlearning’ to do before they are in a position to deal with learning to LLW.

The way that I deal with getting on with ‘life’ and not messing up my training is I use two ways of attaching myself to the dog. One way to train and the other for management when I feel the dog won’t be able to cope with a situation beyond the scope of their current level of training.

1. Training – Flat collar and short lead – I use a lead that is about a meter long so that there is not too much lead to work with when walking and using food rewards when training.
2. Management – Front clip harness and double ended lead – I use this for young pups and small dogs, who are not committed pullers, to manage the dog when I have to take them to places where their training is not sufficient and they will not be able to manage themselves properly or I have a time pressure so I cannot train properly.
3. Or Management – Headcollar and short lead – I use this for dogs who cannot be controlled safely on a front clip harness either because they are too strong or if their brain is too fried to be able to deal with being managed in a harness.

 

Safety is the most important thing when walking your dog on the lead.  For you, your dog and for the community around you.  As far as I am concerned there is no point having a dog on a lead unless you can physically control the dog in a challenging situation.  Life is not predictable and even if we try not to over face our dogs, sometimes the unexpected happens and we need to be able to deal with that safely.

Safety for the handler – as a handler you need to look after your own safety, I have dealt with many clients who have shoulder and back injuries due solely to their dog lunging on the lead.  If you have a large, rambunctious, or reactive dog, who you struggle to control, then headcollars reduce the ability of the dog to pull as hard because you are attached to the weakest part of the dog’s body.  See below for more info on headcollars.  For smaller or more easily controllable dogs then a two-point harness may give you enough control to be physically safe and comfortable when managing your dog.  This is especially important for large breed dogs as a lady, in the town where I used to live, tragically died when her dogs pulled her over and she broke her neck.

Safety for the dog – some dogs lunge at cars, people, livestock, cats or other dogs and this can put them into dangerous situations if the handler cannot control them.

Safety for the community – a dog lunging at cars can cause a driver to lose focus on the road and possibly contribute to an accident.  Dogs lunging at people and other dogs can cause distress to those individuals, this can also trigger accidents as people or dogs try to avoid the lunging dog.

Comfort is also something that needs to be addressed.  Comfort for the dog and comfort for the handler.  This is where some people struggle with the choice to use a headcollar.  Some dogs prefer to wear a harness and indeed a lot of dogs find acclimatising to wearing a harness easier that to a headcollar, so this needs to be addressed if you choose to use a headcollar with your dog.

If you choose to use a headcollar with your dog it is very important to introduce the headcollar slowly and help your dog to have positive emotions towards wearing a headcollar.  This means in the long term they will be comfortable and happy to wear it.

Some dogs also need to have a lot of time spent habituating them to wearing a harness as they don’t like it initially.  Whichever management tool that you choose to use, you need to make sure that it is introduced in a way that your dog learns to be comfortable wearing it.  This is a video which shows how to introduce a headcollar to a dog so that they are happy to wear it.  It uses a particular brand but the principles work for any brand.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1wakterNyUg

Comfort for the handler is also important.  If a handler is very uncomfortable taking a dog for a walk on the lead, then it may impact the amount of exercise that a dog is given.  Many people have to walk a dog on a lead to and from their off-lead exercise.  Creating comfort for the handler also benefits the dog in the long term as they can generally be included into more family activities if they are easy to have on a lead.  Ultimately this will hopefully be with a trained dog walking on a collar and lead but in the short-term using an appropriate management tactic helps to reduce frustration for the dog and handler.

1 – Training

I am not going to focus here on training LLW as there is far too much to cover.  Suffice to say that I spend as much time as I can teaching on and off lead heelwork so that I can ultimately walk my dogs on a flat collar and clip lead everywhere.

The purpose of this missive is to look at the pros and cons of the different management strategies available to us while our dog currently does not have the education or ability to LLW successfully.

2- Harnesses

I like to use a two-point connection for LLW management with a puppy and also for dogs who only need minimal intervention to manage their lead walking.  There are some harnesses on the market which specifically have d-rings at the front to aid this.  Others don’t have a d-ring but do have a metal ring joining the pieces at the front which can also be used for the front lead clip.

The Trixie Premium H Harness is a cheap and cheerful one that works well and doesn’t absorb too much water like a lot of the padded harnesses do.  When fitting a harness, you need to be sure that the belly strap is

well clear of the ‘armpit’ area.  I like the belly strap to be at least 5cm (2”) back from the front leg when standing.   When using a padded harness be aware of the width of padding between the dog’s front legs.  If you have a narrow chested dog the chest pad may rub as it is pushed from side to side as the dog is walking.

 

 

Rogz also do a similar product but with a front d-ring

 

 

 

 

 

Any harness that has a bar across the chest isn’t great for a dog as it inhibits the front leg movement.  Something like this style.

 

 

 

 

 

Equally the type of harness that tightens across the front of the dog should also be avoided especially with pups as it can mess up their front-end development.  Anything like this.

 

 

 

 

I also avoid harnesses like this style as it pulls in the armpit area as the lower portion tightens and can potentially cause irritation to the bicep muscle attachment.

 

 

 

 

 

This video gives a bit of an overview of using a double ended lead and harness.  I tend to have the back attachment part of the lead in the hand closest to the dog and the front attachment part of the lead in my other hand so that it makes steering the dog and doing about turns much simpler.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xrqpd55I2Es

 

3- Headcollars

 

So, to the controversial topic!  These are my conclusions from using headcollars for the last 20 years with many different client’s dogs and my own dogs.  They are not exhaustive by any means but I will try and explain why I have come to these conclusions as I go on.

As with harnesses there are headcollars that cause different amounts of discomfort to the dog.  A rope figure-8 lead can cause a lot of rubbing on a dog’s nose and it has a small area of pressure due to the rope being round.  Together with the rope being thick, it sits in the dog’s eye line and so many dogs really find this type of headcollar very unpleasant.

Dogs have very different head shapes so it is very important that you pick the best type of headcollar for your dog.  This may mean trying several different types before finding one that works for you and your dog.

 

 

In general, larger dogs can use headcollars that attach under the chin or from behind the head.

Small and medium dogs tend to do better with the ones that attach behind the head as the angle of pull on the lead is too vertical for the below the chin attachments to work well.  The angle of pull on the lead tends to make the straps push up into the dog’s eye.  Also, they find getting a foot over the lead very easy.

 

Behind the head attachment headcollars

There are two brands that I recommend to my clients – Canny Collar and SWAG headcollar.  Each have pros and cons.  I am not affiliated with any of the brands mentioned in this post, they are just the ones that I have found best to use as most dogs seem to accept them well.  They also loosen very quickly when pressure is removed.

Canny Collar Pros

• Very easy to go from collar to headcollar when a dog is able to walk on a collar sometimes but not always.
• Only one strap around the face so less intrusive than some headcollars
• Face strap is flat so that it doesn’t interfere with the dog’s vision
• Face strap releases very easily so that it remains slack if the dog chooses not to pull.

Canny Collar Cons

• It can be a bit tricky to get the hang of putting the nose strap on
• The nose strap can fall off if it gets too slack so it needs to be monitored
• They are a bit of a faff to put on and take off, a bit bulky to fit into pockets

 

SWAG Headcollar Pros

• Once you have mastered the technique, they are very quick and easy to put on
• The nose strap is flat and padded
• They release well when the dog chooses not to pull
• Small enough to fit in your pocket when not in use

 

SWAG Headcollar Cons

• The dog can back out of it if you don’t use a Houdini strap. Only relevant for some dogs
• The company is small so sometimes it takes time to get your order delivered.

 

Under the chin attachment headcollar for larger dogs with long noses

Dogmatic Headcollar – Pros

• These ones seem to fit dogs best and they don’t seem to ride up into the dog’s eye like some of the other brands

 

Dogmatic Headcollar – Cons

• There are quite a lot of straps on the dog’s face which some dogs don’t like.

 

I don’t have a lot of experience with the under the chin attachment headcollars as I have found that more dogs deal better with the behind the head attachment ones.

 

How do headcollars work?

 

Basically, headcollars take the force of the pull onto the bridge of the nose rather than the neck or chest of the dog.

Some types will pull the nose towards the chest and others tend to pull the head around towards the handler.

Some headcollars tighten and some don’t.  If they do have a tightening action then they need to release very quickly when the pressure is removed.

There is a lot of debate surrounding headcollars as to how unpleasant it is for the dog when there is force going through the nose area.  Nobody can tell exactly what it feels like and the response to the headcollar acting on the dog’s face is very wide in its expression.  Some dogs will shut down because they dislike the feel of it so much, other dogs will not show any signs of being at all bothered by the experience.  Most dogs fall somewhere in between which is why it is best to take your time introducing the headcollar gradually and letting the dog acclimatise to wearing it before using it to manage lead walking.

One other thing that I think can be misunderstood is sometimes dogs are walking along fine wearing a headcollar and then suddenly react and start fighting the headcollar.  Mostly this happens when you are walking along and the dog has accepted wearing the headcollar but then wants to go to a distraction, the headcollar stops them from being able to do what they have always been able to do and they react and fight the control.  I have also seen this happen with a two-point harness, the dog reacts and fights the handler’s ability to stop them from doing what they want to do.

To help a dog cope with the loss of control I do a lot of teaching them about boundaries and how to disengage from interesting things in a context that is not on a lead.  Susan Garrett’s Crate Games Online is a really good, step by step introduction to boundaries, self-control and impulse control which helps to support the dog learning that the lead is a boundary.

Dogs learn to do a behaviour when it is productive.  If lunging on a lead is productive, they will continue to do it.  If you have a strong lunger they can get quite a bit closer to their objective if they lunge in either a collar or even a two-point harness.  Using a headcollar stops lunging from being productive as the handler can control the dog’s access to a distraction because the dog cannot pull so hard.

People often ask me why a head collar works if it isn’t aversive to the dog.  I think that this is a major reason.   Using a headcollar can support LLW training because it interrupts the successful lunging, creating a space to reinforce better choices.  I use headcollars as a prevention mechanism rather than to create unpleasantness for the dog.  I am aware that they may not be their favourite thing to wear but I make sure that they are sufficiently OK wearing it that they are not massively stressed by it and they don’t avoid putting it on.  I will also reward them when they are walking on a loose lead whilst wearing a headcollar.

As a dog’s LLW education increases then I use the headcollars less and less as they are capable of managing themselves better.

The other area that I use them is when I am starting out teaching two dogs to walk in tandem.  I struggle to use a two-point harness when I have two dogs on one side of me so in the early days both dogs will wear headcollars and then whichever dog can manage themselves on the collar will then transition to just being on a collar.

When I walk a trained dog and a dog whose LLW is a work in progress, together I feel that it is no fun for the trained dog to be constantly stopping for the inexperienced dog.  If we are on the way somewhere then I will start both dogs on a collar but if the inexperienced dog is struggling to maintain a loose lead, then I will put them in a headcollar so that we can all get where we are going.

I also do train them together on collars when we aren’t going anywhere so that they are educated about working in tandem with another dog.

Sometimes I need a brain break, I need to exercise the dogs but don’t have it in me to train them, so I will also use management then too.  It is OK to sometimes prioritise the human’s emotions over the dog’s emotions.  In all relationships we all have to compromise at different points.  Most of the time I do the best for the dog, sometimes I need to do what is best for me.  I have previously taken the time to habituate the dogs to headcollars so that it doesn’t stress them out too much when they have to wear them, so they deal with it and keep on keeping on.  They generally get to free run as part of the exercise so it is a means to an end for them.

Everyone must make their own judgment call about their own ethics when training dogs.  Let’s be kind to one another when people make different calls than we do.  Their circumstances are different to yours and if you were in an identical situation, you may very well make the same choices.  We cannot know what is in other people’s lives so let’s be generous and assume that they are doing the best they can with the resources and abilities that they have at the moment.

For a while I had a huge amount of back pain and even a small amount of pulling on a lead was excruciating for me.  I used a headcollar with my dogs all the time as they could have put me in hospital with even a small amount of lunging.  Now my back pain is largely gone so I use headcollars less now than I did.  Circumstances change and we need to be flexible.

I use headcollars but I am aware that they are not the most pleasant thing for most dogs so I work hard to make them as positive as possible and use them for as little time as possible.

Hopefully this has given you a bit more information in order that you can make an informed choice as to whether you want to use a headcollar with your own dog.