Dog Training and Pinch Collars

I've never had to resort to using a pinch collar on any dog I've handled. Keeping a normal collar snug and high up under the jaw line has always allowed me to give an occasional quick correction with gratifying results.

That being said, I realize that I have more arm strength and experience than the average dog owner, and for some folks a pinch collar may be a temporary necessary equalizer when they own one of the medium to large size hyper-active breeds. The pinch collar should be a last resort and a temporary installment. If you train correctly for at least ten minutes a day, your dog should become perfectly controllable under a normal collar and leash within a week and the pinch collar should be discontinued.

The key to ridding yourself and your dog of this "owners crutch" is in learning how to give effective, sharp, short leash corrections. The collar should be snug enough to stay high up under the jaw line and still allow your dog to breath comfortably. There should be enough room that you can easily slip two fingers between the collar and the throat without putting any pressure on the dog's windpipe. Leash corrections should be at a sharp upward angle, not to the side. They should be a very rapid jerk upward and then instant release of tension. You can't do this with a stretchy leash and you certainly can't do it with one of those cheesy twenty foot leashes on a retracting reel. The Illusion collar from Cesar Millan was designed to keep the collar in this position, but I don't recommend it...I've tried one and it doesn't work very well, even though the concept behind it was brilliant.

A good correction technique, once developed, should never be used in conjunction with a pinch collar. If you are doing corrections right, and you have a pinch collar on your dog, the correction will result in aerly severe amount of pain for your dog. I don't care what the so-called "pinch collar experts" and manufacturers say about the lack of nerves in a dog's neck. I've seen too many people add pinch collars and then apply normal leash corrections and it's obvious to me that it results in a high level of pain for their dogs.