Harnesses

A harness is a restraint and for most dogs just tends to teach them to pull.

We don't recommend a harness for teaching loose leash walking.

If you think about it.. police dogs have harnesses, sled dogs have harnesses, mountain dogs that pull carts have harnesses. Harnesses teach dogs to pull. 

So in some instances we use this to our advantage.

Puppies under 16weeks we recommend the use of a harness so that it is just management and they are not learning to pull on their collar. Until they are ready to start basic obedience training.

If a dog already has an existing neck injury and for some small dogs we may use a harness but it is not necessary to use a harness with all small dogs.

We use harnesses to help teach a restrained recall. Some dogs just lope their way on over to their owners when called. To make coming to you sooo much more exciting we teach a restrained recall. 

In the following video the handler is just holding onto the dog but it can be much easier with a harness and just restraining the dog http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0yMw3RdrFxQ

There are many different types of harnesses available.

Standard harness that we recommend for use just as management and to restrain should look like this one...

 There are other types of harnesses like this easy walk harness to the left.
For a dog with a soft personality this can work as management for some dogs that can help limit the strain on you when pulling. It does not stop pulling and you will not be able to take it off and the dog still walk nicely.

There are many other harnesses available that are supposed to stop pulling as well. Again all of these are management tools that can help with pulling on a soft personality dog. But will not stop pulling altogether.