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Originally Posted by Britster  Jackson has slipped out of a Puppia harness as well as a nylon step-in harness and an Easy Walk harness. It's not even like he tries but he has gotten out of all of these on 3 separate occasions lol. It's definitely possible and I couldn't have made these any tighter or he would have been suffocated lol. Step-ins seem to cause the most problems for us. But luckily, I'm not too worried about it as he has a great recall and I just don't pull on it a certain way now (like if he's behind me and I pull for him to come forward, that's when it's slipped over his head). I still use Puppia basically every day. I have the leather Choke-Free and he has been unable to escape out of that yet. I'd still like to re-try the Buddy Belt one day... I may have to make some altercations as it seemed one size was too big and one was too small so I couldn't find a good size for him.
I use a tie out at my moms house because there's no fence and 3 acres. But I never leave him out there alone. It's a 50 foot line so he has lots of space. But usually, I wouldn't call it a "tie out" because I'll either be holding the other end of the leash or letting it drag while we play fetch.
I think Jackson, at 16lbs, MAY be able to pull off walking on a collar. He doesn't pull and he's a bigger dog. However, I still don't take chances. And I'd never use one on a tieout, because if he were to see something and take off after it, SNAP, that's his neck. I'd rather is be a harness for a big OR small dog on any sort of tie out.
I think the OP is trying to do the best she can with what she has! I know I had never heard of putting harnesses on dogs before until joining YT. I walked Jackson on a collar for the first week I had him. It just didn't seem all that common or normal to me until I started going to dog events and dog parks and online forums, etc. |
This is pretty much the exact boat as we are in.
Ellie chokes on collars. Easy enough to throw a harness on her and much safer. She slips out of step-ins/Easy Walks. I'm not at all comfortable using them and have gotten rid of them. Now we use the cheap ones from the petstore and as long as they aren't really loose, she does fine. I can tighten the step-ins as much as possible and they are still unsafe for her.
Rylee can slip out of the regular petstore type without trying. We are going to try another kind (which reminds me to measure him - sigh I need to get off my butt). I had him in a collar. Got a harness when he got kennel cough and the collar started making him choke. He walks terribly on collars too. So we'll see. A 15lb dog who isn't a huge puller and no history of tracheal issues, honestly I don't think there is much risk to use a collar. In fact, if they can slip out of their harness, then IMO a collar is much safer. Very tiny dogs, absolutely yes, harness. But the bigger ones, I'm just not convinced. I think a lot of times it may look like the collar caused an issue when really it just showed that there was an underlying problem. Many vets use collars on their own small dogs and notice most don't say a thing when an owner chooses a collar. Probably not quite as big a deal as what people have been led to believe.
For tie-outs, I don't like collars because of the snap factor. And for heavy pullers of any breed, I don't think it's all that healthy.