Now before you get all angry with me, let me just say upfront, that some shock collar rehabilitation is cruel. The dog has no idea why he is being shocked and the behavior gets worse, rather than getting any better.
Some breeds however, like Oreo, being a pit bull, are stubborn. I did the normal training six week of boot camp with him. Taught him all the verbal and hand commands to sit, come, stay, and heel. But as I have shared on other blog posts, Oreo loves to run away. And I don’t mean down the block. I don’t mean out of the subdivision. I mean he escapes to the next county.
When I had my knee replacement surgery, it was impossible to walk him on a leash as long as I was walking him before the surgery. He hated being on a six foot short leash, and the retractable leash allowed him to wrap around trees and telephone poles. I was desperate for an alternative.
I knew about the shock collars to discourage barking. I did not know that Pat Pet makes a variety of “behavior modification” collars.
There are various upgrades based on your needs: there are waterproof collars for dog’s like Oreo that will jump into a stream without a moments notice; there are various distance collars that will work regardless of how far your furry friend likes to wander. The one I chose for Oreo is the PatPet 1000. It has three different settings: a tone, a vibration, and then a shock. In Oreo’s case, I would hit the “tone” button first. If he did not respond, I would go to the “vibration” setting. When all else failed, and only then, would I hit the “shock” button. The great part about this product is that it has various levels of function, i.e. 1 being the lowest or loudest, in the case of the tone or the vibration. And the shock level can go up to 30. In Oreo’s case, I think after a while, he actually liked the feel of the shock. I don’t know if it was a leftover from his pit bull fighting ring days, but the use of the collar after time stopped working and I was no longer getting the results I desired. Also, make sure you get the collar that has the type of strap that will stay on. Oreo was a regular Houdini in getting it to come off on some branch in the woods. I preferred the collar that actually has the design like a belt buckle that you can make as tight as you want.
In the end, it is a very personal choice whether to use this kind of collar or not. Having eight dogs with unique personalities requires us to decide what works best for each one. For Oreo, he has severe separation anxiety. The biggest punishment I can ever dole out to him is separating him from me, or his pack. The other day, once again he took off into the woods after a deer and I could not locate him for over thirty minutes. No matter how much whistling or clapping or calling his name, he was not coming back. I said something to the effect of “have a nice life Oreo. I hope they feed you”. I turned around and walked back to my car. By the time my hand hit the car handle, Oreo was at my feet. He got reprimanded severely for his behavior. That translates into a few carefully administered slaps to his bottom. He tried to apologize, trying to come under my arm and nudge me. The more I ignored him, the more distraught he appeared. Maybe he will remember that the next time he wants to run away?
