Yesterday, Red gave us a scare while on her tie out. She was attached to a tether where could she could be half on the grass and half on the driveway. As I was walking towards her, she did a jump/pull in my direction and the tether yanked her back. From what I could see, she fell back on her side/shoulder onto the pavement. She cried like I had never heard her cry before, it was terrifying!! She had done the same on other occassions but during those times, she was always on the grass and never cried out. My husband ran over and checked her all over to make sure there wasn’t swelling or that nothing had collapsed. Ultimately she was fine and went back to being her old hyper/jumpy self. But this time, she had clearly hurt herself because she tried to jump and pull while at the very end of her tether on the driveway.

We had her on a martingale collar but now I’m questioning if that was the wrong type of collar to use while on the tie out or maybe we should have used a harness instead? What are everyone’s thoughts? We do have a harness and the D-Ring is on the back (rather than the front). I didn't have her in the harness while on the tie-out because she escaped from her harness before. Red is just over 5 months old and she pulls A LOT. I know this is the sled dog instinct and I do realize that harnesses tend to encourage huskies to pull. But while I’m walking Red with the martingale collar, she will keep pulling and pulling and you can hear her literally coughing/hacking from the pull. I don’t know that she is even making the connection that pulling=discomfort. Here are my thoughts:
1. Martingale collar: I like the fact that this collar doesn’t stay taut when the dog isn’t pulling but for Red, she still pulls no matter what. So I’m not sure this type of collar is effective in training her not to pull. It's not convenient when I have to take this collar off but I'm more at ease knowing that there isn't a buckle for her to break.
2. Harness: I like that this doesn’t choke the dog but I don’t like that it encourages the pulling. I’m also leery of the fact that harnesses require buckles to put on and off (at least the ones I have seen all require the plastic buckle). My sister has a couple of schnauzers and they have gone through so many buckle harnesses already because the buckles became loose and her dogs were able to pull them apart and run loose in the street while on a walk.
3. I came across the “Freedom No Pull Harness” and “SENSE-ation™ harness” Has anyone tried using these to train their husky to not pull? Any success and how has the buckle held up for you? For the “SENSE-ation™ harness”, has anyone tried attaching this harness to an existing collar and if so, does it seem to work/fit well?
4. Do you use a harness or collar while your husky is on a tie out? Any recommended brands? Maybe I could use our existing Martingale collar along with the SENSE-ation harness both for security and to keep her from choking herself directly around the neck?
5. Choke / Prong collar: I know some folks said that they have had success with these but again I am leery of these seeing as Red already pulls to the point of making herself cough. I think she would end up severely hurting herself on these types of collars before she learns not to pull. Besides, she’s still young right now and I guessing that her urge to pull would be stronger now than when she is much older.

Red is my first husky (first dog too). My husband has had huskies before but his work hours are a lot longer than mine so Red spends most of her time with me. Any suggestions/help that anyone can give me would be so appreciated! Besides, it wouldn’t hurt for my husband to get some viewpoints from other husky owners as well.

I know there are a few here that swear by the freedom no pull harness or the easy walk. There are some others here who swear by the prong. My suggestion for the tether is to get a sturdy collar. I am not a fan of the martingales. When Miya was young we did have her tethered with just a collar and she did the same thing. She no longer gets tethered, I will go out with her instead.

With all of that said, I think, imho, that you need to focus on leash training and proper leash etiquette. It does sound like you have enough property to train there, training Red to focus on you, and to behave on leash, and other commands. My story is different in that I trained on leash until Miya was around 6 months old. Then we did other things. Taking her to places had been a nightmare, because she is not use to the leash anymore, and having a 65 pound husky pulling is almost impossible for me, let alone my husband who is a big man, lol. We went to the training facility to observe our breeder for our next pup. He asked if we wanted to include Miya in the Good Canine Citizen training class. There were all Belgians and German shepherds in the class, we laughed and said Miya wasn't good on leash. He asked my husband to show him. Trainer took the leash and one quick flick of the wrist and she walked better on leash than the rest of the dogs. The training that I did long ago came back to her in a snap. What i would recommend, since you are new to dogs, as far as training, would be to look into a puppy class for obedience, or call around locally and see if someone could help you train Red better in the art of walking on leash. So now you have a few  options that can work, and choose what will work best for you.

Training a husky is not the easiest, however, I, again imho, think it's very crucial early on, you do not want a difficult adult dog on your hands. Not only are huskies more prone too pulling than other breeds, but they do have high prey drive, which means taking you for a walk, and many are prone to taking off when loose.

I agree with Renee.

If you are going to have her on a tether, a harness is best. I am not of fan of harnesses for everyday walking, but for a tether...especially if she is going to be excited and running out the length of the rope (which isn't really a good idea to begin with), you don't want that force being applied to her neck.

Just as a quick note on prong collars, they don't choke dogs, at all. They apply universal pressure around a dog's neck in quick little jolts. Normal everyday collars and most other chain type of collars end up with all the pressure on the dog's throat if they are pulling, and will choke the dog.

Your dog will never connect the dots between pulling and choking. They pull because of arousal (not being a Husky) so in order for to address the pulling, you're going to have to address the arousal she gets from being on leash, which is essentially what Renee has suggested.

Dogs who pull you on leash when you're not wanting them to are struggling with arousal, priority problems, and have no sense of what you want as being relevant.

To address this, you'll need to start doing a lot of work in all areas of her life with you: food, doorways, sleeping, leash, indoor behavior, etc .

It's a time involved process, but the pay off is incredible.

For tether, I favor a sturdy,metal buckle collar.  As far as any jolts to the neck - all of Ami's tethers/trolleys have springs on the distal end.  You could also attach the distal end to a bungie leash, as long as it is up high where she can't reach it and chew it apart (my primary objection to using a harness.  I'd be really surprised if Ami could reach his collar to chew it off (though, please note, he DID figure out how to undo the snap shackle from the tether to his collar D ring...I now have TWO snapshackles on his tethers).  But, rather moot - he's hardly ever tethered any more since the efence went in - only when we leave the property.

Yes, bungie rope or leash is very important.

Good call Amy.

Yes, let me clarify that....prong or harness for walking, or solid training with a standard collar. As Amy said some type of bungee for the tethering, to give it some spring, as to not choke her.

Thanks for the advice everyone. This is some serious food for thought. We would absolutely love to not have Red on a leash but we can't at this time since the house we just moved into doesn't have a fenced in yard. We will def be looking into some sturdy fencing. In the meantime, we have been tethering only on the occasions when we had projects to complete outdoors and wanted her to be out with us.

Question on the bungee leashes,  does it completely prevent jolts to the neck or does it lessen the force behind a jolt? I guess it would really depend on how hard and fast she pulls? I'm just a little freaked out with the prong collars because I saw photos of the damage they can do but I guess those were probably under the worst conditions possible.

We might look into obedience classes if she hasn't shown any improvement with not pulling when we walk her. For now we are going to try with the home training to see how she does. So far she's been doing well with food (managed to get her under control with the food aggression) and luckily she is not much of a howler or furniture chewer. We are about halfway successful with her crate training so far. I think the pulling is probably going to be the biggest hurdle.

I believe the nasty photos of prong collar damage are from a pup whose prong collar was left on, grew, the collar became too tight. I use a prong on both Ami and Archer - but, only for their walks. Prong goes on with their leashes (it stays attached to the leash hanging on the hook), go for a walk, return home, prong comes off. Ami has done some pretty spectacular "pogo stick" leaps in our early days together - he never got any damage or even hurt from his prong collar.

As for bungee leash - I use a Rok leash. I found it added to the corrective effect of the prong - gives a slightly more gradual squeeze instead of instant all at once squeeze of the collar. The only thing I don't like about the Rok leash is it is only 54" which I find too short for Ami (I made a 9 ft leash that I attach to the ROk) and I find the handle too bulky.

http://www.thedogoutdoors.com/rok-straps-stretch-bungee-dog-leashes.html?gclid=Cj0KEQjw9o-vBRCO0OLi2PfPkI8BEiQA8pdF4N2wNbu4fQG8UDpzp0aiD5gPiOp4Xnj4ub_Yiwvs30AaAqdw8P8HAQ

LOL Amy, you made my day with the "pogo stick" image!!!

I was just afraid of somehow screwing it up and hurting Red by using the prong collar simply because she's my first dog. Even though my husband has had huskies before, it doesn't necessarily mean he knows everything about huskies and he has never used prong collars before. But since it's been such a success for a lot of husky owners, I have been tetering between considering them or not (with some reservation). I'll have to look into the prong collar and Rok leash combo since that makes more sense with the gradual squeeze. Any recommendations on the brand for prong collar or are they all pretty much standard? BTW, thank you so much for recommending the Rok leash, it looks very solidly made. Did you end up getting the one with the bigger width?

Before I go ahead with that combo, has any one tried using a harness with the front D-ring attachment with any success? As Jeff had mentioned, I needed to address the arousal she gets from the pull and I understand that the harness won't address that. Although I did read that the front attachment (as opposed to the back) is supposed to help you redirect your dog more easily when they're pulling. As Renee had suggested and in combination of all the other posts I've read, I'm considering the following:

Walking: Regular Leash & Prong Collar
Walking: Regular Leash & Harness with front D-ring attachment (leash will secure harness to regular collar for added security)
Tie-Out: Rok Leash & Harness with front D-ring attachment (leash will secure harness to regular collar for added security)

I didn’t want to use the Rok Leash while walking Red just yet only because I’m afraid it might give her too much free range since she doesn’t have the pulling under control yet. I figure it would be better to use it on the Tie Out to reduce chances of injury if she does a Pogo Stick move again.
Agree....disagree....mehhhh????

The rok leash will NOT give too much range - it is only 54" long and is a stiff stretch to mayby30-40% more. My complaint was it was too short for my puposes. Search "prong collar" and look for my threads, somewhere in there is a link to a site that sells the Herm Sprenger prong adapted with a side release buckle. Makes it very easy to use with bouncing huskies and easy on the hands. The quick release buckle is different, confusing to me and said to be prone to unwanted release.

ok - had a moment and found the link to the site that adds the side release buckle:

http://www.leashesbydesign.com/ProngCollars/ProngCollars.html

I have not ordered from this place - Ami's prong was fitted by at the shelter by and given to me by the shelter.

Oh - and the medium is a good size for huskies.

I tried a front attached harness (not the one you mentioned) and found that it disturbed Ami's gait - yes it slowed down the pulling but he was walking sort of sideways and bumping into his leash. I wanted him to have full stride and walk freely.

As for "regular leash and prong combo" - that is what I use with Archer with no problem, as soon as he feels the prong start to squeeze, he "tacks" instead of going dead ahead. With Ami, the Rok leash was invaluable when we first got him - he was a year old and full of the ole scratch, constantly going airborn and pouncing on small critters in the ditch with me attached - the Rok saved my shoulder. And greatly reduced the number faceplants for the old lady - with the stretching, I had warning, he had warning and it stopped the Pogo before it started.

So since I am not familiar with prongs, I will go with your other questions. The easy walk harness with the d-ring in the front, Casey, a member here loves hers. It is weird at first to get used to, because when your dog starts to pull, it will automatically turn your dog back to you. So it is an attention grabber and redirects focus back to you. So it does take some getting used to, but like I said Casey loves hers. As with anything, patience and practice on both you and the dog is a must.

I also wanted to mention, it was long ago when I still lived at home, but my dad had an overhead trolley system for our husky/gsd and after her our gsd. I believe it was strung across two trees, so everything was above their heads, so gave room for them to walk and they didn't get tangled up. With me all I had was a runner to one tree and Miya would wrap the line around the tree and only giving herself enough line to sit or laydown, hence why when she jumped she would choke herself. I do not know what your system is, nor do I know exactly how Amy's trolly is set up. But I do know that the way my dad set the trolly up, there wasn't an easy way for them to pull on the line to choke themselves.

You're  too funny! I've face planted in the driveway already because Red tripped me when I went to save a teeny frog from her clutches. Now my wrist is killing me for the last couple weeks but that's another story......

Thank you for the link to the prong collar! Seems like they have a good warranty service on them too. I think I will end up getting the front attached harness, prong collar and Rok leash just to try out all the combos to see which works best for Red. I really do appreciate all the recommendations for brands...saves me time from having to do research on items that I don't even know if they have been husky tested. I'll have to do more research on just the harness though due to the issue you had with Ami's walking. I'll post an update once we have put these to the test.

We did have a trolley/runner set up in the yard. It was hooked to two trees but Red always cried like a banshee when she was on it. She still managed to flip herself on it because she would build more momentum on the line before she got to the end of it...thus creating more force to flip herself when she did get to the end

My trolley runs 100' between 2 trees, has a dog house.

Thanks Amy for letting us know, I thought that was your system, and it seemed to work well for you.