There is no shortage of people with very strong opinions about the equipment you use to walk your dog. But are harnesses really responsible for dogs pulling on the lead? And if not, what is?
Do harnesses ‘make dogs pull’?
An argument often put forward by harness critics is that dog harnesses were originally designed for sled dogs, so they will actually make your dog pull more. Let’s dig into this a little deeper. Yes, there are specialised harnesses available that are designed to maximise the power with which dogs used for draught sports (like sledding and canicross) are able to tow a weight behind them. These harnesses are intended to allow full freedom of movement of the shoulder joints and to distribute the pulling force across the entire harness so that it does not become concentrated in one area and cause discomfort to the dog.
However, it is not as if the minute your dog steps into a harness it will magically unleash their inner husky, causing them to make a dash for the next flight to Alaska so they can live out their dream of joining a mushing team. It is not the harness itself that is causing the dog to pull; it is rather that certain harnesses facilitate the pulling action. This is illustrated nicely by the pictures below: when I do canicross with my dog Lyra in her specialised harness she pulls extremely hard, yet she is also capable of walking on a loose lead when wearing her everyday harness. So there must be more to it than simply harness = pulling on the lead. To find out why dogs pull, we need to take a closer look at the motivation behind the behaviour.
So what does make dogs pull?
There are many reasons why dogs pull on the lead, all of them perfectly natural! Just because our dogs are domesticated does not mean that they come with a pre-programmed ability to walk on a loose lead. Your dog may be pulling because:
They want to get to an interesting sniff that is just out of reach
They naturally walk faster than humans
They know that being on the lead means walking to somewhere exciting where they will get to run around off the lead, so they want to get there as quickly as possible
They are anxious and want to get away from something that is worrying them (e.g. a busy road)
And while we are on the subject, your dog is definitely not pulling on the lead because they are trying to ‘dominate’ you or be a ‘pack leader’ – but that’s a subject for another blog post.
Okay…so what kind of harness will stop them pulling?
By now I am sure you will have come across harnesses marketed as ‘anti-pull’ or ‘no-pull’. These tend to have a strap running horizontally across the front of the chest, and work by restricting shoulder movement. Now this may help to take some of the strength out of your dog’s pull, but it also affects their normal gait pattern and can result in shoulder pain, arthritis, inflammation and bursitis in the long term. For any readers who have ever worn a pencil skirt, imagine having to walk everywhere in one that’s a size too small. Not nice.
Instead, I usually recommend a Y-shaped harness with an attachment loop on the back and chest, combined with a double-ended lead. The effect of this is that when the dog pulls forward, the pressure on the front attachment loop diverts them around to one side, giving you a bit more control. However, if your dog is an incredibly strong puller, even using a harness like this can cause muscular and joint issues in the long term. I tend to use this setup as an ‘A-to-B’ solution, i.e. when I just need to get my dog from one location to another and for whatever reason it’s not the right time or place to work on their loose-lead walking. So if there really is no ‘miracle’ equipment that stops dogs pulling, what is the answer?
Training, training, training!
You guessed it: the only way to get your dog to walk on a nice loose lead is to teach them how! In many cases it is also a question of undoing past learning, as the dog has spent their entire life thus far getting reinforced for pulling. In other words, if all of the walks a dog has ever known have involved them dragging their owner around to every sniff spot, they will have learned that pulling gets them what they want! Certain types of equipment can contribute to this as well, such as retractable leads. When a dog moves forward on a retractable lead, this automatically creates tension as the line unreels from the handle. So what has the dog learned? Tension on the lead = getting to move forward and obtain reinforcement.
I’d love to tell you that all it takes to teach your dog to walk on a loose lead is one simple trick or piece of equipment, but unfortunately life is never that straightforward! Instead, it takes consistent, positive training where your dog is rewarded for the behaviour you want (no tension on the lead, checking in with you regularly) and is not given an opportunity to practice the behaviour you don’t want (doing their best impression of a freight train).
If this all sounds a bit daunting to you, why not take a look at my Perfectly Painless Loose Lead Walking package? The training is always tailored to what works best for you and your dog, so you don’t have to worry about feeling overwhelmed. You’ve got this!