You will need three specific pieces of equipment to properly train your dog: a training collar, a leather training leash, and a 15-foot length clothesline rope.

If you’re already thinking that your dog’s present leather collar will work, and that his 4-foot chain leash will suffice, you may as well stop reading this article and save yourself and your dog weeks of discomfort and hardship.  There simply is no substitute for the right training equipment. A training collar is a slip-chain type made of metal. Don’t substitute one that’s made of nylon.

One of the many things your dog is going to learn is to have confidence in you. But he will never develop that feeling of confidence if you substitute improper training equipment that will not be effective. Where there’s no confidence there can be no respect, and no respect means no desire to please. No desire to please means no willingness to learn. Add them all up and you have an uncontrollable dog that will never achieve his rightful place in human world.

The proper leash

Your leash should be of the regular five to six foot leather type with a hand loop at one end. Training collars and leather training leashes are available at pet shops and via online catalogs. Training collars are sometimes called choke-chains, which is incorrect. While it’s true that a training collar can choke, if it’s worn on the dog correctly and used properly, there’s no way it can be a choke-chain and cause harm to your pet.

The right collar

The collar should be large enough to slide over the dog’s head comfortably, but not so large as to fall over the ears if the dog should lower his head. A good rule of thumb to follow is to place the collar on the dog and cinch it up tight for a moment and observe whether you have three inches of chain left over. If so, you have a fairly good fit. It is better to have a training collar that’s slightly too large than one slightly too small.

Other dog training necessities that you cannot find in a store

The remaining equipment that you’ll need cannot be purchased at any store, but without them, you cannot successfully train your dog.

You must love and care for your dog! You must have patience and exercise patience while your dog is learning. A shallow patience mixed with a short temper will ensure complete and utter failure.

To lose your cool and blow up means the end of training, so here’s a little tip that might help you keep your cool:

It takes 4 to 5 days for an average dog to learn the average thing. Do not expect your dog to perform like a professional the first few days of teaching him something new. It just doesn’t happen that way. If you lose control of yourself, you have lost control of the situation. When this happens, your dog loses confidence in you.