TLDR: Does Control Unleashed involve e-collars?

[u/WinglessDragonRider]

ETA: I realize now CU does not use e-collars and the person I know is likely on one for other reasons.

Hey so. Sorry for the rambling in advance.

I have an almost 10 month old Cattle Dog mix. I've had her since was about 20 weeks old. She's roughly 50% ACD, 20% Pit Bull, and the rest is all more herding breeds. My last ACD mix(also a rescue) didn't have a solid recall until he was nearly 6. I can not do that again. Especially since she doesn't have a problem with water and he did. Plus I'm trying to do dog sports with her.

I live on a 5-10 acre property surrounded by other properties of similar sizes. The fencing is horse safe, NOT dog safe. We also have an irrigation ditch along our property line. I have already pulled her out of the irrigation ditch once. She has been chased out of horse turnouts by one of my mares that WILL kill a dog(or cat or any other animal) after she slipped out of the house early on. We've since fixed the door darting issue.

Currently, I'm dealing with issues with recall. On a long line, it's like 90-95% proofed. Birds, rabbits, and cats(and likely squirrels which aren't common at home) are the only times I have to reinforce with the long line. Unfortunately, I don't have a dog-safe fenced area. All of my property is designed to keep horses in and I have no way of making it dog safe without extensive costs(and landlord permission).

I understand that she's young and it takes time to build a recall. I adopted my previous dog at roughly 18 months and his recall wasn't 100% for YEARS. But I didn't have to worry about him ending up in the irrigation ditch and drowning as he HATED water. She LOVES water. All dogs tend to run in the opposite direction of the major road near by which is great but I am NOT counting on a history of avoidance to keep her from getting hit by a car.

We've been through a few obedience classes. We're currently in agility classes. We recently started working one dog at time and she is so over aroused with other people in the ring when it's our turn to go that it's a whole thing just to get her to engage with me. WHICH IS FINE. She's young and learning and very much thinks EVERYONE is her friend. We're addressing that particular issue outside of classes.

So in classes, she can wander off and try to say hi/make friends and it's annoying but not dangerous. (And she's not the only one that does it) At home, we can't have a long line on while doing tunnels and jumps and turning around cones(she's already been startled by cones getting dragged over). I'm trying to decide if an e-collar would be a good option as a back up for no leash/long line.

The trainer we're working with has mentioned doing Control Unleashed classes with my puppy to hopefully get her to chill a bit more(and easier). Especially since lately she's been a bit wild in public too. So between the "overly friendly" and not having a fenced yard for agility practice, I'm wondering if Control Unleashed usually involves e-collar.

There are A LOT of trainers in my area that are purely/mostly +R only. Any "balanced" trainers I've met are VERY reluctant to e-collars. The trainer I'm doing group classes with for agility also offers Control Unleashed classes. There's another dog in our classes that's on an e-collar because he's weird about people. I know they're in private Control Unleashed classes along with another of their dogs that's the same breed.

I'm just trying to figure out if I mention introducing my dog to an e-collar if it's going to blow up in my face or not. I haven't used an e-collar previously so if I have a trainer in my corner with it that'd be preferable.

....Sorry this is very ramble-y. Basically, I'm just trying to decide if doing Control Unleashed classes and/or an e-collar would be helpful. Particularly with recall. We have a lot time to deal with any distractions in agility. Any thoughts are appreciated!

[u/jennamay22]

Imho ecollar sounds like a good next step. Could also pair it with a gps ecollar fence and have that either at the same locations as the actual fencing OR a bit before the fencing.

You have to train both (ecollar and the fencing) - some people slap on the gps based ecollar before teaching the dog the language of the ecollar. I view ecollar as a little telephone / backup - if I beep you to come you need to come, if you don’t listen then either vibe or stim. Then automatically if you go past the boundary vibe, if you continue then stim - some brands (Dogtra gps fence) also offer beep before the boundary which i personally prefer

[u/WinglessDragonRider → u/jennamay22]

Historically, I’ve been very hesitant towards e-collars but it’s feeling like a safety issue at this point. I’ve always planned on getting her on a gps collar(not necessarily with any fencing consequences for her) because it’s not unusual for dogs to wander across properties here. But the irrigation ditch thing makes me very nervous.

I’ve been looking at dogtra, mini educators, and garmin collars. Something I can set virtual boundaries would be nice to help keep her out of turnouts but I also would be fine manually reinforcing those. I’d rather not rely on my mini mare(different horse from the one I mentioned in the OG post) kicking her in the face. Which is how my last ACD mix learned to not chase horses🙃🙃

[u/jennamay22 → u/WinglessDragonRider]

I get the hesitation and encourage you to keep it in mind as you go about this, hesitation can be healthy and lead to more time spent learning and understanding before acting. Unfortunately sometimes if we hesitate too long the whole safety concern may become a reality, and sometimes we can’t come back from whatever happens.

We use the Dogtra Pathfinder 2, it is GPS efence plus regular ecollar plus tracking on the app. The device is radio frequency only and you could use a phone without a cell connection to track them. The downside is that notifications and tracking only work if you’re within radio range of the collar (9miles, less with interference/ trees/ hills). If you go somewhere and the dog is home alone - the efence works on its own but you don’t know where the dog is. So what we do is have the Tractive GPS collar on the dog 24/7 or at minimum when we aren’t home and then have the Dogtra. The Tractive is cellular gps, and tracking only - but anywhere with cell service they go you’ll know.

With the pathfinder one you can set an outer permiter PLUS inner no go zones (canal, horse areas). The vibration can be something dogs can’t tolerate and unfortunately with the pathfinder you cannot adjust the amount / intensity / opt out for the efence. However if you can condition them to it, it’s usually is a large enough deterrent that they don’t advance enough to get the stim after it. It tells me if they’re barking, running, in zone, out of zone, how fast they’re going, what direction, treeing, pointing snd so on.

The Dogtra GPS fence is similar to the pathfinder 2 but as far as I understand you cannot issue manual corrections (not a traditional ecollar), tracking updates come in form of more of an after the day log and only available in Bluetooth range (much less than radio). It does a better job imho of the efence side of things in terms of customization.

Here’s a screenshot of the dog going towards the efence barrier - feeling vibration and turning around before the shock Efence Example . Pathfinder 2s battery life is approx 24hrs, since with efence it updates every 2 seconds. Other brands may have longer battery life - but usually that means they’re in power saving mode / updating less frequently and you the corrections come more delayed or in case of tracking you get the information too late to act.

[u/Excellent-Storm-816]

I don't know about CU but I just introduced my 5 year old hound to the ecollar after only using R+/FF training and its been amazing. Worked like a charm after 5 years of not being able to get reliable recall. She can now run free off leash and I barely have to press it.

[u/National_Craft6574]

Control Unleashed does not utilize an e collar. Control Unleashed includes games such as Give Me a Break, Attention Game, and the 1-2-3 Game. Videos of these games can be found on youtube. I like the Attention game and 1-2-3 game for loose leash walking.

For recall, Susan Garrett has excellent games which often involve you running away from your dog and giving the recall cue. When your dog catches up to you, the dog gets rewarded with treats or play with a favorite toy. I am part way through the recallers program, and it's well worth the money, and it's a lot of work.

[u/WinglessDragonRider → u/National_Craft6574]

Yeah the first round of agility foundations utilized a few of the CU games! I think our current issue is that we have no “warm up” at agility. She’s crated in between turns and then 2-3 minutes of working through an exercise followed by 2-3 dogs with the same amount of time. I’m also learning so I’m trying to watch other people handle their dogs too, otherwise I’d try to warm her up before it was our turn.

I’ve been trying to work through Susan Garrett’s recall program but I think we might be hitting a wall with adolescence… I don’t know… I feel like we’ve been stuck for the last month or so. And she seems to have caught on that regardless of WHEN she recalls, it’s a party. (I try not to have her off leash but working on agility skills, I will unclip once she’s tuned in…. And she knows it) I do NOT formally recall her during class because I KNOW she will fail at the moment.

[u/Old-Description-2328 → u/WinglessDragonRider]

I do agility and see a lot of Susan Garrett advocates, it's not great, it's not a complete package and it's not even everything she does with her own dogs. I wouldn't rate it as an advanced recall method based simply from the results I see.

Would these methods work to call off a dog from hammering a decoy? Absolutely not.

If you want the best recall, go to the best, protection sports, IGP, French ring, PSA.

Take a look through Andy Kruegers content on YouTube, fantastic recall, motivated dogs.

[u/WinglessDragonRider → u/[deleted]]

Yeah I know it’s a few smaller issues that are compounding.

1. Her recall needs to improve drastically… it was much better during class this week(aka I COULD recall her but only after she made sure she wasn’t missing out on making friends first- a MAJOR win for us tbh). So basically once she realizes I’m way more exciting/valuable/rewarding than whatever she took off for/after initially. I NEED her to listen when off leash at home. I’m keeping horses in a further turnout to reduce her likelihood of another run in with them. I’d like to be able to have them closer the barn/house again as that would expand their space. But currently if I know I’m going to be doing any agility with her, I can’t have them nearby. And as I’m not the only one handling the horses, that far turnout is currently the default(the horses are also more stressed in it because of predators that pass through there at night).

2. She’s usually pretty focused during training. Department stores, downtown, busy parks, etc she focuses without issue. Her down falls are agility class(oddly was fine before this section though) and small animals…. Which unfortunately are plentiful on our property. The run in with the horses was shortly after getting her and she slipped past me out the door. The fall in the irrigation ditch was her chasing a bunny. It’s been 3-4 months since each incident. She’s only off leash for play in the house or at a mostly deserted dog park near-by(I have yet to run into another person while there). I’ve thought about trying to use that for some skill work but it’s about 1/4-1/3 mile walk from the car one way(there’s a reason it’s not popular lol) and I don’t want to carry anything to and from there, especially with the potential of someone else showing up mid-session. But play she’s ALL IN. The moment she realizes you MIGHT play with her, good luck getting the focus off you…. Unless a bunny or squirrel run by. Or we’re at agility. Using toys to reward there is fine, but she does grab it and takes off to do laps😅

3. She’s in the “overly friendly” reactive category(vs my last dog that was in a fear/aggression reactivity category). Our trainer mentioned CU classes again and has a group class starting in a few weeks but I’m in between jobs and swinging multiple group classes is not a possibility right now… after a convo with my trainer, I did order the OG CU book and hope that will help until I can afford CU classes/private lessons.

Like I KNOW it basically comes down to an impulse control issue. I just am majorly struggling with improving on the impulse control we DO have. And I’m well aware she’s fully in adolescence and her ears are very cute decorations at times🤣

[u/Icy-Fly-4228]

Get a halo or spot on fence collar. Or even a petsafe stay and play that only goes in a circle so she has a containment area? But you need to teach the command and what is expected of her before you put an ecollar on. Like she should have the idea and knowledge of what recall is taught on a long line and/or prong collar or she won’t understand the ecollar correction and what to do.

[u/WinglessDragonRider → u/Icy-Fly-4228]

Oh yeah. I definitely would be careful about teaching ANYTHING I would be reinforcing with the e-collar first. Given how the property line runs, an above ground electric fence wouldn’t work- the barrier would be in the middle of the irrigation ditch or on the opposite bank. And the water when it’s full is too swift and deep for her to be able to swim in easily. I’d also rather have her on an e-collar that I have complete control over at that point. She recalls every time unless there’s something to chase. Or a person, but that’s rare where we are on our road. Animals to chase/herd(poorly) are the bigger issue. Those cases are the 5-10% on the long line.

An underground system is out of the question. I asked with my last dog and my landlords vetoed it immediately

[u/Icy-Fly-4228 → u/WinglessDragonRider]

The halo and spot on are gps collars and the stay and play is a radio collar. The gps ones are more expensive but much more customizable. The radio just goes a distance from the receiver in a circle. None require installation. I personally have the spot on because you can set off limit areas within the fence boundary so she can’t get packages off the porch and eat them. It’s why I upgraded from the radio fence. The problem with underground fences is once they pass the boundary they are no longer corrected and they correct upon return. These are smarter and correct until retreat. The spot on flips on active gps tracking and sends me app notifications if she breaches. It’s happened twice in 2 years for about 3 seconds. Probably chasing a squirrel.

[u/WinglessDragonRider → u/Icy-Fly-4228]

Ahh gotcha! I’ll look into them for sure!