Help & FAQ

Yes, we currently ship to New Zealand. Orders are sent by Australia Post Overseas tracked service with delivery in 10-14 days.

If you are based in the UK, please visit our UK site cannyco.co.uk and if you are based in North America, please visit cannyco.com.

Customers in Europe should visit our site at cannyco.eu.

No problem. Providing you purchased the collar from our website and return it to us within 7 days in a new and resaleable condition, we will exchange it for you. Simply return your collar to us along with a printout of this form and we'll do the rest.

For a full explanation of what the Canny Collar is, see here.

You can see a guide to choosing the right size for your dog here.

Since dogs, like humans, come in all shapes and sizes, it’s important to measure your dog's neck snugly to ensure you have the correct size Canny Collar. As your dog's neck can sometimes be hard to measure accurately (especially if there is a lot of fur), we have designed the Canny Collar so that each size overlaps with the sizes above and below. This allows some flexibility when choosing your size.

If your dog is exactly borderline between two sizes, we generally recommend getting the smaller size of the two options. If you have a puppy however, it may be worth waiting a month or so and buying the larger size.

Once you have your collar fitted, it's advisable to test it first in your garden or house to ensure it cannot come off over your dog's head.

If your dog's neck measurement falls exactly between two sizes, our experience shows that the best option is normally to choose the smaller of the two sizes to ensure a good fit.

Absolutely. But bear in mind the size and weight of your dog and be sure to be gentle when handling. This page will help you decide if the Canny is suitable for your puppy.

Check here for Canny Collar fitting instructions.

We have had a great deal of positive feedback about the Canny Collar from Boxer owners who have been delighted to find a piece of dog training equipment they can finally use to walk their dog. As the fitting depends on neck size, this simply means there is a little less nose band behind the head on a Boxer than there would be for other breeds, but the fit is not a problem.

French Bulldogs, Pugs etc are a little trickier as mostly they have virtually no nose! For those that have a slightly longer nose, the Canny Collar would work but if in doubt, invest in a body harness.

The Canny Collar can be worn with a basket or ‘Baskerville’ type muzzle without a problem. The Canny Collar should be fitted first and then the basket type muzzle fitted over the top. We don’t recommend using the Canny Collar with the cloth type muzzle that does not allow a dog to open his mouth.

If your dog has vertebral neck problems, our recommendation would be not to use any type of training device that fits around your dog's head. There are many harnesses on the market which would be more suitable for your dog.

The most common reason for this is that the yellow plastic guider on the Canny Collar nose band is not positioned under your dog's chin. Ensure that you have pulled the nose band through the guider and that your dog doesn't have a piece of yellow plastic on the side of his face (or on top of his head!).

Another possible reason is walking with too long a lead. The key to keeping the nose band on your dog is twofold: keep your lead short (but still loose) and your dog’s head upright. Try beginning your walk with the pressure applied on the Canny Collar and then slackening off the lead just enough so that the lead clip either just rests on the back of your dog’s neck or that the nose band of the Canny Collar is loose enough for your dog to open his mouth.

This means the Canny Collar is loose and comfortable on your dog but that there is not enough nose band for it to move towards the end of your dog’s nose and fall off the end. We don’t recommend using a flexi lead with the Canny Collar for precisely this reason as it allows too much lead with the possibility that the nose band will then come off the nose.

To keep the head upright, you will need to watch your dog for the first couple of minutes of your walk so that if his head drops, you can gently correct him by easing his head up off the floor with a steady upward action on the lead. As soon as his head is upright, give him plenty of vocal praise and slacken the lead once again. Don’t say anything negative to correct him if he drops his head again, just lift his head and then praise him when it is upright – this lets the Canny Collar do any corrective work (as it does with stopping the pulling) and you can then give the vocal praise reward.

Much the same as you expect certain behaviour from your dog when he on lead (ie. not pulling you), the same applies to other things like stopping to mark territory, pulling towards other dogs etc. You should be in control of your dog’s walk and not your dog, which means you decide (perhaps with a special training command such as ‘free!’) when your dog is able to do as they please, for example when your stop to let him off lead, meet other dogs, stop for a sniff etc. The first couple of minutes of your walk are the most important and set the tone for the rest of the outing.

After a few times of beginning the walk this way, your dog should start to become accustomed to you being in control of the walk and keep his head upright with no pulling. It doesn’t mean that he can’t stop and sniff etc, the only difference is that this happens when you decide and not your dog. The key to walking your dog well on a lead is consistency and if we are trying to gain your dog’s respect for your authority when lead training, he will get mixed messages if we are trying to control one aspect of the walk (the pulling) but allowing him to do the other things that often impede a pleasurable walk.

The nose band on the Canny Collar is designed to be free-moving rather than in a fixed position, so that when your dog is walking well, he doesn't feel any pressure at all on his face. This is in fact how the collar works, using a pressure and release system - pressure when pulling, no pressure when not pulling - this is your dog’s ‘reward’ for walking well and he should only feel pressure if he pulls.

If the collar was in a fixed position, there would be (at least some) continual pressure which means no actual training is taking place and your head collar is working more like a restraint. Your dog will only walk well on a loose lead and this is what we are looking to achieve.

When he is walking well, it is important to keep the lead short but just slackened off, so that it is not so loose for the nose band to come over your dog’s nose. The yellow guider underneath the chin is designed to be loose, free-moving and not fixed as the collar is a training aid to train your dog to eventually walk without pulling.

An extendable lead or similar long lead is not recommended for use with the Canny Collar.

The Canny Collar can be used in conjunction with common positive reinforcement dog training methods such as clicker training or food based reward training, which will help get your dog's interest and encourage him to walk. By lowering your height and giving vocal praise and/or a food incentive, your dog can be encouraged to begin walking with his Canny Collar.

When using the Canny Collar, it is important that your dog realises that at some point during the walk, the collar will loosen and if he is a persistently bad puller this may not be happening.

One tip would be to let out your lead when walking and allow him some way ahead of you and then, whilst still watching him, turn quickly and walk around in the complete opposite direction, taking good care not to yank his head when you turn. This will put him immediately behind you and give you some distance ahead of him before he then tries to pass you again and pull.

Once he does pass you, turn again immediately and repeat the process, continuing to turn when he passes you. He should begin to look at you and try to anticipate when you are going to turn in order to stay ahead but the best place to watch you from is just behind your leg. And this is ideally where you would like him to be on a walk.

When you have a very persistent puller, often it is best to try not to control them immediately with the collar, but to get them used to wearing it and give them plenty of vocal praise when they begin to walk without trying to remove it and when they are behind you. The exercise described above is intended to take away the worst of the initial pulling but should only be done in bursts of three or four minutes maximum as it will be both physically and mentally demanding for both of you.

Once you begin to get some control/acceptance, then try using the collar to control as per the instructions to stop pulling. Without the hard, initial & tiring (for you both!) pulling, you should be able to apply pressure when he does pull and release when he stops.

Dogs generally will only walk well if their lead/collar is loose and he needs to know it will loosen at some point. Once he experiences it loosening, he will realise that by walking in this position, it is more comfortable and the yellow plastic guider should then sit underneath his muzzle in the correct, relaxed position.

After we had launched the Canny Collar, we met a representative of the Newfoundland breed society at the Crufts dog show who mentioned to us that there was no satisfactory solution currently available that would fit the large breeds such as Newfies, St Bernards, Pyreneans etc. We knew Newfie owners who had enjoyed success with the largest size Canny Collar on their younger dogs but once the dogs had outgrown the Canny, there was no way to continue their lead training.

So we took the original, simple Canny Collar concept and beefed it up for the larger breeds. While the Colossus works in exactly the same way, the buckles and fittings are larger and more heavy duty, the collar and nose band are much wider and the collar features seven eyelets instead of the standard five on a Canny Collar.

The Canny Collar can indeed be used to train your dog to eventually walk on a regular collar and lead. In fact this is precisely what it is designed to do.

To achieve this, try walking your dog on the Canny Collar with the nose band over his nose for a two week period. Then, walk him for perhaps five minutes one day with the nose band on his nose and then remove it, pulling the excess nose band out at the back of his neck, turning the collar into a conventional lead and collar arrangement, for five minutes more.

If he begins to walk well, you are on your way to training him. You can then alternate between the two arrangements, gradually 'weaning' him off having the nose band on his nose. If he doesn't respond well to this, he will need a further period of keeping the nose band permanently on his nose before again trying the 'alternating' method of walking him.

The Canny Collar is designed only as a tool to help train your dog not to pull on lead.

We never claim that the Canny Collar is able to fix a problem where your dog feels fearful or anxious when out walking. Nor is it a 'quick fix' for reactive/aggressive behaviours for which we would recommend finding a qualified dog behaviourist or trainer.

Having said this, we are often told that dogs appear calmer and less prone to distraction when walking with a Canny. It is impossible to say for sure why this is, though one possibility is that your dog feels safer away from home knowing that you are in control during the walk.

Problems of fear, anxiety or aggression may or may not relate to your dog being on lead; either way, there is no magic tool or product that can ‘fix’ this.

Yes. We recommend for two dogs, that you walk both on the same side which will make it easier to control them using a Canny Collar. If using a standard length lead (120-180cm/4-6 ft) and walking your dogs on the left, this would mean holding the handle of the lead in your right hand and the part closest to the clip in your left.

The dog on the outside will have slightly more lead than the dog on the inside but both dogs should have their leads so that they are short but loose ie. that there is just enough slack so that as soon as one pulls, he/she feels the pressure of the collar tightening.

With the leads in this position, only the dog that started to pull would feel any pressure and it would allow the second dog, if he wasn't pulling, to enjoy the benefits of walking on a loose lead and feeling no pressure.

Absolutely not. If your dog runs fast and then stops suddenly at the end of a long line, wearing any type of head collar can severely damage his neck.

The Canny Collar guides your dog’s head so that she is where you want her to be on a walk. Of course you want her to be walking nicely by your side, with her head up and not constantly to the ground sniffing.

The collar works on a 'pressure and release’ system so that if your dog pulls forward, you can apply gentle backwards pressure, effectively in the opposite direction. By then releasing this pressure, your dog realises that at some point during the walk (when she is walking well beside you), there is no pressure on her snout and she will be walking on a loose lead.

Similarly, if your dog pulls to the side, away from you, you can apply the same action in the opposite direction by moving your arm across your body and then releasing, to bring her back in beside you. Each time she goes to move away from your preferred position of walking to heel, a gentle correction followed by vocal praise, will train her that this is where you want her to be.

The other direction your dog’s head is likely to go is downwards to the ground. Some dogs are real sniffers (which also depends on the breed - Beagles and other hounds for example naturally have their nose to the ground more than others) but it is possible, with patience, to train your dog to walk with her head upright in a similar way.

Choose a flat area for training as you will need to keep an eye on your dog while walking and not run the risk of falling over because you are not looking forwards. Starting with your arm down by your side, each time your dog goes to move in any of the ‘unwanted’ directions of forward, to the side or downwards, gently apply pressure in the opposite direction, then release and praise. You may have to do this several times in quick succession but the important thing is not to keep the pressure on, otherwise you won’t be training her, only restraining.

And don’t forget the vocal praise when she returns to the correct position and is walking well – this is vital to encouraging her to walk well. So, watching your dog and as soon as her head goes to ground, raising your arm to lift her head and then releasing and praising will help to train her that this is the position you would like her to be in.

By training your dog to walk using the Canny Collar, the collar does all of the corrective work leaving you free to do the positive reinforcement of vocally praising your dog, ideally using a higher pitched tone of voice and saying ‘good girl’ or similar with an enthusiastic voice. At this stage, try not to bend down and pat her as this will disrupt your rhythm, using vocal praise will be sufficient. Once you get to a convenient stopping point though, bend down and give her a fuss if she deserves it!

Absolutely not if you don't need her to be. ‘No pulling’ means just that, so if you want your dog to walk slightly ahead of the heel position that’s absolutely fine.

For example, dogs that are being trained to be service dogs for mobility help will often need to be slightly ahead of the owner because the type of equipment used for mobility doesn’t work when the dog is in a side heel position.

As long as the lead is loose, the owner feels in control and the dog is enjoying their walk with no pulling on the lead, that’s what we’re aiming for.

When we did the original trials for the Canny Collar, we did indeed have a metal triglide at this point under the dog’s chin made from nickel-plated steel. During the trials, some dogs had an allergic skin reaction to this component and so we researched an alternative and ended up with the yellow (easy to see) guide that we use now.

The material in fact is called acetal, an engineering thermoplastic used in precision parts requiring high stiffness, low friction, and excellent dimensional stability. It is extremely strong and a more durable material than nylon plastic (though not as strong as a dog’s teeth so take care it doesn’t slip into your dog’s mouth!).

Nylon plastic will bend, crack and break over time as it is more sensitive to temperature changes and moisture levels in the air whereas acetal will not.

Polypropylene is probably the most common material used in the webbing for pet products for several reasons:

· It is naturally very strong to withstand the force of a pulling dog.

· It stretches less than other types of webbing, meaning it lasts longer and functionality is not affected.

· It is durable and doesn't tear easily.

· It doesn’t absorb water like cotton for example, which means that it is less likely to smell bad.

· It is easy to either wipe clean or pop into the washing machine to make it good as new.

The four square-hooped guiders around the collar through which the nose band passes, the metal buckle and the two D-rings where the lead is attached are all made from tough, nickel-plated steel.

Yes. It can easily be wiped clean with a damp cloth or for really mucky pups, a cold hand wash in soapy water will have it looking like new.