Dog Training Collars
The type of collar you use is your personal preference and your goals in your dog training program. I normally do not tell people what kind of collar to use in their training program since everyone has their own personal choice. Although the type of collar you use should be based on your skill level as a handler. The higher your skill, the less important the collar becomes. The main purpose of the collar is to communicate mistakes to your dog. It's main purpose is to get your dogs attention back to you.
Flat Collars
These include buckle collars, nylon collars, leather collars and cotton collars. These type of collars are your normal collar your dog wears to carry their tags. Young puppies should wear collars that have the plastic snap buckle, since these are safety collars. If your puppy gets the collars stuck on something and panics, these collars will unsnap and release the dog. For training purposes metal buckle collars are better, since they will not unsnap during a session.
Slip Collars
These include choke chains, nylon slip collars, nightingale collars and others that tighten when pulled by the leash.
What's nice about this style is that they are a simple design that will not come off at the wrong time during a training session. Chain slip collars while very popular, can cause a bit of injury to your dog and should be used with caution. They tend to bruise the dogs neck and even though we can't see most of these injuries because of your dogs fur, that are still there.
Halti Or Gentle Leaders
These are the collars that have a loop that goes over the dogs muzzle. These are not muzzles, as they do not cover access of your dog mouth. They serve as a tool to give you more leverage during your sessions.
Prong Or Pinch Collars
These are the collars that have points that sit on your dogs neck and when pulled tighten up to simulate a biting around the dogs neck. They were designed to feel like another dogs corrections like a biting response. There are a few different styles of this collars. While they look very threatening, properly used are very effective and tend to cause less injury to your dog. This is a very popular collar for inexperienced handlers, since they can deliver a higher level or correction with the least effort. Some experience handler like this type as well since again it does not require a huge effort to deliver a very startling correction.
Agitation Collars
Agitation collars are the most comfortible collars on the market today. They are designed to make pulling more comfortible for your dog. They are wide to distribute the force evenly around your dogs neck. Even if you do not do aggression work these collars are the best.
Electronic Collars
Electronic collars or ecollars have special certain uses. They are used to fine tune the advanced dog and problem solve issues where you do not want to be present, like digging in the yard or raiding the trash can, etc. The most common problem people have with these tools is that that are expensive and you want to get your moneys worth. So they tend to get over used. As with any training tools we want to get over them and not rely on constant use.