Sunday, July 14, 2013

Yosuke's Review: Red Harness

Yosuke (yo-skay) is my English cream mini-dachshund.  He takes up almost all of my time outside of work, and I love it.
Playing outside. So pretty!
We are trying to find the perfect harness for our little guy, but just can't find one yet.  He is almost done growing, only a teeny bit left to go.  He currently weighs 9.3 lbs.  We love to take him on walks, but hate the traditional collars (like he has on above) for walking.  They look great, but that is it.

Yosuke -- Mom says I can't wear my collar anymore for walks.  Which is good with me.  I always try to pull out of it, because it doesn't fit me well and I don't like wearing it.  The collar thing that went around my legs was NOT okay.  It slipped around too much on my back and took too long to put on and it was hard to get off.

Here is the one harness we did buy so far:
This harness is terrible!  The loop where the leash ring (D ring) and back adjustment strap goes through (on the left side of the picture) was huge.  I had to sew it shut about a 1/2 inch before it would stop sliding around.  It was such a pain to get on him too - only one clasp on the back and it always ended up on his side or belly not his back.  The red one only cost $6.99 for an xsmall at Meijer, but it wasn't even worth that.  After trying to make it work for a few weeks, we gave up and threw it out.

We liked the idea of this harness though.  Simple, easy to adjust, very inexpensive (perfect for a growing puppy), made of nylon (super durable), not bulky and tons of colors to choose from.

So now we are attempting to find one that not only he likes, but we like.  Yosuke is always too intrigued by the hamsters, conveniently located by the harness/collar isle, at the pet store to have him fitted.  So for now, the collar stays.  Any recommendations?  Happy Sunday!

5 comments:

  1. My favorite harness for Nola is the Puppia original (she has a sky blue one and a black one). They're a great price (about $16 I think?), very durable, washable, easy to put on, no chafing, lots of colors, and are a great all around harness. She's had one since she was about 7 months old, and I've only had to replace it once (she's almost 3 now), and that was only because one of my other dogs had chewed the seam and caused it to fray.
    She wears a small size. She has a 16" chest, 11" neck, and is 11lbs exactly. Puppia also makes vest styles and one that you can adjust neck size too.

    My second favorite is the Ruffwear Webmaster harness. Nola wears an XXS in that.

    I also like one I got from Arja's Art that's easy on/off, made of leather, and very soft.

    Two others I'm looking at are the Hurtta Y harness and the ComfortFlex harness.

    Nola's Mom

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thank you! :D We were considering a Puppia harness next. He might need an xsmall if Nola wears a small. I'll have to remeasure him.

      Delete
  2. Nola pretty much covered all the ones I was going to suggest. We have tried many, many harnesses... most of them would have been great, but we were unable to get a perfect fit because one of our sweet ones has a VERY deep chest for her size. So with every harness we'd try, one size would be too small, but the next size up would be too big. I can't tell you how many exchanges and returns we've been through. Sometimes we'd just donate them to a rescue. With harnesses, it's really important to have a good fit.
    Right now, we are using the Puppia original like Nola. I think they just call it the Puppia Soft Harness. This: http://goo.gl/FVL7L - But we get ours on Amazon... great price. Just in the Puppia line alone, we have also tried the Vest harness: http://goo.gl/tpAbN and the Superior: http://goo.gl/V3gn7 and the RiteFit: http://goo.gl/yACzS
    All of those would've probably worked just perfect for other dogs... but just didn't work for ours.
    I've lost track of how many other brands we've tried. We even got custom harnesses made... and guess what? Didn't fit right. Apparently I measured wrong, even I though I'm pretty sure I measured EXACTLY as the diagram instructed me to.
    So yeah, because of the quality and the very reasonable prices, I would check out the Puppia Soft Harness first... or any of the Puppia line that you think would work.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. So glad we aren't the only one having trouble finding a harness. Our first dachshund was a standard size and he too had a deep chest like your baby, but a small neck. We went through over 10 different harnesses before we just had one custom made for him. Such a pain and expensive!

      Thank you for the links. I'm definitely going to check out Puppia as our next harness!

      Delete
    2. I missed this reply before. Oh good, I'm glad you know what I'm talking about with the whole deep chest thing. I would see pictures of all the dachshunds in harnesses that look like they fit perfectly and I'd just want to scream because I couldn't get a single one to fit right!
      Like you say, such a pain and so expensive to go through so many harnesses trying to find one that fit properly.

      Delete

Thank you so much for leaving a comment. :D

Note: Only a member of this blog may post a comment.