Product Review: Harry Barker Designer Collar

Harry Barker designer collars are made from recycled plastic bottles woven into tough webbing. They are durable, lightweight, and dry quickly. These collars are available in a variety of prints and colors, and come in six sizes to fit dogs with necks 6-26" around.

Photo by Erin Koski

When it comes to sustainable dog collars, I think Harry Barker might have some of the best options out there. The patterns and colors are beautiful, and the collars really last. I see these on dogs at daycare all the time, and they look beautiful even after months of surf and sun.

Pros: Bright patterns and colors resist fading. Webbing is light and thin, yet very strong.

Cons: The thinnest collars are 5/8" wide, so they look ridiculous on Ru.

Bottom Line: This is Darla's new collar, it will be going to her new home with her when she gets adopted.

Cheapass Dog Fun: Play Mat Stay Mat

Brisbane's Ruffwear portable bed makes an awesome mat for practicing games like the ones I found in Control Unleashed. The idea is to teach the dog to lay down on the mat and stay there. Brisbane gets very excited about racing to his mat and sprawling on it, Ru occasionally decides to participate. Before we started playing these games, I kept the Ruffwear bed in the car for convenience. After we started using it for training games, I briefly considered buying a second one.

To be honest, I bought Brisbane's Ruffwear bed on clearance for 50% off. I was lucky to find it, and I really don't need to spend $70 for something to throw down on my floor for a few minutes of training. An old towel or a throw rug would do the trick, but I found something more fun.

I love thrift stores, and we have some amazing ones nearby. Something I often see an abundance of is baby play mats. They come in a delightful array of shapes and themes, always in bright colors. They are lightly padded and easy washable. I'm pretty sure these things come as part of a baby gym set, with doodads that suspend toys over the kid, or pillows to prop them up on their tummies. They never have these when I see them at the thrift stores though, the mat is the sad remnant of a once elaborate baby toy...or something.

At any rate, these mats are easy to find, cheap or free, and a lot of fun to play with. They apparently make decent ultralight pet beds, when I toss on on the floor it is likely to collect a dog or cat within a minute or two. Play mats are probably not as durable as the Ruffwear bed, and they probably collect a lot more dirt and crud outdoors, but they are also easy to replace. They're pretty cute, too.

Cheapass Dog Fun: Food Packaging

There are lots of fun dog toys and dog activities out there, but unfortunately most of them cost money. They also tend to involve time and effort, and sometimes I am feeling sick, or lazy, or it's raining and my dogs refuse to go outside because they might melt. (We live in Southern California and they can easily go 8 or 9 months without seeing rain, so Brisbane and Ru always find it disconcerting.)

One of Brisbane's favorite, totally free, hobbies is shredding stuff. Josie enjoys shredding paper towels and toilet paper. Brisbane is only interested in shredding things that once contained food. He is also very good about not eating things that aren't food, so I never have to worry about him swallowing bits of potato chip bag or candy wrapper. This means that the vast majority of our food packaging takes a trip to Brisbane's lair before it reaches the trash can or recycling bin.

Empty cereal box? Hand him the entire thing and let him pull the bag out, rip it open, and lick the crumbs out. Restaurant takeout containers? Close them up tight and let him figure out how to open them to lick them clean. Empty peanut butter jar? Biggest Kong ever.

I wouldn't do this if Briz had a tendency to snarf down garbage along with his food. I am also careful to read labels and avoid giving him anything that might have traces of his allergens, or artificial sweeteners. Ru also occasionally enjoys a bit of shredding fun, but I am a bit more careful about traces of chocolate and other no-no foods because he is ridiculously tiny and therefore more susceptible.

Plastic bags can present a suffocation risk, so happy fun shredding time is a supervision-only activity. It also makes a mess and requires sweeping and/or vacuuming, depending on the type of floor. Still, it can add a few minutes of fun and problem-solving to Brisbane's day with minimal effort on my part.