VestHarness Review

Rating: 3 paws

The VestHarness is a sort of cross between a dog harness and a padded vest or chest protector. I bought the Vest Harness (made by Canine Friendly Products) mainly to use as a "seatbelt" for my dog. I have previously used other car harnesses and regular harnesses as seatbelts, but the main problem I had is they were uncomfortable for her to wear, and most were not padded. The Vest Harness design doesn't put the pressure a regular harness does on the dog's neck or chest in case of an accident or sudden stop, which I liked. Most of the harness is padded, so it's comfortable for the dog to wear. One thing which can be a problem: There is a space for you to thread a car seatbelt through the harness to use it as a car harness. This works fine if the dog sits still in the car, but if she tries to turn around, she will get twisted in the harness. What I did to prevent this is I bought a very short lead with a swivel hook, attached it to the harness, and threaded the car's seatbelt through that. Unfortunately even with this, my dog was getting tangled. I then tried a BatziBelt, which is a leash strap made for use in cars. This worked pretty well, but the dog still managed to get tangled fairly often, so I finally stopped using this seatbelt altogether and switched to the CARE Champion System (see review.) Please note also that the VestHarness is not an accident tested dog seatbelt, which I would recommend using for car travel.



The only problem I had with the VestHarness was fit. My Golden has a large chest and small neck, making it difficult for her to fit many products that have to go around the neck and chest. Due to this problem I was not sure which size to buy. The size I ordered turned out not to fit my dog, and when I exchanged it for the next size down that did not fit either. I ended up contacting the customer service of the company that makes the VestHarness, Canine Friendly Products. They were very helpful and they actually modified a large size harness to fit my dog.



I have used the VestHarness when bike riding with my dog. It works VERY well for this, and, unlike a normal harness, doesn't dig into her skin if I stop the bike suddenly. It would also work well in other situations where you want a dog to be comfortable while pulling, but it is not an actual "pulling harness" for weight pull or similar sports.

You can purchase the VestHarness at the manufactrurer's website www.caninefriendly.com