Customer Reviews

D.A.P. (Dog Appeasing Pheromone) Collar for Medium to Large Dogs - 25"

5 star:		(23)
4 star:		(14)
3 star:		(8)
2 star:		(6)
1 star:		(17)

 

 

Our 9 yr. old dog had occasionally been nervous but about a year ago it became extreme to the point he was shaking all over and would not leave our side. Our vet suggested we try this collar to see if it would help and it does. I think it took a couple days for his body to absorb enough of it that he became completely calm, but it has been very beneficial for him. At about 4-5 weeks of use we notice he begins to shake again and become timid so we put on a new collar. It has to be placed snugly around the neck so the body can absorb it. I don't know why he began to have such strong symptoms as an older dog. He was abandoned as a puppy and would act scared of certain situations when out on walks, but never as extreme or persistent as he did a few months ago. This has worked well for him and I'm glad to find it on line as it's about half the price as from our vets office.

I was desperate to find help for my 15 month old rescued siberian husky's separation anxiety. She was still struggling with being alone after many, many months of working with her using gradual separation techniques. I read mixed reviews about DAP's effectiveness, but decided to give it a shot anyway. I certainly did not expect miracles and actually fully anticipated it would have little effect on her behavior.

Within 2 weeks of putting it on her, I had increased the amount of time she could spend alone from 30 minutes to over 4 hours using gradual separation techniques and the DAP collar. This was remarkable! Not only is she calm while I am gone, she is no longer displaying overly-excited behaviors when I return.

I am very pleased with the effectiveness of this collar and would recommend it. It is important to remember that you still must work with your dog on separation issues. The collar does not 'fix" the problem. It is a tool for use during the behavior modification period that will help the dog calm itself more effectively.

This collar is amazing. I think it's important to note the collar does not work immediately, at least not in my experience. But, after 4 - 5 days wearing it, it was noticeably kicking in.

I have a rescued year old Alaskan Malamute, who is petrified of me and anyone else. I built her a pen within my fenced yard and all she did was run in circles, for as long as 6 hours, when I let her. It was so sad to watch her. Her foster mom mentioned DAP, and I must admit, I didn't think much about it working, but figured it would be worth a try.

Within 4 days, I noticed her behavior changing. She started pacing less and less and now, after less than 2 weeks, she's actually taking naps in her pen. I thought maybe it was because she was getting used to me and the cabin, but my gut is telling me otherwise. I'm ordering more collars and also the diffuser. I don't want to take any chances of this poor girl reverting to her former self.

She's outside sleeping on the deck right now. That wouldn't have been feasible 2 weeks ago. I'm not saying it will work for everything. It hasn't helped her accept me yet, but it has definitely calmed her down. I'm very grateful for that.

I'm eager to see how it works on July 4th and through a thunderstorm. She wears it all the time and I think it's helping her find herself.

Thanks.

We adopted a puppy mill rescue Boxer 6 months ago. Harriet is 2 years old and had been crated her whole life - used as a repetitive breeder female. Since we brought her home, her whole demeanor has been getting out of hand. Aggressiveness, barking, biting. We were just about out of options and had even thought of putting her down as to our despair, several obedience trainers advised us that she would not be welcomed at a class. The dog would "shut down" while we trying to work with her - stare into space - totally ignore us. This dog had been severely abused mentally.

After finding this collar & related information about it on the internet in addition to the references on this site, we immediately ordered one in an attempt to get through her barriers in a different way. To our delight, after only 1 week of wearing the collar, she is a totally different dog. Calmer, quieter, sweeter. The difference is AMAZING! We have started to work with her on basic obedience commands and she is responding.

I highly recommend this collar.

My three year old greyhound has recently developed anxiety to thunder, fireworks and gun shots. We bought this on the advice of our vet. At first it worked great but the July 4th holiday pushed him over the edge! I do think it has helped to ease some of his anxiety but that we will need to combine this with medication when there are fireworks or severe thunderstorms expected. I would still recommend this to anyone dealing with an anxious dog since it does seem to lessen his anxiety.

I am a vet student and I have had a ton of success with DAP collars on my pet and on others. It is important for possible buyers to know that these collars are meant to soothe anxious or worried dogs, not dogs experiencing fear. For example, if your dog had a terrible experience as a puppy or is afraid of thunderstorms, this collar alone may not work. Fear in dogs is something that takes time and effort to train out. For example, this might help me feel more calm before a test, but it sure as heck won't help me get over my fear of spiders.If you want to diminish a fear response, try using this collar in conjunction with training. In many cases, seeing a behaviorist can be very very helpful.

SHORT VERSION: DAP collars work great on anxious pets, but are not enough on their own with very fearful dogs.

My dog becomes stressed when leaving home and encountering new people or situations. I found the collar helped reduce his stress, which then enabled learning to occur through training.

D.A.P is not a "magic bullet" that will instantly resolve complex behavioral problems like severe separation anxiety with no effort on the part of the owner. In my experience, D.A.P. can help the dog calm sufficiently over time to begin learning new responses or behaviors.

Initially, I used one of the DAP cartridges near the dog's regular sleeping place. I then added the collar while traveling and at weekly training classes where stress was an issue - not 24x7. The collar was left quite loose so close skin contact was avoided. My particular dog did not have any reaction to the collar.

The combination worked well for us when paired with active training and behavioral modification.

I just had my dog at the vet. She does not deal with storms well at all and is a little neurotic as it is. I just bought the pheromone collar called nurturecalm24/7 - when reviewing DAP and another different collars I noticed the amount of pheromones in each. It looks like the Nurturecalm has the most percentage of pheromones compared to the other brands.
I just wanted to inform people that are trying these collars and didn't have much effect possibly try Nurturecalm. Nurturecalms pheromone percentage is 9% and the other 2 brands I reviewed were 2.5% and 6%,
So for those of you that got a little change but not enough for what you were hoping, maybe try Nurture brand with the higher percentage of pheromones.
Bella just got hers today so we will see what happens. I am hopeful this will help her!

After about 2 weeks of use, this collar irritated our dogs neck area (under collar) to the point where he had a bald spot there and also had broken skin (bleeding). We didn't see him scratch this area either. Just an FYI, thought we should warn people about this possibility. No response from seller about my concerns, so I wrote a review for people to see.

When we brought our new dog home at 1 1/2 years old from the dog shelter, he was very nervous, afraid and distraught when there was a reflection on the wall, ceiling, floor, etc. The DAP collar has been useful in calming him down over the past year. He tends to self monitor, and when there is a reflection, he leaves the room. Gunshots and cars backfiring are still a problem, but overall, we have a much happier dog when he is wearing the DAP collar. His behavior always alerts us to the fact that four weeks is up and it is time for a new collar. I do wish it was easier to remove the collar for his bath so we could put the same collar back on afterwards. Jan