Only put the collar on her when you are walking her or she is in your direct supervision.

agreed - then your dog will associate the collar with a fun time, going outside and going for a walkies. You can also teach your dog not to chew the collars, but tell her firmly NO, Leave it, and giving her a toy to chew on and encourgaing that to be chewed instead. Good luck

If she can get her mouth under the collar to chew it, it is too loose. Our dogs have always had their collars on full time.

In fact, a dog we had for 16 years felt naked without her collar and would get very agitated when we would take it off to bathe her or put tags on it.

You should be able to fit 2 fingers between the collar and your dog's neck, no more, no less. I leave my dogs' collars on all the time because I have an irrational fear about them escaping the house. In fact, they wear an ID collar, a choke collar, and an invisible fence collar all the time, except the invisible fence collar comes off at bed time.

Yep, I'm trying to figure out how any dog could get a collar in their mouth unless it's way too big and loose for the dog!

My dogs wear their collars all the time, they have the license tags and the rabies tags attached and it is best they have them all the time.
Actually, just like Carmen's dogs, they are highly indignant when I remove the collars for any reason, they consider them their jewelry.

Like Meghane, I also have an irrational fear of the dogs escaping our fenced yard. But, both of them have gotten their collar (leather buckle type stuck) on the gate fence post. Both pups were left dangling by the neck. Luckily, I was there for both of these scary situations.

Flanagan was lying on the porch and I had the front door open so I could hear him (and could also see him if I walked to the door to look through the screen) anyway, I heard him try to get up, then I heard him struggling. I thought he might have fallen and hurt one of his legs. When I was right next to him I saw the real problem. Part of his collar (a choke type collar) had slid down between the floor boards and then when he tried to move it caused the circle loop to turn sideways. The more he struggled the tighter the collar got. He couldn't breathe. It was a very lucky thing that I was there and got to him so fast. That was the first time...so that's when we decided to switch collar types.

Now they never wear their collars but I'm still so afraid of them ever getting out of the yard by accident or chance.

Silly

Good point Silly. Choke collars should never be left on an unattended dog but your experience shows that even the other styles (buckle) are not accident proof.

I only use the break away collars on our girls so that problems like Sillys don't happen. When the pups were younger, one of them got her tooth stuck in the others collar. She was struggling and the other collar worked like it was supposed to. It broke away and came off. Since then I have been a firm believer in them. I am no way affliated with this company, just wanted to put in a link for those to see it.

Linda

Here is a link that might be useful: Break Away Collar

Probably not an issue for the OP, but wanted to point out that there are issues with breakaway collars, too. Our puppy has broken two of them (on a tie-out in the yard, she yanks, and the plastic prongs break). I looked out the window, and there was her collar, still attached to the tie-out, but no puppy! The first time, I thought the collar must have been weak/chewed on, but after the second time, I just don't use them anymore. If it had happened while on a walk on a busy street, it could have ended badly. Granted, one would hope that a dog would not be yanking that hard while on a walk, but still...

Seems like the "right" collar just depends on your dog and your situation. For a dog in a fenced yard, a breakaway is probably a good choice.

Freezetag-there are two loops, one on each side of the break away, that the lead goes through. You have to attach the lead to both loops in order for it to work. Sorry I went off topic for the OP.

Linda

I agree that a collar a dog can chew is too loose. I had no idea that dogs feeling 'naked' without their collar was so common, that's totally my dog's reaction!

We leave hers on all the time which is why of course, she's so accustomed to it.

I'm not sure if what she wears is a breakaway per se but it has a plastic buckle. She has broken two of them when she's pulled a bit too enthusiastically but I've avoided metal buckles because of the strangulation risk, I would rather she broke her collar, she's generally pretty good at staying round home and she has a tattoo and microchip. She is also a very gentle dog and not aggressive at all, so I wouldn't be concerned about her attacking anyone.

Proper supervision I guess is the answer in the end.

As for the original issue, I think the op needs to check collar is not too loose, and to work to get the dog accustomed. I suppose a tattoo and microchip would be a good idea just in case.