I was hiking in the Boise Foothills recently and another dog owner noticed how well our retriever was minding and wondered how we did it.

I showed him the electronic collar my wife and I use for training our retrievers and explained a little about it.

I’ve gotten other questions from readers about electronic collars for dogs.

E-collars can be very helpful for training, but they can be a disaster if used the wrong way.

I’ve been a firm believer in their use since I was introduced to them by Jim Closson of Sit Means Sit dog training in Boise. He helped my wife and I train two retrievers.

E-collars get criticism because some people think they are cruel, but modern electronic collars have come a long way. In the hands of a trained dog owner, they sure beat yelling, pulling, choke collars and other frustrating things that can come with training dogs.

Today’s electronic collars come with numerous features. My remote control (which operates the collar) is fairly simple. It has three settings.

One is the pager, which produces a vibrating buzz on the collar and lets your dog know you want its attention. There is no electric shock involved.

Two other settings are for the stimulation, or electronic pulse. One gives a short, mild electric shock and the other a longer, mild pulse of electricity.

The strength of the pulse can be adjusted from almost nothing to an attention-getting jolt. I’ve found that medium to medium-low is enough to work with your dogs.

“The collar, when used properly is a tool that communicates to the dog, just like a cell phone communicates to people,” said Closson. “The collar should never be used as a punishment tool.”

It’s important that the owner of an e-collar learn its proper use from a dog trainer who has been certified in electronic collars, or get some other form of instruction.

It’s surprising how well it works when dog owners are trained on how to properly use the device.

In one of the dog-obedience classes we attended, the strategy was to keep the pulse on a very low intensity. The pulse was not painful, but it was bothersome to the dog, almost like a buzzing mosquito.

Now, we seldom use the electronic pulse when we’re out hiking, hunting or walking the dog in the neighborhood.

All we have to do is “page our pooch” and it turns around and looks for the next command, whether we call or use a hand signal.

After a second hit on the pager button, the dog immediately knows to return and sit by our side.

Of course, with the e-collar around its neck, the dog knows what comes next if she doesn’t check back for further commands after being paged.

I’ve used the pager to call my retrievers off a dangerous retrieve for ducks. Instead of letting the dog continue on a long retrieve in big water, I’ve hit the pager button. The dog immediately does a U-turn back to us. Then we head out in the boat to finish the retrieve.

The pager also works well in other dangerous situations. I’ve paged my dogs after they’ve flushed quail across a highway. I didn’t want the dog going out in traffic. With one hit on the pager, the dog looked for a signal and came back to my side.

There are a lot of other times when the pager comes in handy.

E-collars also are used to break bad habits and enhance other training situations.

Like I said, they can take a lot of the frustration out of dog training.

There are pros and cons about using them, like your dog will only mind when the collar is on. That’s not true if they are used properly.

Closson recommends:

Æ Purchasing an e-collar from a store or outlet that has multiple choices from different manufacturers. Top choices used by professional trainers are Sportdog, Dogtra and Tri-Tronics

Æ Choosing a collar with selectable levels of stimulation. This will help you find the level that best works for your dog’s personality.

Æ Check out training classes. See how trainers work with dogs and also how they teach dog owners.

Æ Use the remote collar for training, not as punishment.

Finally, there are basic and sophisticated models of E-collars, and they come with different features like beepers, locators and GPS tracking.

You can spend from $125 to $699 and more.

I’ve been using an e-collar for about five years and the most important thing I did was to get instruction on how to use it.

I do like being able to “page my pooch” out in the field.

Pete Zimowsky: 377-6445