Black lab, 3y/o, e ecollar, inside/outside dog, hunts a few times and well taken care of.

This past hunting season he keeps getting "Hot Spots" on the same spot of his neck. I dont tighten the ecollar down tight, just enough to make sure it doesnt fall off in the marsh. He only wears the collar when we hunt and 99.999999% of the time i only use the beeper button instead of the nick or burn.

The vet gave us antibiotics and some Neo-Predef powder to use on his sore. He gets a good bath once a week and he is washed down after every hunt.

Other friends dogs hunt in the same bodies of water as my dog but mine is the only with the hot spots.

i dont have a picture and google images is on the extreme side if you choose to google it.

Anyone have any insight?

My oldest dog gets the same thing (not used for hunting). We found he has dry skin and gets irritated quick. We use oatmeal bath to bath him! It's a pain to rinse off, but helps


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Do you think it's being caused by the collar rubbing? Sometimes they have allergies. Sometimes it's out of boredom that they get fixated on a spot.

If it's dry/irritated skin then go buy a bottle of Fish oil- problem solved.. And in my personal experience, you'll see a vast improvement within a couple weeks

Why does he need a "good bath" once a week? Could be you are washing all the natural oil out of his skin. Try cutting back on the number of times you bathe him.

My 3yo lab gets hot spots due to food allergies. It took us forever to figure out why she was itching so bad. We switched her to a grain free food and it stopped.

I tablet of fish oil a day may help if it is dry skin. Usually they get hot spots from scratching but not always. Giving them baths takes a lot of the oils out of their skin so maybe get a shampoo that is more skin friendly and then use it every other week unless you need to do it every week.

The first thing I'd look at is your e-collar positioning/tightness.

If you're putting it on loosely, that allows the prongs from the e-collar to flop around and rub the skin. Try positioning the e-collar as high behind the ears as possible (smallest diameter of the neck) and tight enough so you can just slip two fingers under the strap. That way the prongs are "locked" into position on the skin and don't shift around and rub the dog raw. Pull the skin under the prongs "down" to make sure the prongs aren't positioned on a fold of skin.
You'll think you're strangling your dog...lol...but, you're not and it's safer to have that collar strapped down tight.

Also, change the place where you position the prongs on the dog's neck from hunt to hunt. You can strap it tight on the left side of the neck, then next hunt position the prongs on the right side. Then, the middle, etc. If you see some irritation, then shift it during a hunt.

Remove the e-collar as soon as possible after a hunt to limit any rubbing. There are some dogs that are allergic to the stainless prongs, but that's rare.

I'd also concur with limiting the baths and the fish oil. You can find a huge container of "Grizzly Salmon Oil" on-line (I think it's about $35) My dog loves a couple squirts over his food and I've noticed an improvement in his coat even though I feed a very high quality food. Water seems to roll off his fur.

good luck!

X2 on food allergies. I talked to guy today who's dog is allergic to grain feed and was causing his dog to hot spot. That would be where I would start. Along with the other suggestions from these guys

Thanks for the input guys, I appreciate it! He has been on SportsMix Black for 2 years now with no issues but you never know. When I give him a good bath, its really only when he just reeks of marsh so bad he cant come in the house smelling like that! lol I'll ask my vet about the fish oil, that would be awesome to have such a quick and easy fix.

That's cool, but I'd still look very closely at your e-collar positioning. More likely than not, that's the problem.

You said you don't tighten the collar down tight? That's a big part of your problem. It's rubbing and chafing. There's a reason the collar companies tell you to tighten the collar down snugly. Take a look at your manual that came with the collar. That'll tell you exactly how to put the collar on.

Only time my dog has ever gotten hot spots was from a flat collar he was wearing on a 9 day hunting trip. The skin under the collar was apparently not drying well enough and the collar rubbed him raw.

A dogs collar should be like a Marines hair cut, High and Tight.