Best harness for Bloodhounds with large necks

Bloodhounds are genuinely one of the hardest breeds to harness — that combination of an enormous neck, deep chest, and loose skin folds means most standard designs either gape at the chest, won't close at all, or dig into the skin at exactly the wrong spots. Fit is everything here, and a poorly fitted harness on a breed like this causes real chafing problems. Before I point you toward something specific: how much does your dog weigh, and what are you mainly using the harness for — general walks, managing any pulling, or something else? And which part of the fit has been failing — the neck opening, the chest strap, or both?

That's the classic Bloodhound fit problem — the neck circumference is so much larger than the chest relative to other dogs that anything sized for the chest ends up strangling the neck, and vice versa. You need a harness with independent neck and chest adjustment rather than one that sizes as a unit. Can you tell me roughly what his neck circumference is? If you haven't measured, a rough estimate is fine. Also, does he have particularly heavy skin folds around his shoulders and chest, or is it mainly the neck that's the issue?

Right, 60cm neck plus heavy shoulder folds — that rules out a lot of options. The sore patches from bunching skin are really common on Bloodhounds and usually come down to straps that are too narrow or that sit at fixed points rather than floating slightly with movement. For a dog with exactly this profile, I'd go with the Julius-K9 IDC Powerharness in size 3 or 4 depending on his chest measurement. It has a very wide, padded chest plate rather than a narrow strap, which distributes pressure across a larger area instead of cutting into folds. The neck opening on the larger sizes is genuinely generous — designed with working dogs and mastiff-type breeds in mind — and both the neck and chest adjust independently with a decent range. The belly strap also sits further back than most harnesses, which helps avoid the shoulder fold area altogether. It's a back-clip design, which suits a moderate ambler fine. Measure his chest girth just behind the front legs before you order, and if he's on the boundary between sizes, go up. It's widely available on Amazon UK and there's a Julius-K9 sizing guide on their site worth cross-referencing.

Yes — the IDC Powerharness chest plate is one of the more substantial ones on the market, with a neoprene-backed panel rather than bare nylon. For an hour or two of walking it holds up well even on dogs with skin folds, provided it's fitted correctly and the chest strap isn't sitting right on top of a fold. The one thing I'd add: when you first put it on him, run your fingers under the chest plate and make sure the skin is lying flat underneath rather than bunched up into it. With Bloodhounds it sometimes takes a minute of adjusting the fit before a walk to get everything lying smoothly. Once it's right it tends to stay right.

Exactly — bigger size on a poorly designed harness just gives you a bigger poorly designed harness. The Julius-K9 IDC in the right size should genuinely solve this. Measure his chest before you order, aim for the middle of the size range rather than the top, and if you do get chafing around the chest plate edges in the first few weeks, a thin layer of anti-chafe balm on those contact points while he adjusts can help. Good luck with him.