Thanks for the feedback,
sounds like an e collar would be valuable...if that is the route I take I most definitely will get the video first. until that time I will be not having him off the lead again.In the mean time how should I deal with the cats if they come around?just a leash correction?

squirt guns work well as a cat correction device. Around my garden I have motion detection sprinklers and now cats aren't so much an issue anymore.

 Quote: shauna recknagle

In the mean time how should I deal with the cats if they come around?just a leash correction?

What is the outcome you want here? Do you want Kane to just ignore the cats? What behavior are your cats accustomed to from dogs? I think there is a difference between dealing with farm cats who avoid dogs and expect dogs to leave them alone, as opposed to teaching a pet cat and dog to live in close proximity to each other. Either way it's a matter of figuring out how to obtain, mark and reward the behavior you want from the dog while appropriately correcting unwanted behavior. However, how you set things up to get there would be different depending on your goals.

If you want Kane to ignore cats and understand that they are totally off limits, the e-collar will be very helpful. A really strong leash correction and stern "no" meanwhile when he even looks at a cat will start getting the message across. Any correction has to be strong enough to get through to him in no uncertain terms, and your timing of the correction needs to be accurate so he makes the connection. It's no use correcting him once the moment has passed. Personally I'm not a fan of lying dogs down as a correction - maybe it works for a really soft dog, but I know my dog would just think it was a hoot. I don't know your dog and what level of correction works for him, but given that he has severely injured one cat and you need to get serious about this, I would err on the side of too much rather than too little correction.

Hope this makes some kind of sense.

After a 15-45 minutes most dogs forget that they're wearing a new collar. So even if you start stimming the first day you can vary when the collar comes on and off. You will still get a dog who ignores the e-collar and you don't have to wait two weeks. It's putting the collar on and then stimming the dog every time that causes the dog to connect the two events.

Thank you all for the input

Any experience training shelter dogs? I am new to this board but an Ed Frawley fan. I trained field labs for 25 years and found I didn’t want to use many of the techniques the pros were using. I can’t wash my dogs out and I like Ed’s philosophy. Im wading through the suggested reading he sent. Older shelter dogs have had so many owners, repeat offenders in and out of the shelter, and react unpredictably from experiences unknown to us.

Our 3rd rescue is a 2.5 year old intact male Lab(?) from the shelter. I took him because he was on death row, too much dog for most people and wanted to see if I could retrain him to be a family dog for a new family. I’m not too sure about his breed. He looks all lab at first look but his movement, desires, and bark indicate something else. In general he has a pleasant attitude, fairly obedient that needs reinforcing. He’s very physical pushing with his big head. He has no retrieving desire. He was neutered 3 weeks ago. Bailey allows us to do anything to him and take his food. But he is he is the first dog our 16 lb cat has been afraid and he will put on a fierce chase after the cat. So far all the attacks have been in the house, plenty of places for the cat to hide and easy for us to get hold of the dog.

We had to fix this problem. The cat has taken care of “leave the cat” before. All I can envision is the cat throttled and Bailey has scares that indicate that he’s had a cat in his mouth before. For a week or so I had him on lead when near the cat, put him in a down, rewarding him with treats for leaving the cat alone. All praising when he did leave it, big correction when he didn’t. So, all that is fine when I’m paying attention. The dog goes in his crate when I can’t watch him or to sleep. When we are out in the yard he is always on a leash or in his kennel. After a couple of weeks I moved from the head halter to the pinch collar and starting to work with the e-collar. I am taking the ecollar slowly working on “here” and “kennel”. He got away from me 3 times and wants to bolt with even low ecollar stimulation (pager or power) so I have a lot conditioning to do. He reacts more than any dog I have had to the collar. Even more more than the GreatDane/Greyhound did.

For a few days I walked him around tied to my waste on the 16 ft lead. This week I put Bailey on a 50 line tied to the hitch on my bumper so he can walk around as I work around the yard and he is sticking with me. If he gets interested else where I give him a “Here” , low stim on the ecollar until he’s coming my way and I have a pocket full of treats when he gets to me. Now, I just have to get the cat to cooperate and test the dog but the cat isn’t playing this game. I use one or two of the other dogs to distract him letting them run around loose but Bailey on lead, doing basic obedience drills, but for the most part I’m keeping him separate from the other dogs. I don’t have high hopes breaking his cat attacking ways. It may be old habits from roaming.
This is Baileys blog Bailey

It seems that cat avoidance should be approached as any avoidance. We have moose, bear and porcupines to "proof" the dogs against.They can mean death for the dog. We'll see if we can do that and cohabitate peacefully.
Alaska Dog News

Let me answer with I am always present with my dog if off leash. The problem with this GSD is that she wanted to chase the cats in the house even in my presents. The e-collar did exactly what it was suppose to do in that she was to ignore, not even look at the cats and that is what happened. I have watched Ed's video and it is the same as when he talks about pack structure and babies or little kids. The dog has to ignore them because they cannot be elevated higher than the dog in the pack. Again, I am always around when off lease and she ignores the two cats. I am not saying this works for every situation, but it worked for mine. I used less that medium and it only took two nicks. The e-collar also worked for stopping her from jumping up onto my wife. I used the same procedure that Ed uses in the video. I am not fond of e-collars, but in this situation it was better than jerking her with a prong collar.