So here’s the deal. I’ve got a four-year-old dog who couldn’t be a better pet. Friendly, good with kids, protective…
Which leads to the barking. Incessent, relentless barking. She’s indoors most of the time–and quiet in the house–but occasionally we have to let her outside. When she’s out, she barks. And barks. I’ve even tried a shock collar, but she figured out how to pace her barks to keep the shock strength to a minimum.
I understand her barking is a release and a protective mechanism, and I don’t want to have her surgically altered. She should be able to bark when she needs to, but it’s annoying our neighbors (not to mention US) and I need ideas! So, I look to the smartest people I know on the internet… what can be done to control a barking dog?
Your thoughts are greatly appreciated, believe me.
This is very difficult behavior to change…imho. In fact, you may want to get a professional dog trainer. My suggestion is that you use a hand signal or voice command for “no bark”. Once you get the dog to show moments of silence… reward. Be sure to reward before another bark. Increase the amount of time for no bark. This will require great patience on your part. You should not expect this to make a huge difference for a considerable amount of time.
Meanwhile, the best you can do is exercise the dog and give him / her lots of quality time… all the while attempting to reinforce the do not bark rule. When you are not home, you may consider crating the dog. This may limit the barking. I just know the neighbors could be getting frustrated as well.
FWIW, I hope you do not surgically resolve this issue. I would strongly disapprove of this resolution. It seems cruel to me. YMMV.
What is it she is barking at when you let her outside? I think aversive training methods, such as shock collars and spraying in the face are cruel and unnecessary. Jacksen9 has the right idea. You need to train her to bark on cue and when to be silent and then you can control when she does this. But it is important to realize that if she is displaying a problem behavior, she is communicating an imbalance of some sort to you and it is up to you to find out what is causing this and correct it.
Does she get enough play time with you? If she is bored or not getting enough exercise or not socializing enough with other dogs, it could lead to excessive barking. Are you unintentionally rewarding her barking? By this I mean do you yell at her and give her negative attention when she barks? If so, it could be that she barks to get this attention. Remedy this by giving her a lot of attention for NOT barking. Tell her how much you like it when she is quiet and reward her for the quiet time.
According to Paul Owens, The “Dog Whisperer”, you can control problem barking by:
Ignoring it. Don’t reinforce it with negative attention
Distracting your dog with a sound or movement (not you yelling) and then give a “quiet” signal.
Go out and walk around. Reward your dog when she pays attention to you.
Desensitize your dog to the stimulus that is prompting the barking.
Make sure your dog has eliminated. Maybe your dog is over the stress threshold.
Block the view of your dog.
Put some peanut butter or caramel on the roof of your dog’s mouth.
Hold your dog firmly but gently until quiet. Release when her muscles relax, even if only slightly. Say “okay” or another release word.
Overall, I think numbers 2 and 3 are most effective, because essentially, you are interacting with your dog and relieving her boredom. If you are just putting her out and going away, that may be a lot of the problem.
This topic has been covered within the past 6 months. Do a search.
The most interesting suggestion was to make a rattle using an aluminum can with a few coins inside. Apparently it makes a noise which dogs don’t like. They can become accustomed to it, however, so use it sparingly.
If she’s mostly in the house anyway, is there a reason she has to stay outside when she begins barking? My dog would bark outside when he was bored or frightened. I’m assuming that since he was inside with us most of the time, he looked to us for companionship and entertainment. I found (in our fenced yard) he didn’t bark at all if he had something to do. One thing that worked really well was buying a water Kong. We’d tie that in one of our trees (this is a Great Dane) and he’d basically play with it like a combination tug-o-war and tether-ball. I’d help him get the idea in the beginning, and once he figured it out, he’d be out there for hours with no problems entertaining himself.
Spending time with him in the yard and associating it with playtime, I’m guessing turned the yard into a fun thing rather than a punishment. I also let him come back into the house when he wanted. I think he finally realized that he wasn’t being separated from us permanently and that it was more fun to blow off some stink outside rather than being made to lie down for being rowdy in the house. This wasn’t a quick fix, but with patience it might work for you, too. Good luck.
We live in an apartment, with our Labrador. This will sound cruel but if you don’t do this when it’s hot out the dog wont suffer any physical problems trust me, and don’t pit me for this. When ever we left our apartment our dog would get lonely (you know how moody Labs can get) and start barking, we were going to get a big fine if we couldn’t stop it, I asked our vet and he suggested the following.
If you have an apartment reverse the steps here (obviously) you go out and leave your dog in the house.
Get a roll of masking tape, put the dog out. When the dog starts to bark, go out and say QUIET! (or whatever command you want). Then tape the dogs mouth shut, (not with lots of tape so as not to injure the dog when you remove it) The dog will totally freak trying to get the tape off, you go back inside. The dog will be successful (this is why you use masking tape, and not to much of it) when the dog starts barking again, you go and say QUIET! And tape his snout shut again. Do this 4 or 5 times and I guarantee the next time you say QUIET Your dog will be quiet. Reinforce as necessary .
It worked for us, Zoey only barks now when someone with a smell she doesn’t recognize comes to the door and that’s not such a bad thing in this town.
