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Need Help Curbing a Dog's Territorial Barking
Officer 1BDI
Registered User regular
Registered User regular
Some possibly relevant background information:
Here is the subject of this thread. Let’s call him “Draco”.
For the first six months that Draco was in my family’s possession, he was all but the ideal puppy. He was playful and smart and very quiet. As in I started to suspect that he didn’t even know how to bark. About 6 months ago the quiet part changed, and he started barking at people who walk by our backyard.
We have a decent sized, fenced backyard that Draco has free reign of, but the yard also borders a pathway on two sides. Furthermore, the “fence” is actually a bunch of tall hedges growing around chicken wire, so he can see people walking by (though even if that weren’t an issue I’m sure he could still smell or hear them). If someone walks by the house Draco will run the length of the fence, often back-and-forth, barking at them until they pass the house.
He doesn’t bark at anyone if we’re out taking a walk or at a dog park. He’s very friendly and submissive when we’re in public; it’s only on my mum’s property that it’s a completely different story, which makes me think this barking is largely territorial (although sometimes if he hears other dogs barking down the road he’ll join in).
The problem is that the pathway bordering the house gets a lot of traffic; on the weekdays there are clear “peak hours" in the mornings and evenings, but on the weekends it’s pretty random. This, unfortunately, leads to a lot of barking. This, of course, has my mother worried. She’s not only afraid of one of our neighbors getting fed up and complaining about it, she’s worried it’ll annoy one of our neighbors to the point where they storm over and kill the dog. I’d call the latter fear irrational, but when she was a child she had a neighbor threaten to shoot her dog over the same complaint so I can’t say it’s completely unfounded.
We’ve already tried a couple of things to at least temper the barking. For the most part this has involved calling Draco in when he launches into one of his yipping sessions, but even if he calms down enough to stop and listen to us he usually rushes back out as soon as the next person comes by. We’ve also tried locking him in during peak hours in an effort to remove the distraction altogether, but then he becomes anxious and scratches at the door whenever he senses someone passing (and sometimes he’ll just start barking at the person through the door or window, even if it’s shut). It’s also hard to determine when “peak hours” are on the weekends; sometimes they seem to last all day.
Now that I’m in the process of moving in with my mum and I'm around more often, I’m trying to teach Draco the “quiet” command, which involves me telling him “quiet” when he starts barking, waiting a few moments, and then rewarding him verbally/with a treat if he remains quiet. It’s only been two days, and seems to be catching on, to the point where if he’s barking and he sees me coming outside to command him he’ll immediately stop and run towards me. However, my mum’s afraid that I’m just unintentionally rewarding him for the barking… and now I’m worried about that, too. Even if that weren’t a concern, though, “quiet” still doesn’t prevent him from barking in the first place.
My mum is at her wit’s end, to the point where she’s threatening to buy a bark collar. I’m adamantly against this idea, in part because I hate the idea of using pain as a deterrent and in part because I’m not sure I trust either of us to implement the bark collar correctly. In the end, though, this is her dog and if she’s going to buy a bark collar I can’t do much to stop her.
I do think I can eliminate the need for one entirely if I can just get the dog properly trained, though. Hence this thread. I would love to try to train Draco to not bark at passing strangers, or to possibly desensitize him to passer-bys to the point that he doesn’t feel the need to bark, but I’m not sure how to accomplish this. Are there any other commands I should try to teach Draco? Is there some way I can reassure him about the strangers walking by without reinforcing his barking? Would taking him to puppy/dog school possibly help us curb his barking?
Tl;dr- How to I get this dog to stop barking at passer-bys in a humane manner?
I’m a recent college graduate who has been living with my father for the past year and visiting my mother (and the dog in question) on a weekly basis. I’m now in the process of moving in with my mother. I’ve known the dog since he was a puppy and we’re on very friendly terms. He usually minds me, but much of that depends on how distracted he is when I’m trying to get him to follow a command.
The dog was spontaneously brought home by my younger sister last October after she ran across a woman giving away puppies in a grocery store parking lot. At first the family wasn’t planning on keeping the dog, but he eventually became integrated into the family. However, he’s the first dog my family’s ever had (only my mum ever grew up with dogs), so this has been a huge learning experience for me.
Also, we have no idea what breeds are in him. My sister was told “terrier” and “chihuahua”, and while we at least believe he’s part rat terrier the rest of him is up in the air. So we’re [I’m] not sure how much of his behavior is instinct and how much of it is learned.
The dog was spontaneously brought home by my younger sister last October after she ran across a woman giving away puppies in a grocery store parking lot. At first the family wasn’t planning on keeping the dog, but he eventually became integrated into the family. However, he’s the first dog my family’s ever had (only my mum ever grew up with dogs), so this has been a huge learning experience for me.
Also, we have no idea what breeds are in him. My sister was told “terrier” and “chihuahua”, and while we at least believe he’s part rat terrier the rest of him is up in the air. So we’re [I’m] not sure how much of his behavior is instinct and how much of it is learned.
Here is the subject of this thread. Let’s call him “Draco”.
For the first six months that Draco was in my family’s possession, he was all but the ideal puppy. He was playful and smart and very quiet. As in I started to suspect that he didn’t even know how to bark. About 6 months ago the quiet part changed, and he started barking at people who walk by our backyard.
We have a decent sized, fenced backyard that Draco has free reign of, but the yard also borders a pathway on two sides. Furthermore, the “fence” is actually a bunch of tall hedges growing around chicken wire, so he can see people walking by (though even if that weren’t an issue I’m sure he could still smell or hear them). If someone walks by the house Draco will run the length of the fence, often back-and-forth, barking at them until they pass the house.
He doesn’t bark at anyone if we’re out taking a walk or at a dog park. He’s very friendly and submissive when we’re in public; it’s only on my mum’s property that it’s a completely different story, which makes me think this barking is largely territorial (although sometimes if he hears other dogs barking down the road he’ll join in).
The problem is that the pathway bordering the house gets a lot of traffic; on the weekdays there are clear “peak hours" in the mornings and evenings, but on the weekends it’s pretty random. This, unfortunately, leads to a lot of barking. This, of course, has my mother worried. She’s not only afraid of one of our neighbors getting fed up and complaining about it, she’s worried it’ll annoy one of our neighbors to the point where they storm over and kill the dog. I’d call the latter fear irrational, but when she was a child she had a neighbor threaten to shoot her dog over the same complaint so I can’t say it’s completely unfounded.
We’ve already tried a couple of things to at least temper the barking. For the most part this has involved calling Draco in when he launches into one of his yipping sessions, but even if he calms down enough to stop and listen to us he usually rushes back out as soon as the next person comes by. We’ve also tried locking him in during peak hours in an effort to remove the distraction altogether, but then he becomes anxious and scratches at the door whenever he senses someone passing (and sometimes he’ll just start barking at the person through the door or window, even if it’s shut). It’s also hard to determine when “peak hours” are on the weekends; sometimes they seem to last all day.
Now that I’m in the process of moving in with my mum and I'm around more often, I’m trying to teach Draco the “quiet” command, which involves me telling him “quiet” when he starts barking, waiting a few moments, and then rewarding him verbally/with a treat if he remains quiet. It’s only been two days, and seems to be catching on, to the point where if he’s barking and he sees me coming outside to command him he’ll immediately stop and run towards me. However, my mum’s afraid that I’m just unintentionally rewarding him for the barking… and now I’m worried about that, too. Even if that weren’t a concern, though, “quiet” still doesn’t prevent him from barking in the first place.
My mum is at her wit’s end, to the point where she’s threatening to buy a bark collar. I’m adamantly against this idea, in part because I hate the idea of using pain as a deterrent and in part because I’m not sure I trust either of us to implement the bark collar correctly. In the end, though, this is her dog and if she’s going to buy a bark collar I can’t do much to stop her.
I do think I can eliminate the need for one entirely if I can just get the dog properly trained, though. Hence this thread. I would love to try to train Draco to not bark at passing strangers, or to possibly desensitize him to passer-bys to the point that he doesn’t feel the need to bark, but I’m not sure how to accomplish this. Are there any other commands I should try to teach Draco? Is there some way I can reassure him about the strangers walking by without reinforcing his barking? Would taking him to puppy/dog school possibly help us curb his barking?
Tl;dr- How to I get this dog to stop barking at passer-bys in a humane manner?
Officer 1BDI on
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For 2 months now I have flipped him onto his side, held him down (gently but firmly), shouted "NO", and glared at him in response to barking. I try to be consistent and I keep my attention on him until he cowers and behaves. It takes a lot of repetition.
Within the last few days he has shown signs of improvement. Instead of full-on barking he mostly grumbles and yips while glancing guiltily at me.
So whatever you do, if possible, get your mom and anyone else in the house to do it too, so he's not getting conflicting commands.
Ps. Your dog looks adorable.
Edit: Oh, and we also tried a bark collar, it didn't work. We had one that would spray him with a burst of some sort of lemon water or something. He just started to bark once, wait the half second for it to go off, then bark like crazy for the four second window where it wouldn't spray. Again, probably because of the conflicting training. All it did was teach him how to bark super fast in short bursts.
kedinik: It sounds like what you're describing is alpha rolling, which I've heard can go very wrong if not done properly, so I'm hesitant to use it because I'm so inexperienced with dogs in general. I'll keep it in mind, though.
Aethos: Now that you mention it, my mum does something similar (not very often, but it does happen), so I'll bring it up with her. And your dog's workaround for the bark collar sounds like something Draco would develop.
Thanks.
Dogs roll onto their sides to display obedience, instinctively. When you put your dog on his side you are tricking his brain into obedience, not frightening or bullying him.
It's similar, neurologically, to how forcing yourself to smile makes you a little happier.
I would try distraction, such as working on obedience lessons during a peak hour with some tasty treats, walk away and deny any more fun time if he barks and loses concentration on you.
good lord, dog training should not be this difficult
you've tried the carrot, now bring on the stick
you've been doing things positively so far, but you haven't made clear that you're the arbiter of right and wrong
you have to display both or you're going to get nowhere
also
exercise him, as onceling said
I understand that this may come down to us incorporating methods I'm not comfortable with, but for the moment I'm trying to see if I've exhausted all of my other options first. While I appreciate all of the advice I’ve been given so far, what I’d like to focus on, at least for the moment, are commands or calming techniques that I may have overlooked.
As for exercise, I agree that it’s important and I’m sorry to say that I don’t think the dog is getting enough. He’s played with multiple times a day, and he as a buddy in the family cat that helps burn off some energy, but he doesn’t get walked as much as I think he should. I actually brought up that point with my mum this morning and we’re going to begin walking him twice a day; once in the mornings/before work and once in the evenings.
And thanks for the obedience lesson tip, onceling. I’ll definitely give it a shot.
You need to do two things. First you need to prevent him from practicing this behavior while you are training a new one. What you are doing right now is a form of management and you need to step it up. Does Draco have a crate? Do you have kongs? You need to find a way to keep him inside and occupied unless you are outside with him. Every time he practices this behavior it gets stronger.
Second you need to teach him a new response to people walking past. You can't teach a dog to stop doing something without using punishment. You can teach a dog to do something else instead. Decide what behavior you want your dog to do (sit and watch?) and create situations where it is easy for your dog to do the correct behavior. If need be, sit out in the yard and practice obedience behaviors and have a friend walk by further away than normal from your fence (my friends are happy to do weird things like this if I give them beer and pizza afterwards). Slowly move the person closer to the fence and slowly move yourself further away from your dog but only when you are willing to be $50 he will sit quietly without barking in the new setup.
Also, Draco is an adolescent right now, the training will likely go very slowly but it will have big payoffs as he matures into his adult brain. You might find this article on canine adolescence interesting.
More physical exercise can help, so can more mental exercise. How do you feed Draco? I would suggest that he not get any more kibble from a bowl, make him work for his dinner and he will likely enjoy the games and it will use up some energy in the process. You can make trails of kibble out in your yard for him to follow, or hide jackpots of kibble around the house or yard or buy toys dedicated to making dogs think. Does Draco know any tricks? How much obedience does he know? Just doing some training every day will help as well and you don't need to block out large chunks of time to be effective. 30 seconds per training session several times throughout the day will be enough to keep him learning.
EDIT: While classes are really great for this sort of thing, if you can't get to a class, here is a wonderful website called the training levels that lays out how to train a dog with very clear directions on how to start each behavior in different types of dogs.
*Yes some dogs have longer association times than others. However, for idea learning, the consequence of a behavior, positive or negative, need to come within 3 seconds of the behavior. Yes, if you like I will provide citations when I get home from work.
This is what I've heard elsewhere, and it's why I haven't struck the dog myself. My mum smacks him once in a blue moon, but it's still something I think I need to discuss with her.
Thank you so much for all the info, Kistra. That's exactly what I'm looking for.
You're right about the situation: Draco usually starts barking outside while we're all inside and by the time any of us make it outdoors it's already been at least 5-10 seconds. I didn't realize the window of time was even shorter than that, though, so thank you for clarifying that.
Draco does have a Kong toy, but it's not big enough to hold a significant amount of kibble. I can easily get a more suitable one, though. He's not crate trained yet, but my mum's wanted to train him for that for a while and this may be the push we need to finally start that process. He does know tricks, and we try to practice those with him at least once a day, but we could bump up those sessions. And I'm sure we could gather a few friends to help us train him to react to passer-bys in a more appropriate manner.
And thank you for those links. I'll have to look over them after work, but from a glance they already look like they'll be very helpful. If you have time to provide those citations you mentioned I would love to look through those as well.