Kingdom of Pets

Posted by kay-r
Jul 13, 2010

I have a two year old sheltie, named Nellie. I have followed your books and she is well trained. Can heal on and off leash, does agility training, can sit stay, comes when called, enters the house after us, etc. BUT, I can not get her to stop barking. She barks when people come and when they go. I don't mind a few barks but she keeps it up. I have tried the training collar, closing her mouth firmly, teaching her to speak and then telling her not to speak when barking. The whole family is on board with all of these techniques and they do not work on her.

Question... I have an invisible fence for her. Works great! Also, have a hand set collar for use when I'm at the lake home. Could I use that correction collar to teach her to stop barking? Yet, I do not want her to get confused with her ability to roam the yards.

Please help!! I do not want to ruin what she already can do and the use of the invisible fence but she needs to stop barking!!

Thanks in advance for the advise.

K

Posted by MaxHollyNoah
Jul 19, 2010

Hi Kay,

I just read your Feb post too and I am not sure if Nellie's barking is aggression, or attention seeking, or excitment barks, or ???

I feel for you because Holly, one of my dogs, is a real barker too. She is a perfect dog if she doesn't bark. She is very smart so my husband and I always wonder why she cannot learn how to NOT bark. I think that is our fault though. We haven't been able to get our thought across to her. Barking seems to be a single problem to us people but it is not at all one action from Holly's mind. There are multiple reasons for her barkings and we need to deal each one of them separately.

She used to bark when I got home from work but we were successfully able to correct this behavior by going back to my car everytime she barked and didn't open the door until she got completely settled.

She barks alot with excitement evey time she sees even a very subtle sign of me going out with an anticipation of "I can go out with Mama!". This is really annoying and it makes me feel like I would rather take my other dogs instead. For this particular barking, I have been working with her to make her "down" and "wait" by the doorway until I am ready. She still barks at the beginning but when I remind her to "down and wait" she follows my instructions, although she looks so excited that even a fall of a straw can trigger her barking

She barks when someone comes to the door like Nellie does and we still cannot correct it. However, once we invite the person inside, she doesn't bark and she settles down quickly. No barking when he/she leaves.

She barks at even a slightest sound outside the house, including someone comes to the door of the house across the street but to be honest with you I don't want to fix this because I really like to have a alert guard dog when I am home alone. All I need to teach her is to "Thank you but that's enough for now" command

We adopted her 6 years ago so you can imagine how hard to correct this problem.

I would suggest you observe her barking and figure out reasons of each barking. If it is attention seeking, it's best to ignoring but if it is too much excitement that she can not handle without barking, it's best to give her a "work" (commands like sit or stay, or watch me!) to distract her from what she is so excited about.

I wish I could invent a pill that I can toss to Holly that shuts her up immediately

Good luck

Posted by wayne-lowery
Oct 1, 2013

I have 2 yorkies & they bark at any activity outside ,a passing jogger, another dog, a stopped car, really anything or everything.We have tried high frequency sound & shock collars.please help.Wayne

Posted by Preethi KOP
Oct 1, 2013

Hi Wayne,

Thanks for writing in to us.

Yorkies have a tendency to bark, so you are not alone with this issue. The easiest solution to this problem is to prevent their access to the trigger- so, if you can put them in your backyard and prevent access to viewing the road, your problem is mostly solved. Is your yard fenced? Even changing your fence/gate to one that is non-see through works wonders. I had the same issue with one of my dogs a few years ago and this solved our problem immediately!

Otherwise, you should do the following:
- Start basic obedience training. Please have a look in the Secrets to Dog Training ebook, it has a detailed 12 week training regime.
- Read through the alpha training ebook and incorporate the dominance-asserting ideas into your daily routine with them.
- Teach them the word NO. This is of the essence.
- During the training find out what motivates each of them. Is it food or toys of praise? Use this to your advantage.
- You could try desensitising them over a few weekends by having a family member/friend walk past your property continuously till they get tired of barking. This will require some very tolerant neighbours and possibly some acoustic ear muffs too.
- Be consistent, affirmative and patient during the whole process. With time, you shall certainly see progress.

All the best.

Kind regards,
Preethi

Posted by jennifer-booth
Feb 17, 2017

Part of the reason that I got the system was in hope that I could find a solution for my dogs excessive barking. Anytime somebody is walking in front of our house or when they're out in the backyard it is excessive and it doesn't matter if it's an animal person a squirrel a rabbit it's just non-stop how can I fix this problem

Posted by Preethi KOP
Feb 19, 2017

Hi Jennifer,

Thanks for your email.

Could you give us a bit more detail on your pooches - what kind, their ages, are they obedience trained, etc ?

I look forward to your reply.

Regards,
Preethi

Barking and will not stop!