This Is How To Stop Dog Barking
In all likelihood you have probably already tried to get your dog to be quiet - perhaps by scolding them or giving them a sharp rap on the back.
After all, dogs are born to bark.
Over the course of hundreds of years, thousands in many breeds, dogs have been trained to bark and defend property.
Some have been trained to be very aggressive, whilst others bark less often but still do it.
So what can you do? First off it becomes necessary to understand which forms of barking behaviors you can control.
To do that, we will first need to take a look at what causes the bouts of barking.
Prime Causes Of Barking In Dogs There are countless reasons for barking behavior in dogs.
Anger - barking can be a sign of aggression and loss of temper.
They bark when they are excited.
When something scares them they may bark in fear as well as a warning to their owners.
Lets take a look at some of the causes of this barking then:
Therefore it's undesirable not to mention impossible to quell a dogs barking completely - you can simply make it less of a problem.
They're going to want to express themselves at times, regardless of what you do to inhibit their behaviours.
Key Ways To Stop Dog Barking With the above in mind - check that anything in the situation doesn't justify the barking.
For the most part, you could classify the behavior as a bit excessive and so it should and could be stopped with behavior training.
First, ask yourself these three questions: When does the dog bark? What is the dog barking at? What exactly initiates the behavior? If the cause is fear-based or as an alarm to warn of something, a shout or reprimand wont be useful or effective.
Negatively reinforcing the behavior can lead to negative outcomes and behavior in other areas and so is not recommended.
Your dog doesn't understand what you're trying to tell them.
The fundamental cause of the outbursts remains, even if he gets the message that time.
The best strategy then becomes to change the very situation and circumstances to quell the dogs desire to defend itself.
Begin by taking control and leading the dog.
When you do this, you become in charge of the defense of the property in the eyes of the dog.
Another thing to do in conjunction would be to simply remove as many of the stimuli as possible by drawing curtains or restricting your pets view of the street etc If Your Dog Is Barking Due To Fear - You Can Do The Following Often we negatively reinforce the very behaviors we are trying to stop - for example if your dog barks while you are away or leaving the house, this is often because you have unconsciously trained him to do it.
How you have done this is that when he barks while you are returning home, you lavish him with attention.
This reinforces the behavior.
To prevent this, I recommend that you ignore your dog when you return home for around a quarter hour.
This way he will be less likely to associate your homecoming with attention.
Finally, to stop barking dogs, you should teach your dog how to speak and be quiet.
By creating a command that allows you to control the behaviour, your dog will learn to control the barking when it is not necessary.
A benefit of this is that, if there is an intruder or something you want your dog to bark at, they will still alert you.
Dog barking does not have to be the bane of your community that it has become.
Learn to control it early and you'll never need to worry about the neighbours banging down your door every day when you get home.
After all, dogs are born to bark.
Over the course of hundreds of years, thousands in many breeds, dogs have been trained to bark and defend property.
Some have been trained to be very aggressive, whilst others bark less often but still do it.
So what can you do? First off it becomes necessary to understand which forms of barking behaviors you can control.
To do that, we will first need to take a look at what causes the bouts of barking.
Prime Causes Of Barking In Dogs There are countless reasons for barking behavior in dogs.
Anger - barking can be a sign of aggression and loss of temper.
They bark when they are excited.
When something scares them they may bark in fear as well as a warning to their owners.
Lets take a look at some of the causes of this barking then:
- Territorial Barking
- As an alert to you of intruders
- Boredom - dogs will also bark to catch your attention and try to relieve their frustration
- As A Greeting - very commonly, your pet will probably go crazy and bark loudly to welcome you home
- Frustration Barking
- Compulsive Barking
- Injury or Illness Related Barking
Therefore it's undesirable not to mention impossible to quell a dogs barking completely - you can simply make it less of a problem.
They're going to want to express themselves at times, regardless of what you do to inhibit their behaviours.
Key Ways To Stop Dog Barking With the above in mind - check that anything in the situation doesn't justify the barking.
For the most part, you could classify the behavior as a bit excessive and so it should and could be stopped with behavior training.
First, ask yourself these three questions: When does the dog bark? What is the dog barking at? What exactly initiates the behavior? If the cause is fear-based or as an alarm to warn of something, a shout or reprimand wont be useful or effective.
Negatively reinforcing the behavior can lead to negative outcomes and behavior in other areas and so is not recommended.
Your dog doesn't understand what you're trying to tell them.
The fundamental cause of the outbursts remains, even if he gets the message that time.
The best strategy then becomes to change the very situation and circumstances to quell the dogs desire to defend itself.
Begin by taking control and leading the dog.
When you do this, you become in charge of the defense of the property in the eyes of the dog.
Another thing to do in conjunction would be to simply remove as many of the stimuli as possible by drawing curtains or restricting your pets view of the street etc If Your Dog Is Barking Due To Fear - You Can Do The Following Often we negatively reinforce the very behaviors we are trying to stop - for example if your dog barks while you are away or leaving the house, this is often because you have unconsciously trained him to do it.
How you have done this is that when he barks while you are returning home, you lavish him with attention.
This reinforces the behavior.
To prevent this, I recommend that you ignore your dog when you return home for around a quarter hour.
This way he will be less likely to associate your homecoming with attention.
Finally, to stop barking dogs, you should teach your dog how to speak and be quiet.
By creating a command that allows you to control the behaviour, your dog will learn to control the barking when it is not necessary.
A benefit of this is that, if there is an intruder or something you want your dog to bark at, they will still alert you.
Dog barking does not have to be the bane of your community that it has become.
Learn to control it early and you'll never need to worry about the neighbours banging down your door every day when you get home.
