Sep 05 2009
5 Reasons for Dog Barking Problems
I cannot get the thought of barking dogs off my mind this morning. That is due to laying awake listening to my neighbor’s insane pack of dogs barking at coyotes all night long. This gave me plenty of time to ponder all the many nearby dogs with barking problems, and the various reasons that caused these behaviors. It became apparent that my normally peaceful neighborhood, has more than its share of occasional dog barking madness.
I have written a short list of just some of the commonest reasons that cause dogs to bark in excess . You will have some work to do with your dog to correct the problem if he suffers from this behavior-actually I think we suffer a lot more from the barking than they do. It is too bad, but this barking problem isn’t going away without some work by you.
- One very common reason that a dog will start barking is when it sees another dog or a stranger somewhere within its visual range.This behavior is easy to understand, because it is very natural for a dog to want to protect its family and territory from others. This becomes problem barking when a dog just won’t stop the barking even after it has made its point. When the offending object has moved along, the dog feels a positive reinforcement of sorts, thinking he was responsible for chasing the person or dog away form the area that he can see.
- Many times the problems start when dogs start having a long-distance conversation with other neighborhood dogs that just goes on way too long. You can train your dog to stop doing this if he is one of those talkative dogs. You should want to correct your dog if he has this excessive barking problem, for the good of both you and the neighbors.
- Dogs that are all stressed out and insecure are much more likely to bark even for insignificant reasons. Because they just aren’t feeling secure in their surroundings they will bark out of nervousness. This problem reoccurs frequently throughout the day or night unless the master is there with the dog to comfort it. My good friend’s dog was such a nervous Nellie that it would bark if a leaf fell down form a nearby tree. That dog was really nervous. You can guess there was often a lot of barking going on for nothing.
- Many times dogs that are really bored and feeling lonely will start to shout out their frustration with non-stop barking tirades-sort of like they are going on a rant. Dogs that are left all alone most of the time without attention and interaction are the obvious candidates for this barking problem.
- Sometimes a dog just wants your attention, and will continue to bark at you until he gets it-he doesn’t care if you are busy doing something else. If the dog respected its master as the Alpha dog, he would not be trying that. If you cave in and give your dog attention in response to his bullying, you are in reality letting your dog train you. Until I put an end to my dog’s training of me, my Lab used to get a kick out of bossing me around when she wanted to play some more.
Give these tips a try for controlling your dog’s habitual or excessive barking behaviors. Please check out my full review of the best on line dog training program.
For more free helpful articles about dog obedience training and solving dog behavior problems, please visit www.BehaveDoggy.com.
3 responses so far
Very good write up. If you re-write it a bit to rephrase it I will post it on my blog. Let me know if your interested. I can link to whatever you would like as well.
[...] 5 Reasons for dog barking problems I cannot get the thought of barking dogs off my mind this morning. That is due to laying awake listening to my neighbor’s insane pack of dogs barking at coyotes. [...]
I have two 6 year old 80 lb. sister dogs together that enjoy the long distance conversation barking with other dogs and coyotes about 3 times per night. (This has become a problem for us now that the weather is nice enough to leave the windows open.) These are outside dogs that have 5 acres to play on all day long, and are placed in a smaller fenced yard with their food and dog house for their protection from the coyotes at night. I might add that many times during the day they are sleeping in this smaller yard that’s seperated from the 5 acres with a open gate. By the time I can get out to them at night to correct the barking, the barking would have stoped and they’d be quietly lying down, therefore going out to correct the problem after the fact wont work. Thankfully, they’re not bothering the neigbors, we’re up in the mountains and their dogs are barking along with ours. Being woke at 12:00, and 3:00 am is becoming old. We’ve tried turning a light on over their yard when they bark using remote controll, and that only worked for a while. We’ve yelled out the window for them to stop, only to be out-barked. This barking lasts for about 1 minute. Enough time to wake us up, then we can’t get back to sleep. Coming in the house or putting them in the garage is not an option. We have put them in the garage only when it’s very cold outside, and they don’t bark, but putting them in the garage all the time wont work. In the summer the garage is too hot and I really don’t think they like the feeling of being indoors. Your help would be appreciated. Thank you.