Barking started at 6 months/What to do?

[Nina]

Hi Everyone, my sweet quiet puppy is now 6 months old. She barks in the house at noises that in the past would not have made it into her consciousness. She barks at her reflection. Today she barked at my cellphone ringing (music) in my purse. I read that at 6 months puppies have a second fear period. I hate barking in the house and do not want a watch dog. One trainer told me to get beef baby food and tell her Come as soon as she barks. Apparently, me with the baby food is supposed to be more appealing than barking. Any ideas?

[Nancy, Ned, Clancy, and Charlie]

Ned is barking more also and even makes a low growl - and this could even be our son coming home! I saw an electronic machine that works inside to inhibit barking. I am considering getting it especially to use in our RV.

[GBK]

Didn't work for me Nancy. Buddy hated it, Kona had no reaction whatsoever and she is the barker :(
Poor Buddy had to listen to it go off and he wasn't even barking, he would look at me like "not fair mom, I
am being good!"

[Adina P]

There are a number of things you can do to train your dog to quiet on command--but not much to keep your dog from barking at all (which is my ideal because I also have no interest in a watchdog). I think short of a bark collar there isn't much to prevent barking entirely.

What I did, and I haven't kept it up so it's not working anymore, is to catch the dogs while barking and give a command phrase or word while sticking a super delicious treat in front of their noses and luring them away from the window. They start to associate that command with getting a treat and a stop barking and come to you for the treat. The phrase I used was: " thank you that's enough." Again this worked great for quite awhile, but the longer I went without giving treats as a reward the less they responded--which is usually how it works if train something with treats and then you stop giving treats entirely. That said, I don't like to hear the start of the barking so every now and then I'm tempted to buy A bark collar... But always chicken out!

[Doodlegirl]

We have two that bark more than we care to hear. Our older doodle, Charlie barks at any random thing like people walking by or if I'm listening to the radio and I laugh he barks at that, on a windy fall day he barks at the leaves blowing around the yard (every Fall - I'm not kidding). Then Charlie's barking gets our 10 month doodle, Fergus going and it can be quite nerve racking. Charlie barked at his reflection for the first 1 1/2 years of his life. At times he would get really worked up over it. We covered everywhere he could see his reflection, the stove, windows etc. and he got over it. I think you have to work at it really hard - act on it the split second it happens. I keep Charlie out of the dining room, where he can see people walk by unless I'm doing something that allows me to be right there with treats. If he starts I feed him treats while I softly say "quiet" and then cover my mouth with my fingers as a visual cue. The visual cue is what he responds to the best when I don't have treats nearby. He knows to stop barking when I put my fingers over my mouth. My trainor suggested that I actually set up the situation that gets him going. Have someone walk by the house while I'm right by and can immediatly treat him and give the verbal and visual cue. It's a great suggestion and it would probably be successful, but finding another person to carry it out with any frequency is the challenge! My trainer also said the barking at people walking by the house was particularly hard to stop because he barks at the person to keep them away and out of his territory so (in his mind) it works like a charm because the person always walks away!
Anyway, expert I'm NOT but I hope this was helpful to you.

[Danielle]

My 2 year old is like that and there doesn't seem to be much I can do about it. He barks at EVERY little noise, any new people around and gets scared extremely easily. He was never like this until he was just over a year. I can't take him anywhere anymore because he is too big of a chicken and when he is scared he barks like a crazy dog. I think it may have something to do with the fact that we tend to move around a lot (between college, home and at a friend's in the summers) and that he just doesn't adjust that easily, but I don't know. He loves going to these new places but gets freaked with new people and things. Makes everything very difficult.

[Rachel Jones]

Out trainer was telling us to reinforce the bark with a treat when she does it and say "speak", and then teach her to switch it off with "Quiet". She says to start with something you know will triggger the bark.

[Donna Griffin]

I'm no professional trainer, but it would seem to me that the treats may be rewarding the barking. If I did that for Jack, our 7-month old mini, he would be barking all day long! Jack started barking at about 4months. At first I was thrilled because I hadn't been able to get him to bark when he needed to relieve himself. So, every time he barked, I asked him, "Do you have to go potty?" and then I would take him outside. If he peed or pooped, I gave him a treat and lots of praise. If he didn't, we just went back inside. If he barked again, I would put my finger up to my mouth in a "hush" sign and say, "Hush, that's enough". If he kept barking, I would spray him with the water bottle. If that didn't work, I would calmly put him in the bathroom for a time out, about 2-3 minutes. Believe it or not, the time out trick always works. Since being near us is a priority for him, he comes out as calm as can be. Now, all I have to do is show him the spray bottle and he goes and quietly lies down. Sometimes I still have to resort to the time out, but infrequently. Hopefully eventually the "Hush" command and sign will soon work without the other steps. As an aside, I did try treat-rewarding a bark while saying "bark" to teach him the word... so that I could do "no bark" later.... but that was unsuccessful. That method worked great with my Golden Retriever, but Jack just wasn't getting it. Who knows why the spray bottle worked? I'm just counting my blessings! Best of luck to you.

[Meg (Murphy's Mom)]

There is hope. I remember that at about 6 mo Murphy started barking at everything. It was so annoying. He would bark at me when he was trying to tell me something or when he got excited. I remember saying "No Bark" all throughout the day. Ater what seemed like a long while he quite barking. I think he was trying to figure out how to communicate with me. He now uses little squeak noises if he has to go out. I almost never ever hear him bark.

So, I suggest that you show your disapproval when she barks and tell her "No Bark". She will get the clue hopefully soon.

[Linda and Murphy]

One option is to teach her to bark on command. I taught Murphy at about 3 months to "speak" by "capturing the behavior."
I was using a clicker to do so. Everytime he barked, I clicked and said speak and gave him a treat. then put a hand signal with it.
He was more interested in treats and pleasing than just barking.
He is not much of a barker now...only when startled, like when my college kids are home on break and come in at all hours. The boys definitely don't appreciate Murphy waking mom up.