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him with attention from you at
an appropriate time, and may serve to reduce
extraneous barking by making your dog feel appreciated and
recognized by you.
Secondly, teaching your dog to bark gives him some work
to do, reducing boredom. Again, the mere fact of
training gives you and your animal something to do
together and gives him something challenging to learn.
If your dog frequently gets bored, the kindest thing you
can do is to work with him every day (even if it’s only
for a few minutes) on some sort of training.
Lastly, when you teach your dog to “speak”, you follow
up his learning that skill by teaching him to “hush”).
By rewarding your dog when he barks because you asked
him to, you are also teaching him that he should bark
when you say so. (It’s a slight distinction to us,
but it means something to the dog). If he barks when you
don’t tell him to, he hasn’t learned the rules of the
game yet. So first, teach him to bark. Then teach him to
be quiet.
You can teach most dogs to bark by using food as
reinforcement. Hold a piece of his favorite snack up
where he can see it, and say, “Speak!” (or “Speak, Fifi!",
or whatever his name is.). If your dog is inclined to
bark for general self-expression, he will probably bark
to ask you to give up the snack. When he barks right
after you say, “Speak!”, give him the treat and tell him
what a good dog he is. (It’s important to use both
reinforcements of food and praise because one day you
want him to obey without being bribed with treats.
Otherwise, your pockets will always smell of liver
bits.) Practice “Speak” daily until he understands that
when you say, “Speak!” he should bark in order to get a
treat. If he barks when you haven’t asked him to
immediately beforehand, don’t give him a treat; ignore
the bark.
Next, teach him to stop barking. Ask him to speak and
let him bark repeatedly until you say, “hush” and he
(eventually and after much prompting from you), hushes.
Then and only then, give him the treat. Now he is
learning that when he stops barking, he gets a
treat. Practice having your dog speak and hush for ten
minutes once or twice every day until you can feel
confident that he understands and will follow both
commands. How long this takes depends on two things;
you, and your dog. If you really do practice with your
dog every single day, you’re going to see much faster
results than if you just do it a couple of times a week.
Think about it: you and your dog are basically studying
together, and he needs to practice new skills over and
over on a consistent basis in order to really remember
them and perform them correctly. All things being equal,
if you work with your dog every day, you’ll be seeing
good results by the end of the first week, and you’ll
probably be feeling quite confident by the end of the
second. Now you’re getting somewhere!
(If you seriously work with your dog for two weeks and
you’re still having problems getting him to speak and
hush, your dog may have an unusual problem. Either
there’s a big dominance issue between the two of you, or
there may be a physical interference, such as pain,
hearing loss or illness. Discuss the problem with your
vet, and if your dog’s check-up seems to be fine, invest
in a trainer who can watch you together and spot
problems that the layperson might not see.)
Once you feel your dog has grasped the idea that he gets
a treat once the barking stops, you are on your way to
being able to reward him for not barking at all. This is
tricky, because now we’re talking about the way you
have been conditioned to respond to your dog’s
noisiness. At this point, you have to learn to respond
to your dog’s silence! The problem with silence is, it’s
easy to ignore it, because it doesn’t intrude on you the
way unwanted sound does. So once you’ve moved into this
final stage of training, make an especial effort to be
aware of times when your dog once used to bark, and
reward him for his silence.
If a dog who has always barked his brains out every time
the mailman arrives stops barking at the mailman, take a
moment to encourage his new behavior. Tell him what a
good dog he is. In the beginning, you may even want to
keep a few treats by the door so you can offer him a
substantial bribe for giving up that old, bad habit. If
the force of habit is too strong for him, help him out
with a training reminder: say, “hush” and when he stops
barking, give him a treat and encourage him.
Once in awhile a dog takes a real and personal offense
to the mailman, and the barking is more than just to get
your attention: he’d really like to eat the mailman. If
the usual bark prevention methods aren’t putting a dent
in the drama around daily mail delivery, talk to the
postal employee yourself. If you have a mail slot, you
can try simple bribery to change your pet’s mind.
Arrange to leave dog treats outside the door, sealed in
a coffee can to keep them dry and animal-proof. When the
mailman arrives, he can first push a treat through the
mail slot, then follow up with the mail. Dogs are
open-minded about using food to create and solidify
friendships!
The mailman is a great example for targeted
desensitization training. If your otherwise good dog
goes berzerk over a particular person or thing, focus on
that thing and work on it. Now that you have the power
of Bark Prevention Training working for you, you can
target specific areas and solve the problems that have
been bothering you all along.
In the case of the mailman, you can work with your dog
every day around the time the mail comes. If you can,
have your dog “sit” right before he would normally start
barking, and give him a treat and some praise for a good
sit. This is good in two ways: it gives him something
else to occupy his attention, and it’s harder to bark
with a treat in his mouth. If he starts to bark anyway,
tell him to “hush”, and give him a treat once he’s
stayed hushed for five seconds. Your goal is to keep him
sitting and hushed, so have a few treats on hand.
Maintain eye contact with him the whole time the postman
is there and until after he’s gone next door. You’re
letting your dog know there’s a new routine for the
postman, and that you’re serious about the routine.
Don’t turn your attention to anything else –if the phone
rings, ignore it.
If your dog has been barking at the postman for years
and years, don’t expect him to give it up after a few
lessons. Expect to make this routine part of your
routine for at least a month – and that’s with daily
practice! But focus on your goal.One day in the
not-too-distant future, when the postman arrives, your
dog will sit down and wait quietly for him to leave.
Obviously, the postman in the example above could also
be the Culligan man, the garbage man, the Avon “man”,
the Girl Scout “man”. It’s much harder to train
specifically when the visit is unanticipated, but if
your dog barks at anyone who comes to the door, you can
also practice intensively by having a friend come to the
door about ten times a day for the weekend, using the
same “sit” and “hush” technology described above.
Teach to “speak”.
Make eye contact: get your dog’s attention
Hold the treat where he can say it
Say, “Speak”
When he speaks, give him the treat and praise him.
Repeat repeatedly! Practice daily until he can speak on
command.
Train to “hush”
Tell dog to “speak” and encourage him to keep barking.
Say, “hush”. If he stops right then, praise him and give
him the treat.
If he doesn’t stop right away, repeat the command to
hush until he does.
Wait a few seconds to make sure he’s staying hushed,
then praise and give him the treat.
Practice daily!
Expect it to take some time!
Use bribes to help your dog like people he has barked at
before. Have the postman push a treat through the door
whenever delivering mail.
For specific people or situations, use targeted training
after teaching “speak” and “hush”.
Make eye contact: get your dog’s attention
Just before he would usually start to bark, tell him to
“sit”. When he does, give him a treat and praise him.
When he starts to bark, tell him to “hush”. When he
does, praise and treat.
If he starts barking again, remind him to hush, and
praise and treat when he does.
Practice daily, and expect it to take some weeks! (Not
hours, not days; weeks).
Pay attention and reward your dog when he’s quiet
instead of barking. Notice his changed behavior and
continue to reward it.
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