Yes, she's a Chihuahua/Shih Tzu mix. And just like Hatchet she wasn't a barker. Oddly enough. Abby made them find their voices
What gorgeous dogs ? Re the doorbell -could you try training her to go and get a cuddly toy when the doorbell rings or anyone comes in then this would muffle the sound and stop the barking and might be a fun game.
Have you seen this Kikopup video? There’s a similar one of the dog barking at the door but this actually shows the process better.
Haha yes I love the chocolate as well, same thing, Axel matches my couches, rugs, and floors! It sounds pretty good, main thing is finding a trainer who does positive reinforcement training. So no E collars, prong collars etc. I chose to do a private session instead of group classes for personal reasons, mainly because I want all the attention to be on Axel and I. But group sessions would be great for socializing Abby with distractions and other dogs as you don’t think she had much of that in her prior life.
Like the other folks who have posted it does not look like aggression to me either. The other thing is I would not describe this behavior as "over the top" at all. When dogs go "over the top" it is really something to behold. Quite a few ways to get her to stop reacting this way. There is the treat method. I am not fond of this method but others are. It always comes down to what works with your own dog. There is the clicker method. Nah, I am not carrying a clicker around with me but it works too. We were lucky in some ways, we had just moved in so we had quite a few visitors coming by to do various things. Murphy would get way more excited than I saw your dog get. I would get right by him, tell him "it is ok, it is ok" in a calm soothing voice while I stroked his sides. This took a lot of patience, it either eventually worked or he calmed down all by himself. There were stages. When we started he would run right to the door to do his barking. After a while he would stop back from it and bark. Then he got to where when I approached he would sit and bark a bit. Then he stopped barking. Nowadays he will alert, go about 2 or 3 steps from the door and stand there with his tail wagging. He does not lunge at visitors, but he says hello once they are inside and then wanders off, lays down and watches. Not at all sure this would work for you but it might be worth a try. BTW, that "it is ok" thing works with him for lots of other things. He used to bark at any delivery truck that pulled up front when we were in the backyard. I started telling him "it is ok". Now, he alerts, I tell him it is ok, his ears relax and he just sits down.
Anything is worth a shot. I will try what you suggested I try to get Abby to stop barking by talking to her, but she just ignores me, and she will continuously bark until she feels its safe to stop, and with how deep and loud her bark is, it continuing for 10 mins is a bit much. Does anyone have any idea why she might get out of control while in the car??? If no one is near, she just can't relax. She lays down, then she's up again. Ususlly she's whining, panting, and pacing. If she sees someone, and they are far enough away she will growl. No teeth showing, just a low growl. If they are close, let's say in a parking lot, she goes ape ****. This barking is much different than what you saw in the video above. Her hackles are up all the way down her back, she's growling a lot and barking. And a lot of lunging and bouncing all over. I know some dogs just dislike cars, but she will even bark at people who are in their own cars if we are stopped at a light. It's rather embarrassing lol I feel this issue is just too ingrained in her to change as its rather intense. I will post a video in a bit. As I know its one thing for me to describe it, and another to actually see it..
Okay. So. I have a couple videos. We parked down by the lake not far from our house, and the first one is of her barking at a biker across the street from where we parked. And this one is of a jogger on the paths at the lake. Neither of these videos shows the worst of what happens. Usually it is worse when people walk by, not ride a bike, or jog. Her hackles weren't really up in these videos as much as they usually are. On the way home, we passed by 4 people, and she didn't bark once. It only seems to happen when we are stopped somewhere. Her tail is wagging at the time of both of these videos, I just didn't capture it.
I've not watched your videos, but barking at people when in the car is often resource guarding. You can "click for quiet" where she gets rewarded for staying calm. At first this means marking and rewarding as soon as you see someone, importantly before she has the opportunity to react. Park up somewhere where you know you will see people at a distance she can cope with, and work towards a closer distance over several sessions. You can also use a remote treat dispenser for this, which can be used even when you can't treat her yourself. Or, a helper in the back of the car with her.
It could be that she is reacting because the previous owners put her in the car and sometimes took her out and other times left her in the car. So now she would like to get out and about. I am not really sure so I would do like SnowBunny suggests and see how she reacts and go from there. Some of this stuff requires a bit of experimenting to find out what is really going on. Murphy is not crazy about the car, never has been. When we go somewhere he just lays in the back and does not look very happy. But like all labs he sorta knows where we are. When we arrive where he likes to go for a walk he gets up, starts pacing and whining. I have never left him in the car. He is the same way going to the vets. He loves the vets. Interestingly, when I stop for gas, he gets up to see what is what, but does not whine. So that sort of tells me that when he does it is because he knows he is somewhere good. I just took a look at the two new videos you posted. She is a really good dog! Like I said above, I would do as SnowBunny has suggested, but to me it seems more like she is doing the "Hey Look! A person! I am over here!!!" routine. Murphy used to do that until he became more socialized and realized that people are not all that interesting.
I will do as Snow suggests. Hopefully we will see some progress I see where you are coming from too T. Her bark and growl just sound so unfriendly, so I'm just trying to get a good idea of where she's at. Is she just excited, and wants to go meet these people she barks at? Is she aggressive or fearful and is barking to keep them away?? I feel her body language and sounds send mixed messages for me, so it's hard for me to figure out.
Ours don't usually bark at people or dogs when they are in the car, but they will when they are in the house. One of the mysteries of life is how Tilly, who is pretty much deaf, knows that there is someone on the sidewalk. Abby looks a lot like Cooper. Cooper does not bark much, she leaves that to Tilly. I don't think Abby looks particularly aggressive, just a bit excited. The Sammies we sometimes take care of are way worse in the car. Loki (one of the Sammies) is terrible on a leash on in the car, but fine in a dog park or at doggie daycare.
Abby will bark at people while in the house too. We have a nice large living room window that almost reaches the floor. We have to keep the blinds down mostly cause she barks at the people walking by, the dogs, the cats across the street, etc. I guess its the growl I'm concerned about. I think that, along with her tail wagging at the same time is what confuses me. Why the growl? If we are walking, she is constantly all over the place. Sniffing everything, paying attention to anything that moves. She is very alert to every noise, smell, and what she sees. Maybe too much? She's been like this ever since we adopted her. I can tell she's better now than she was when we got her, but it still needs a lot of improvement.
You know, looking at your videos, I would say that is a nervous, rather than an aggressive or resource-guarding dog. For now, I would not take her out in the car - or I would use the tactics suggested by snowbunny, that there is always someone in the back who can distract her or calm her down, and reward her for being calm rather than reactive. My older dog, Poppy, was like this with strangers for a stage in her life. Lots of gentle training and many, many treats helped her to learn that she had nothing to fear from strangers.
I think she looks unsure too, rather than aggressive. She hasn't been with you all that long, has she? Maybe she isn't too sure what you "want" her to alert to, so barks at everything just in case? Have you tried making a show of looking up and listening when she barks, then going "its OK" or similar, to show you checked what she said and she was right, there was something, but wrong, it's not important. She is a lovely girl though, I think you have a little gem there.
Bless her she looks anxious, puffing her cheeks, a little lip licking. I would use LAT (Look at That) with good treats. She looks at the trigger e.g. jogger, person walking past the car, if she's quiet you click, she looks at you and gets a yummy treat. You can set up people walking past your car whilst you sit with her. I'm sure you can sort this out as it's all about giving her an alternative, telling her there's nothing to worry about. There are some threads talking about LAT which I am sure you will find very helpful. She's a beauty x
Thank you all!! Comparing how she barks when in the car, to how she barks while on lead or in the house is different. While on lead, her bark is similar, but there is no growl. She does lunge, and jump, but when the person comes up to her, she sniffs, and is fine. No other issues. I think it's mainly extreme excitement. I've tested this with some brave souls I know, and each person who has met her walks away fine. One person said his dog is like Abby.. he calls how his dog acts as "aggressively friendly. " To me that seems to fit her perfectly. Her bark and behavior in the car sound different though. It sounds more, intense. Not sure if its the tight space or what. But I agree she sounds very anxious and unsure. And to answer the above question, we got her in March. So about 8 months we have had her When it comes to other dogs, I have a friend who is willing to work with me each week on introducing Abby to her dogs at a local park. Tomorrow is our first meet, so we will be taking it slow. I need to expose her, and get her used to other people, and dogs. This will be the perfect way to do it. Unfortunately when we are out on a walk, she shows no interest in the treats I have. Indoors, she loves them, but when outside it's like they don't exist. So I need to find something she sees as irresistible. I know she loves steak lol Anyway, thank you again everyone, and I will post an update on how she does tomorrow with my friends dogs!!
Well today I'm not quite sure what happened. Let me explain, and then perhaps you all can put in your two cents on what you think. So Abby and I met a friend of mine and her two dogs at a local park. It is a fenced in baseball field. It actually has multiple areas that are fenced off, but Abby is tall and can jump sections of the 3 ft fence, so i had to keep her on her leash. I let Abby see my friend and her 2 dogs from a distance. She immediately reacted by barking, lunging, and whining. I wouldn't go forward until she stopped or calmed down. Took us a while but we got there. I had her meet my friend first. She did fine there. Then she saw her dogs behind the fence and lost it again. (They were out of sight for a few). I walked her away and then back again once she was more calm. My friend had her dogs behind one chain length fence and I had Abby behind another. Her dogs were not on a leash. Abby barked and was pulling as soon as she saw the dogs approach. We wanted them to sniff through the fence first and see how they reacted to each other. Abby barked, jumped, and whined and was VERY excited. She wouldn't stop barking. My friends dogs were snarling and snapping at her. To me, I think Abby was coming on too wild and strong and either they reacted that way cause they took her as being aggressive, or just didn't know how to handle her energy. I pulled Abby away and walked around the fenced area we were in and my friend distracted her dogs, and we tried again. Once back near the fence, Abby saw them again and the same thing happened, except now Abby snarled back at them. That's when I pulled her away again, walked around the area, and we ended our visit. My friend and I talked briefly for 10 mins about 5 feet away from each other, and the dogs saw each other the whole time, and Abby just sat next to me, with her head near my hand. I stroked her the whole time she behaved in a calm way. She stayed like that, and whined when she watched them walk away. So, all in all not a great experience, but my friend and I plan to try this weekly, in hopes to get Abby used to other people and dogs. Do you think the other dogs reacted that way because they took Abby's behavior as being aggressive? Or just too wild??
I think you got too close; you need to stay at a distance where Abby doesn't react at all. You need to be rewarding her for being calm and gradually, over the course of many sessions, decrease your distance. You don't want her to rehearse this lunging and barking; whatever the motivation (frustration, fear, excitement...), it's not a good place for her to be. Remember, you need to be rewarding before the reaction, and not letting the reaction happen at all. If it happens, you're too close, back up. Don't expect this to happen overnight, it will probably take many sessions. As for why the other dogs behaved that way, there are many suggestions and it's impossible to know without seeing them. Some dogs will resource guard a boundary line. If Abby was lunging on her lead, she would have been lined up directly at them; this is not how polite dogs meet; they always meet on an arc. A lead makes that less easily achieved unless the owner is very aware; so they mess with the dog's body language, so they may have been reacting to her hostile direct body language, teamed with the demonstrative barking. In many respects, it doesn't matter why, it matters how you approach it, and that's to dial it back and make sure it doesn't happen. Plenty of rewards at the distance she can cope with, gradually working your way closer. Over many sessions.
