Hello, We have a 10 week old female lab. She is eating well, getting light exercise (playing ball, 10 minute walks), on her way to potty training (no poop accidents), and good in her crate, chews her chewies. The issue we are having is her barking when she wakes up, when she wants to play, or attention. We also have 2 6-9 year old cats who seems ok with her. I just feel like she is barking for attention, and we are with her, but are cooking, watching TV etc... Does this go away?
It's hard to say exactly what is going on, but in general, in older dogs, if you always give her attention or food or whatever when she barks that is a reinforcement to her to keep barking. So the thing to try would be to give those things when she is quiet. So no food or attention in return for barks, wait until she stops and then give her what she wanted. You might find the barking increasing before it goes down. But your puppy is just ten weeks old. She is just a baby and figuring out how the world works. So try to work on slowly extinguishing this behaviour rather than going hard on it for now. You wouldn't want to withhold food or attention from her for too long, that would not be good for a little puppy. Try delaying just a little while, and the second she stops barking, put her food down, or give her a pat, or whatever. Dogs have limited ways to get our attention, so we have to be careful to respect that they do need to bark occasionally to let us know what they want while at the same time not allowing it to get out of hand. That being said, however, you also have to recognize that, just like people, some dogs are more vocal than others. My last pooch (a Border Collie) had the title of Barkiest Dog in the Universe, and although I tried to train him to be quieter it just didn't work. I eventually had to give in and accept that barks were part of who he was.
I always cut out the TV watching until they are 5 months old unless they are having a natural snooze. Then I take them in the lounge on a lead and expect them to settle from 9pm when we watch TV. The time spent bonding and playing with a young pup is very valuable for later training. But, I never give attention for barking - wait for at least 10 seconds quiet before going to the pup.
Hi there and welcome to the forum. I agree with the others above. Try to ignore barking and reward quiet. Even if you are going "shhhhh" or " be quiet" you are rewarding the barking so ignore unwanted behaviour unless you feel it's a signal to toilet. Jac
I rewarded quiet too. The OH half was like, whst are treating him for, he hasn't done anything..... I was like... but alas, he has. Now when he comes to the couch looking for attention when we sit down he just gives up after 2 seconds and goes and lays down too. But I found this only works if all your dogs needs are being met. If you had him in a crate all day then come home, wee , walk then feed they will go nuts with the energy burst from the food and bark and go zoomy and refuse to leave you alone.
