Re: Morning Barking Well. Here's an update. The barking has stopped!... ...I'm joking. It's still happening :-\ The weird thing is, I've been reading up on this and 5am is a dog/labradors body alarm clock. I also messaged Dexter's brothers owner and asked her if it was a problem. He is doing the exact same time. I was so tired the other morning, a 4.30am wake up call. I could have cried! Shouting STOP sternly is working but I end up waking myself in the process. I didn't realise I could fill me lungs with so much air to shout I've been thinking about it. trying to have a reason as to why its happening. We put Dexter to bed about 10pm. Now being seven months, we read somewhere his bladder usually holds an hour per month of his age. So now its around seven hours. Which takes him to 5am. Maybe it's that? I am praying this is something he grows out of or its a weird, Labrador/dog phase that passes. Will keep you posted!
Re: Morning Barking If you tried putting him to bed later, would he make it past 5 a.m.??? Worth trying to see. I know that to start off with, it won't earn you any extra precious sleep, but if it does work, then you could bring bedtime forward by fifteen minutes and see if you can stretch it out to claw any extra back that way? Either that or just wait until the clocks go forward and hey presto! Lie in until 6 a.m. Clare
Re: Morning Barking If its any comfort, Lilly did something similar probably at about this age. We got fed up of her waking us up so early for no apparent reason. (we resorted to a quick squirt of lemon in her mouth when she woke us for a few mornings - on the advise of our trainer. It seemed to do the trick after a few mornings, but as an adversive, its not something we perhaps should have done )