Our 4 month old lab has taken to ear piercing barking. He's not left alone during the day, he's crated, house trained, gets daily exercise, plenty of love, attention and play. Trainer at dog class advised to completely ignore him when barking. However when he's barked in class they say to distract him with sit exercises and feeding him. This does not work when we are eating our meal. He goes into barking overdrive. We've fed him, crated him and eat in a different room to him but he just keeps barking. All advice is welcome. We're close to re-homing him as we just don't know what else to do. Thank you in advance
When does he do this barking? The high-pitched bark we get from Coco is always attention seeking. Could that be what your dog is doing? When you're eating, perhaps you could train him to sit on a mat where he can see you. I realise this would take a lot of work initially. Would his crate fit in the same room as you? Coco also barks in class - this is a different bark, he does it when he's bored or frustrated - maybe when he's waiting for his turn, so the distraction exercises you mention certainly help here.
He can sit and see us when we eat, albeit behind a pet gate. We thought that was the issue so tried the crate and closing the door. I think it's the smell of our food that's triggering it. We have shared our food with him a couple of times but have stopped that completely.
Hi Scooby; it's been nearly a couple of weeks since you wrote about the barking problem, so I hope that the situation has already improved since then. I had the same endless-barking-at-mealtimes problem many years ago, with my young German Shepherd. It took a bit of time (and many disrupted meals) to change the situation, but I did it by utilising what I call the Stupid Mummy Syndrome. I decided that Stupid Mummy would believe that barking meant, 'Please may I leave the room?' And so, at the first bark, I happily got up from the table and really cheerfully said, 'You want to leave the room? What a good dog!' and equally cheerfully escorted Mr Bark into the adjoining kitchen, praised him again, and closed the door. All with the same sort of What-a-Clever-Dog happy attitude as if I was accompanying him to the garden during housetraining. But I left the kitchen door just slightly open. Mr Bark could push it open again with his nose, which he did. Naturally, he came back in with a lot more barking. Up I got again, Stupid Mummy Syndrome causing me to believe that he'd accidentally fallen out of the kitchen or something, and wanted to go back there: 'You want to leave the room again! Leave the room then, come along, good dog for asking....' Back into the kitchen we went, I praised the pup, closed the door most of the way, and very soon, of course, Mr Bark pushed open the door, and came back in ... barking, so we did it all over again. And again. And again. I'm glad I choose to eat a cold meal that evening. And for many more evenings after that. Meanwhile, away from mealtimes, I thought about something else. My little Barker was like your puppy - he had this wonderful little life. Never left alone, plenty of playtimes, fun training sessions, cuddles, outings - I had no other dogs at this time, and he was the centre of my world. Well, until my mealtime. Because then, when my partner came home from work, we would sit down to our meal, talk to each other .... and the canine centre of my world was the centre of my world no longer. No wonder he protested, and wanted to get my attention back again! So I also thought that maybe he needed a little less dependency upon me .... or maybe it was actually that I needed a little less dependency upon him. I needed to start leaving him alone during the day. The first time I went out and left him at home for (just!) 10 minutes, I hated it! But I kept it up, even if I only went out into the garden during that time. I stopped taking him to the bathroom with me, and would put him in his crate instead. I left him behind if I was just going out of a room for a short time. I picked up an old hobby again, one that required both of my hands, and so he had to 'wait a minute' if he wanted/needed attention at any time. Meanwhile, back at mealtimes ... Mr Bark learnt the cue 'leave the room' before he learnt to become Mr No-Bark. But a light did come on his head one day. He came quietly back in the room, presumably hoping that I wouldn't notice him. I acted like I hadn't noticed him. Though I did 'accidentally' drop a small piece of food on the floor for him to find. See, my little pup, it's worth it to be quiet in here. He wasn't 'perfect' from that moment onwards, of course, but the daily improvements in laying around quietly were huge. And, in the end, he became quite amusing. If, despite himself, a bark did come forth from him (well, what was that neighbour's cat doing sitting in our garden?), he took himself out of the room and into the kitchen (and turned a circle, and then came back in again). Sometimes he even did this without barking first - I guess that he had been thinking about barking! And, something he invented himself: if he barked, and the door to another room wasn't open, he would take himself into his crate instead. Apparently barking dogs are obliged to go somewhere.
I LOVE it! Thank you for bringing some humor to a very annoying problem. Our 4 mo old lab does the same thing - shrilly barks her head off when we’re trying to eat (and not just then), even though we have NEVER given her any of our food from the table. You clearly have infinite patience for Mr Bark, and I can only hope to keep the same for Molly because the barking, lunging, biting and peeing/pooping in the house is getting really old, really fast. She’s the sweetest thing ever when she wants to be, but can turn on a dime, and her time with us is only continuing because of Bella’s legacy (Bella was our first chocolate lab and we were spoiled by what a great dog she was. We lost her 6 months ago at age 10.) I still have faith that Molly will be a great dog one day as well, but we weren’t ready for so much disruption and, honestly, it’s evaporated all of our enthusiasm.
I use a lickimat for our pup during mealtimes. I put a half a can of puppy food on it. It keeps him occupied for awhile and I get a peaceful meal.
