Barking - Rescue dog

Olive3

Hi,

I was wondering if anyone has any helpful tips. We adopted a rescue dog almost 2 months ago. She is a beautiful, affectionate 5yo boxer cross. She was in Dog’s Trust (DT) for almost 2 years after having lived with a family for 3 years. She was given up as she showed aggression to a child (growled). She was at DT for so long, as she also shows aggression to other dogs, so couldn’t be kept with the other ones. She started to show signs of depression as she hated being surrounded by them, so needed extra work. Plus she needed a home with no kids and no dogs. DT have done a lot of work with her, and she has settled in really well. She is house trained, obedient, knows tricks and is the most affectionate dog i have ever met. When we take her on walks, we try to avoid areas with other dogs, as when she sees one she barks - but we are at the point now where she will bark, we will distract her and she carries on as normal. She loves adults and older children, smaller kids she is a little wary (cowers away and looks unsure) so we don’t mix them.

Considering we have only had her 2 months, she is doing very well - but we are struggling with just one aspect. The garden! Every time we let her into the garden, she runs out, spins around in circles, heckles up and barks excessively and aggressively. When she is in the middle of this, she won’t listen to us either.

I know dogs bark, and we expect this. She barks whenever someone comes to the door, especially the postie (we’ve put a stair gate across the hall!) - she’s a good guard dog. It’s the garden issue that we are trying to work on. One of our neighbours has also mentioned it to us, and we want to fix it.

We have tried putting treats in the garden for her to sniff out and make a game of it (DT suggestion), this didn’t work. We are now restricting her access to the garden, and taking her in it on a lead so we can bring her back in when she goes crazy. But this isn’t working either.

Any suggestions?

Many thanks

O

mac.d

Can't offer any suggestions but have you contacted the Dogs Trust where you rehomed her from? They should be able to give you some good advice as they will have trainers who know all about behvavioural issues.

sheramber

here is one suggestion for calming your dog in the garden https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O2du74nBWgw

A few years ago a neighbours dog would lunge at the adjoining fence and bark aggressively at my dogs who barked back.

When they started barking I went out quietly and stood beside them and spoke quietly to them 'what is all this noise about? And j kept repeating such phrases quiet;y until they stopped and listened to me. Note i spoke calmly and quietly. if you shout the dog thinks you are joining in and this is fun.

Once the dogs were quiet I walked back into the kitchen saying 'come on let's go' and , once they were in the kitchen I shut the door and gave them a tasty treat from a pot that I kept at the back door.

I then carried on as usual . After the dogs been calm for a while I let them out again and repeated the process. if they were quiet when out I walked up to them and praised them for being 'quiet' and gave them a few treats one by one- more value that way- and came back in leaving them out.

If they started barking we started at the beginning again.

I may say that the neighbour's dog was shut out all day so was constantly there.

Eventually, I found that when the dog lunged and barked my three calmly came into the kitchen for a treat without a word from me.

Your dog is barking from excitement and joie de vivre so a bit different. She hs freedom in a garden all to herself with ho other dogs around.

But the principal is the same - calm him down.

As well as teaching him to be calm in the garden, teach him being calm in the house so that you can then transfer that outside.

When he is lying quietly go up to him and drop a treat between his paws. Don't ask him to get up, you want him to stay down and relaxed. Sit down beside him and stroke him slowly and calmly speaking softly saying' good boy , that's quiet ' ( I used ' settle') . If he jumps up or gets excited move away quietly. Don't correct him verbally, just get up and move away.

It is his choice- be calm and get attention, be excited and get ignored.

Practice that until you ask him ' settle' or 'quiet' and he will lie down quietly.

You can then use that cue when you need him to calm down.

have patience, be consistent and keep things calm.

Alvinism

Hey, I have the same problem with my dog, who barks at all other dogs when we walk past them. It is stressful and embarrassing, so I feel your pain!
One aspect we have managed to control, though, is her barking at the postie. She still barks, but I just say 'Rosie, go to bed' and she goes into her crate, which I keep near the front door, so that she can't get near the postman when I open the door. I got her to love the crate as a safe, fun place by repeatedly getting her to go into it and rewarding her with a treat. Now as soon as she hears me coming to answer the door she often runs into her crate herself without a command.

chucknorris

Olive3 wrote: »

Hi,

I was wondering if anyone has any helpful tips. We adopted a rescue dog almost 2 months ago. She is a beautiful, affectionate 5yo boxer cross. She was in Dog’s Trust (DT) for almost 2 years after having lived with a family for 3 years. She was given up as she showed aggression to a child (growled). She was at DT for so long, as she also shows aggression to other dogs, so couldn’t be kept with the other ones. She started to show signs of depression as she hated being surrounded by them, so needed extra work. Plus she needed a home with no kids and no dogs. DT have done a lot of work with her, and she has settled in really well. She is house trained, obedient, knows tricks and is the most affectionate dog i have ever met. When we take her on walks, we try to avoid areas with other dogs, as when she sees one she barks - but we are at the point now where she will bark, we will distract her and she carries on as normal. She loves adults and older children, smaller kids she is a little wary (cowers away and looks unsure) so we don’t mix them.

Considering we have only had her 2 months, she is doing very well - but we are struggling with just one aspect. The garden! Every time we let her into the garden, she runs out, spins around in circles, heckles up and barks excessively and aggressively. When she is in the middle of this, she won’t listen to us either.

I know dogs bark, and we expect this. She barks whenever someone comes to the door, especially the postie (we’ve put a stair gate across the hall!) - she’s a good guard dog. It’s the garden issue that we are trying to work on. One of our neighbours has also mentioned it to us, and we want to fix it.

We have tried putting treats in the garden for her to sniff out and make a game of it (DT suggestion), this didn’t work. We are now restricting her access to the garden, and taking her in it on a lead so we can bring her back in when she goes crazy. But this isn’t working either.

Any suggestions?

Many thanks

O

I can't offer any meaningful advice, but I just wanted to say that our current dog is a rescue (as was our last dog), and we got him only 3 weeks after our last dog passed away. I know that is a very short time, but we just couldn't stand a meaningless existence any longer than that. The first 6 months with him were bad, he was very problematic (jumping up at people, running away, being disobedient). Then miraculously he suddenly changed into the most wonderful dog, in fact, like a clone of our previous dog. I learned a valuable lesson with him, and that was that maybe you just have to give them time. He was only 2.5 years old when we got him, and we were his third home, but he will be with us for the rest of his life, he is the centre of my universe. I think he knows that he has eventually found a loving home.

Olive3

Hi,

I just wanted to say thank you for your help. We tried the quiet approach, going out with her and standing next to her and calmly saying quiet. If it didn’t work we called her in, if it did she got a treat as a reward. We also put solar lights out as we noticed whe was worse in the dark. It all seems to have helped! She has gone from barking 100% of the time to only when she hears another dog! Such a difference. She is settling in more, and we have noticed she is becoming calmer overall.

Thanks again!

Ox

Sagz_2

Well done! Many owners would not put the effort in that you have.

I hope you and your dog have many happy years together x