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The doghouse

Have you got a yapper? Mine is driving me bonkers...

6 replies

PrincessSlayer · 13/04/2015 19:58

Two smallish dogs, one not bothered about much at all and one barks CONSTANTLY at the window.
The house across the road have recently acquired several cats which are the prime source of yap-fodder (if anyone read the hilarious post by the lady who was told her cats would be reported to the council, I'm not that mental)
The poor cats are just sitting outside their house in the front garden as they have every right to do. It's my beloved little tyrant who has the problem!
We've increased her walks to see if really tiring her out will help, but she always finds the energy to rage at them. When she's yapping it's almost like she goes into a trance!
When I'm home, I can sometimes fix it by distracting her or moving her to another part of the house but that can get very annoying as she will usually howl pitifully to get back to the window.
Any suggestions?

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LokiBuddyBoo1 · 14/04/2015 07:42

Mines a bit of a yappy too at things that move outside the window. I find the only way to stop him is with a water pistol a squirt of water and he's quite sometimes I only have to show him the water pistol and he shuts up.

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Steadycampaign · 15/04/2015 18:20

I'm no expert but you are doing the right thing with long walks and perhaps add some mental activities (simple games) in to the mix too.

Then remove cause of barking if possible ie could you put up a curtain?

Finally - and I know this sounds odd - but can you teach her to bark on command? When you can do that, you can also teach her to be quiet (in theory!) . So basically you use a trigger, such as a doorbell and reward him when he barks (reward has to be within one second of behaviour). Then, even more bizarrely, reward him when he is quiet. Then you introduce the commands 'speak' and 'quiet'. Finally, you take away the reward for barking, so you are just left with reward for quiet. I haven't explained this very well, but this is the theory! A dog trainer (or failing that, a video on You tube) will help to explain more fully.

You need to tackle the howling away from the window too by rewarding when quiet too.

Good luck! It can be overcome but it takes a lot of time and patience!

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Steadycampaign · 15/04/2015 18:23

Another method using positive training techniques

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PrincessSlayer · 15/04/2015 20:17

Thanks, we do have curtains but she will just stick her head through them if she's feeling stubborn so I'm looking into blinds.
Very interested in the positive training - she is usually the type to learn commands quite quickly due to her all consuming food obsession so I think I will try implementing the stuff in the video and see if she picks it up!

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Steadycampaign · 15/04/2015 20:36

Good luck!

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loraflora · 16/04/2015 14:16

How about frosted window film which you apply directly to the window?

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