My dogs barking

[damnthisvirusandmarriage]

My dogs bark. They only bark when people go past the house. Or if people are standing outside the house winding them up. I know this as I have cameras.

My neighbours have complained. They complained last week about this but my dog was out with me so it can’t have been my dog.

My dogs don’t bark late at night as I have kids and they’re asleep. I’m a single parent so they’re never alone at night as I’m here with the children.

My dogs are literally never left for more than a few hours due to the nature of my job. They don’t have separation anxiety. They aren’t bored. They are extremely well trained. They just bark when they can see or hear people go by the house.

I’m getting constantly nagged at and was previously reported for this. The man from the council said probably malicious and not to worry. That was months and months ago.

Are my dogs expected to never ever bark? Surely, surely some barking is not unreasonable? I can’t control who walks past and when.

From my cameras I know today has been a particularly busy day on out street though.

Dogs do bark but unless it's constant barking for hours,it's not an issue during the day if it's inside your house.
I can't see the problem with reactive dog barking for 30 seconds at time during the day and as you've mentioned,dog is fast asleep at the evening and during the night.
I think people suggesting film on the windows forget that dogs have very acute hearing and sense of smell so it may not solve the issue.
I usually leave the TV on,make sure the windows are closed and it seems to help as my dog is usually fast asleep when I come back.
Obviously,he does bark when I come back or someone rings an entry phone etc but we live in a pretty small but noisy block of flats so people are so far,we are all quite understanding and I am really lucky to have such wonderful folks around.
I would not really worry,if it's just for a short period of time and otherwise your dog is on his best behaviour,I can't see the issue.Living next door to others will never be quiet.

I hate dogs barking and I own 3 of them!

Not acceptable in my opinion for them to bark when people are walking past your house.
I could excuse the odd woof if someone knocked on the door but not just passing!

My life at home is hellish because of next door's dogs.

They bark when we:
Open the back door
Open the front door
Flush the toilet
Open a kitchen drawer
Turn the kitchen tap on too loudly
Open my bedroom windows
Sneeze loudly in my bedroom
Pull the shower curtain across

Etc etc etc

However it mostly happens when they are out so it's not constant (even though it's about half of the time) so council won't do anything.

It's so so awful.

Just because you can't see it on camera OP doesn't mean it's not happening

can't see the problem with reactive dog barking for 30 seconds at time during the day

A half a minute of a barking dog can be horrendous if you live next to it. Imagine being yelled at for half a minute - or as someone says, having a whistle blown in your ear for half a minute! Half a minute is a long time to have your peace disturbed by loud noise.

Try putting up with that if you are sitting quietly in your own home or garden. Ye Gods.

The OP has more than one dog - stereo!

Now imagine that happening every time someone passes on the pavement - countless times a day.

Intolerable.

@Susannahmoody

I'm your neighbour.

Me and my husband can't work because every time someone walks past your house (ours too, BTW!!) the dog goes ballistic.

I called the police last week and they came to see you. Please take note.

Bizarre

I have two dogs who love the sound of their own voices but they know that barking at non-threats is not acceptable. They will bark if someone is right outside the gate that they don't recognise, but we live rurally and there are only 4 houses so they know all the neighbours and we don't have many randoms come to the house. I'm pleased that they bark at strangers, they are good guard dogs that would lick a wrongun to death, but yes, you must bring their non threat barking under control, it must be v annoying for the neighbours.

However, OP, you aren't going to get many sensible answers on there, it's AIBU after all, and there are MANY dog haters on this forum

OP I would also suggest that as well as creating a visual barrier, you use white noise to mask the noises that set your dogs off. We use it when we go camping.

This thread has been eye opening. I have 2 dogs. 1 never barks, genuinely don't think I've ever heard her bark. The other 1 does unfortunately. He's a yappy breed . He barks when people walk past but thankfully we live in a quiet road. When we go out I always shut him out of the front room as whilst I don't think he'd bark a lot when we're out, I don't know for sure and it wouldn't be fair on my neighbour's. He did used to bark at the neighbours in the garden but that's lessened as he'd have to come in every single time and I think he got fed up of being grounded . You can also get blinds that go down from the top, where the top half let's in the light but the bottom half is blinds and he can't see out then. That really helps. Good luck finding a solution!

@damnthisvirusandmarriage you sound in desperate need of validation&seem to be seeking this through your transparent attempts to minimise the annoyance your dogs are causing your neighbours.A bunch of strangers on mumsnet hardly constitues a balanced demographic poll.how about running a one with your immediate neighbours..hmmmm im betting you'll hear a few home truths about your precious canines.Know far too many idiots like this buying dogs-but have to work all day&in denial about the hugePITA noise pollution deal their"furbabies"are wreaking on the neighbourhood.Gross

Have you tried closing your front blinds/curtains and leaving the radio on so they aren't as sensitive to every noise?

I have to confess I have no idea how to stop dogs barking, I have read up on it we have had dog trainers in, but dogs bark. Fortunately we live in a very small village and it is rare for anyone to walk past, there are only four houses nearby and the dogs would bark if people are getting in and out of cars, having deliveries etc. The only approach that works for us is to stop them seeing outside, we have shutters and if there is activity outside I will close the lower portion of the shutter so they cannot see it.

Anyone else really confused as to why people are standing outside the OPs house, purposely winding the dogs up?

In the real world, dogs bark and unless you are a special kind of person mnetter you know that dogs bark sometimes.

On here they and you should be slapped with an ASBO because even if someone claims to be a dog owner, it is one of those magical dogs that never barks or misbehaves.

though I imagine their children to be feral

For me it would be how often. Two or three times a day, no issue. Two or three times an hour, or late at night, then it is.

Barking is behaviour. Not training

Behaviour is training. It really is straightforward to train your dogs not to bark at every passing pedestrian. Or to put film over your window so they can't see out.

Train your dogs, give your neighbours a break.

My neighbours have a dog that barks non-stop when they’re out. I WFH. I can’t have my window open. It’s beyond annoying.

I had a neighbour like this. Endlessly complaining my children were too noisy. They weren’t. I would never allow them to scream and holler etc. Some people have unrealistic expectations and try to control their neighbours in their own homes. If you live on an estate you will hear the odd dog bark, lawnmowers and children playing. If people are that sensitive to noise they need ear defenders.

But dogs bark?!

My next door neighbours have 3 labs and they rarely bark. They are very well trained not to. If I go into their garden they might utter a brief bark of greeting, but not at any other time even if they can see me in my garden.

Unfortunately this comes down to whether your neighbour is a dog person or not. Give me a barking dog over a child any day!

And for the poster who said they’d be playing Iron Maiden to drown out your dogs - frankly, OP, I’d start playing the music myself and your neighbour will soon pipe down about the odd bark.

Can’t you just shut the curtains so they can’t see people walking past?

Barking abdolutely is behaviour. But what do you think you're training? You're training them to behave correctly

I have 3 dogs and out of all of them, only the Rottweiler barks when someone knocks on the door. He used to bark when we first rescued him and I trained him out of it. Took about 10 days but it’s easily done if you’re persistent. He will literally just do one (half-hearted) bark when the door knocks, just to alert me that someones there. There is no way I would tolerate him barking every time someone walked past. I live off a main road, people walk past about 100 times a day, that would be so unfair on the neighbours. The people who live opposite us got a dog over lockdown and left it, barking, in the garden all day. It was bloody annoying, especially as it was hot so we had all the windows open.

In the first instance I would close all the curtains and turn the tv on when you leave. There’s loads of videos on YouTube about training so watch them and try it. I trained using a motion and the word quiet. Just one word and a hand gesture. They will soon get used to it but be persistent.

I have a particularly vocal breed (beagle) and he doesn't get the opportunity to bark at passers by.

Window film on the front windows and/or closed curtains. If he barks in the garden he gets called straight back inside. Barking indoors and he gets told "enough" and he shuts up.

You just train the quiet command with treats. When they're barking, tell them to be quiet. Treat when they stop. Eventually they learn that "quiet" means "stop barking" and you can phase out the treat - it doesn't take long.

I was mega proud of him yesterday at a friends house - her little terrier went bonkers at the postman and I had my beagle on the floor in silence 🤣

It's a great feeling when they finally figure it out.

When one of mine started barking at passersby, from the garden, without saying a word I took him indoors, shut the door, then left him in the room for ten minutes. You have to be consistent and calm. The dog should get the message within a couple of repetitions. Other PPs have suggested good methods for indoors.

Our Ddog would sit in the window and bark all day if we let him, but we don't. When we go out we shut him in a corner of the hallway so he can't see the main triggers (magpies/pigeons and chinook helicopters!). He is happy enough with classic fm, his teddies and his Kong.
To me, the rights of my neighbours to a quiet peaceful life overrule my right to keep a noisy dog.