Dog barking

[ilkleymoorbartat]

Every night, in the middle of the night, a dog somewhere down the road starts barking and goes on for about 5 minutes. It's been happening every night for the last 2 weeks or so.

I have suspicions on who's dog it is but I'm not totally sure. Is this something we just need to put up with? It's waking me up every single night. What should we do???!

Not much you can do, dogs bark

In the middle of the night for 5 minutes? For context we're in a built up resudential area in a big city.

Just bumping this. Do people think it's just one of those things we have to put up with? Obviously I'm not going to raise it as an issue if people think that would be ridiculous.
I think they must have a dog flap so the dog comes and goes in the night.

It’s one of those things

Just pop a note through the door.
They might not realise..

This happened to us. Every morning 4/5am. Same dog. DH eventually worked out which house and went to the door. The owner worked early shifts and was just putting the dog outside while he showered.
DH had words, asked them to be more mindful of neighbours sleeping. Rarely happens now.

Tell them. Like a PP, we had the same problem and the owners were unaware (out at work, dog had access to garden). Doesn’t happen much now.

I've actually asked my neighbours and they are also getting woken up. 12.15 and 5am yesterday.

Do you think say something non person (even though I don't know exactly who it is?). The other option is mentioning it on our street FB group?

Is it really five minutes, thats a long time for a dog to continuously bark.

Thing is.. if they know, they're probably no happier about it than you are, but if a dog is startled awake and shouting, there isn't much you can do in the moment to stop that instantly - you can't shout at the dog, as the dog either thinks you're joining in or you are just adding to the noise. You can go and get the dog but that means you need to be woken, get up, go get the dog and that isn't instant.

One of mine was waking early and yelling out of my bedroom window, we've resolved that by blocking the gap in the open window (the glass has frosted film on it) with a fabric piece so now she can't see out. But again not an instant solution!

If they DON'T know or don't care... its even harder.

As far as noise pollution laws go, it is recognised that dogs do bark and it isn't unreasonable for dogs to bark when startled, but long periods of barking during the night are not reasonable, no.

I would stick a note through if you're certain whose dog it is just asking if they're aware and if there is some solution, closing a dog flap, shutting a window, having the dog sleep in another room so it isn't woken by noises etc. If you don't ask, you don't get after all!

Thanks for you really helpful post @WiddlinDiddlin

I don't think it's startled, it really does go on for a long time. But I take your point about it being difficult to manage as the owner. The thing is the dog is definitely outside when it's happening. I've got a sneaking suspicion that maybe they don't care / aren't aware how it affects others. I might just have to do some more investigating to know for sure who the owner is.

Lonely/attention barking tends to go 'barkbarkbark- pause to see if there is a reply... barkbarkbark-- pause to hear if theres a response...' and repeat, and some dogs can do that near non-stop, for a looooong time.

Dogs shut out may do this, old dogs with a dog flap may wander out and get stuck in 'shout mode' (mine does... we don't have a dog flap for this reason!) and forget they can shut up and come in...

If you find out where the dog lives, the first step is to communicate (or attempt to) with the owners - a complaint to the LA isn't going to get far without that first step - though if you find out where and then discover the owners are scary you can say you don't feel safe approaching them if you genuinely don't.

They may write to them straight away if they've had prior complaints, they may ask you to keep a diary (id keep one anyway), and following that they may write again, they may also loan you recording equipment though that route seems rare these days.

I wish you luck, it isn't always easy to resolve unfortunately, it is often not easy to find out where the dog is if it isn't one of your immediate neighbours, as sound can bounce of houses and sound as if its coming from somewhere completely different.

I was once on the recieving end of a complaint, which was only resolved when they complained about noise on several days when my dog and I were not there - turned out it was someone elses dogs entirely!