To buy my neighbours a voucher and put through letterbox?

[tertrisnblox]

My neighbours are attached to us. They are renting and moved in around 3 months ago. They are two males, I've spoken to one briefly who has introduced himself, the other guy is quieter.

I have two chihuahuas, who honest to god, are really well trained except the fucking barking. It's actually a nightmare, I feel constantly on tenterhooks. They are fine as long as no one else is in their garden, but if they are, so help the neighbourhood.

So full disclosure, I can't afford a trainer at the moment, so I have been trying to train them. I find this very difficult when I just want them to shut up quietly so not to upset the neighbours.

One of the men are really friendly and always smile at them and have mentioned coming over to say hello so they're not too scared of him.

I try and only let them out when no one else is in their garden. However, tonight I didn't see the quiet neighbour sitting in his garden. Let the dogs out and they went MENTAL. The neighbour looked visibly annoyed and quite right. Until he seen me then started smiling, I apologised and he smiled and said it's fine but he was on the phone and immediately went inside and slammed the door.

I feel absolutely awful and honestly don't know what to do. I know they may smile at the dogs but in their head they'll be thinking fuck off noisy dogs (and worse I'm sure).

I have tried the spray from pets at home, I have tried positive reinforcement, I have tried distraction tactics etc.

Would I be unreasonable posting a voucher and an apology letter to the guys? Or will they be thinking, fuck the apology, get it sorted.

I hate the thought of rehoming my dogs. I utterly adore them but I honestly hate the thought of upsetting my neighbours.

What if I went over and knocked their door and asked them how much this was upsetting them with a promise to do something about it? Like they could give them sausages when they see them to make them not scared?

I wouldn’t appreciate a voucher if I was your neighbour. No amount would make up for living next to yappy dogs

And I really don’t understand what you think your neighbour will get out of feeding your dog a sausage? That’s not going to make up for them having to put up with the noise and not being able to enjoy their garden in peace. Very odd suggestion

They've said its fine? You seem very people pleaser. Don't make it a problem till they do. Do not buy them anything. Literally none problem right now

If you cannot afford to train them, rehome the dogs. You cannot expect people to be disturbed by your pets every time they try and use their garden. People are entitled to peace in their homes.
Yapping dogs are horrendous - no more acceptable than people yelling outside your home every day! Anti social.
A voucher would be inappropriate as it's obviously going to keep happening.

You need to take measures to stop the dog. We are absolutely surrounded by barking dogs here and out dog can be a bit barky too.

However, we're really vigilant when he's in the garden, the minute he starts, he's called back in and the door is shut. So even if he does bark, our neighbours know it's going to be 2 or 3 barks maximum and he'll be in which I think does help. Some people don't seem to be bothered and let them go on & on. Don't be that person,

Don't give them anything, just drop a note in saying you're training the dogs but obvs they're territorial so they wont stop barking 100%, but you'll try to keep them out of the garden when they're around.

Maybe you could use a flag system. On your side put up a red flag to let me know your dogs are out and on their side, they put a blue flag to let you know they're in the garden. In and around this, agree with them general timings when you let your dogs out for toileting and a run around and ask if you can agree on timings when they try to stay out of the garden. The rest of the time will ve a first cone fest served situ, but if no one takes the mick, you'll be fine.

Dogs warning like this is a good thing. Don't completely train this out of them.

Also, introduce your dogs to your neighbours slowly. Eventually, they won't alert when they see them.

Good luck, OP.

If you can't afford training then you shouldn't have had dogs.

Sorry OP but that's the bottom line.

Your neighbours shouldn't be subjected to your dogs' barking just because they're in their garden.

Get them trained. If you can't do it or afford it then get them rehomed.

Constant barking is stressful , most importantly for the dogs.

this Breed has been bred to be highly anxious, protective and reactive. It’s such a tricky breed. I honestly don’t know if you can train it out of them, it’s so ingrained.

I lived with two and hated it. They bark at anything, me just moving from one room to another they kicked off. They’re needy, whiny and noisy. They like to be the boss - small dog syndrome.

i feel sorry for your neighbours, doesn’t sound like you know what to do, and even if you had money for a trainer, don’t think it would work!

this breed put me off dogs altogether, absolutely couldn’t cope with the noise and can barely look at a dog without irritation these days.

If your dogs need to go out for toileting then take them out on a lead, unless they have good recall then you could just accompany them or watch them from the door. As long as they are brought inside as soon as they bark.

My neighborhood’s quiet a lot of the time, until the yappy dogs start. Almost everyone appears to have a yapper, when one starts they all start, when one stops another starts. The owners don’t appear to be bothered by this at all, they just talk louder & I suspect most of them are deaf. Does the barking get on your nerves? I’d forget the voucher, sausages, & asking them how annoyed they are as you may just push your neighbors right over the edge with this one.

Doubt introducing the neighbours slowly will work - the two I knew started yapping when members of the household would walk in. Absolutely irritating

I'm not sure about the voucher but it's certainly a lot easier living next to a neighbour who is trying to do something about whatever nuisance they're causing and recognises it than living next to a neighbour who doesn't care or is oblivious so you are on the right track. You need to put a workable plan in place and let the neighbours know.

The most effective way I've taught my dogs not to bark outside was, the moment they bark, bring them inside on to their bed. If they want to be in the yard, they do it quietly or not at all. They very quickly associate barking with being sent inside.

Little warning for you - if they are tenants they will start looking for something else to move to. If they are nice and quiet, then you will lose out because you might end up with a difficult neighbour, who will hate the dogs, throw stuff in your garden, constantly complain about you, intimidate you etc etc and you will regret not having sorted your dogs behaviour.

Your dogs sound horrendous to live next too.

At least you acknowledge this, but this changes nothing.

As PP say, you need to take them to the park round the corner and not let them loose in your garden until they have stopped this behaviour. Yes this may be inconvenient, but if anyone should be inconvenienced in this situation, it's you and not your neighbours who have no control over the choice you made to have untrained dogs and yet are plagued with the consequences.

If they go in the garden, they go out, with you, on a lead. Then they can be brought in straight away if they start barking.

Again as pp say, however annoying you find the barking, you can times that by ten and that's how annoyed your neighbours are.

Please get your dogs trained, and keep them out of the garden as much as possible until then.

@SofaFromRomania I agree.
OP you sound like a nice person who loves your dogs, and are also someone who is concerned about upsetting the neighbours.
I hope you manage to get it sorted .

I live next door to a yappy dog that barks at everything. It's really, really annoying. However, I do know that they tried really hard to stop it with training/behaviourist but it hasn't worked.

The dog is territorial. And he hates my dog (who just stands at the fence silently, wagging his tail and looking at the Barker going nuts).

Annoying as the yapping is, the fact that I know they've been trying really hard to sort it did help. They seem to have given up now. A voucher would be meaningless.

I'd not take a voucher. It would feel like implicit acceptance. It's not OK. Keep them inside or bring them in as soon as they start barking.

It would drive me crazy.

Incessantly barking dogs are a pain in the arse. I’d rather you apologised than did anything else.

I have a neighbour with a yappy dog, and not only does the fucking thing never shut up, the owner is forever shouting at it to STFU, which just adds to the noise. I love dogs, I’ve had dogs, I can’t stand people who keep dogs and don’t train them properly. An apology, a voucher and a pocketful of sausages isn’t going to solve the problem. Get one of the beeping devices linked on this thread and get it sorted.

They need to go for a widdle and if you haven't noticed we have a heatwave ATM unless you can walk them early morning or late evening it's too hot for dogs to be out.

The sausage thing won't work I'd imagine because it'd go like this

Dogs see neighbours
Dogs bark
Neighbours give sausage
Dogs presume this is a reward for barking

We have this issue with our neighbours. Tonight I was doing some gardening with my head low next to the fence between us. I didn’t hear their back door open and then I nearly had a heart attack (I’ve had one before so know!) when one of their dogs suddenly started barking menacingly through the fence right by my head as they must have just let it out. I have to admit I shouted out “fuck right off” and they took the dog in.
We’ve had it for years - every time I go out in the garden whether to relax or do a job, their effing dogs come out and bark. I can’t tell you how frustrating it is - especially when I’ve asked them to do something about it and they are just too lazy to.
Please sort your dogs out, move to the countryside or rehome them. You are not being fair.

A trainer isn’t thousands of pounds. Most trainers are £50/60 an hour, and recommend 3 1 hour sessions, you’ll need to put the work in around that to resolve the issue but it’s not thousands. It won’t even be £200 that just suggests you’ve not even bothered looking

A voucher isn't really appropriate. You need to train your dogs.

Forget about the voucher.

@tertrisnblox an easy way to help your dogs with their barking.

Teach them the SPEAK & QUIET command . Makesure you use a different hand signal.for each command.

Best way to teach is to say Speak when your dog is barking. This first step might be difficult as it's not easy to get the dogs attention. Finding something that makes them bark could help...
Once they can bark on command intoduce Quiet. My dogs responded best to Speak followed by the word Quiet after 2/3 barks and a tasty piece of sausage! Mine was a barking addict and only shut up with food in his mouth!
The Speak & Quiet command will probably take a few days to master.
This first stage is best taught separately to each dog.
Once they know the command, practice with both together before moving on.

Then comes the tricky bit of introducing Quiet when they are all wound up and barking.

Make your voice deep and give it a stern undertone (no highpitch or too much emotion) say Quiet with hand signal the moment they are noticing/ looking at you.

And don't forget that all important sausage. (Only reward the dogs that respods to you)
Eventually you should be able to control them with just a hard signal!
Remember, practice little and often!
Depending on how clever they are and how committed you are, I think you are looking at 2-3 weeks max for training.

You could even build on this and make them take turns Speaking!!