We've taught 'bark'. Please tell me we'll be able to teach 'quiet'...

[belindarose]

As suggested on here and by our trainer, we've taught 'bark' today. Now I'm terrified he won't learn 'quiet' so quickly! I'm bathing DD and can hear him barking outrageously at DH. I'm sure it's okay - maybe he's practising 'quiet' as well. We're saying 'enough' actually. I did ask DH to practise, now I'm regretting it I think!

How did you teach bark?

Click and treat when he barks! He now does it on command 'bark'. I can hear improvements - 'enough' seems to be working. It's just a noisy training session. And I'm scared he'll bark all night as he's enjoyed it so much!

If it's not a stupid question - why did you teach 'bark'?

It's meant to be the first step to gaining control over unwanted barking. So you put barking on a command. Then you can get the dog to bark when you want, which then sets you up to teach a 'quiet' command. The only other way to teach quiet is to wait for your dog to start barking naturally and then try and intervene - the trouble is with that is that if your dog is in a heightened state of excitement (which mine usually is if she's in the middle of a barking fit), it's very hard to get their attention.

I need to do this with my dog, bu haven't got round to it yet.....

Yes, good explanation, Feesh. Well, he's not barking this morning and didn't after DH stopped the training session last night. Haven't tried yet this morning as neighbour's dog is howling and I don't want to make it worse. I'll summon up the courage to practise later!

I'm so wary of teaching it. She gets a leetle bit obsessed with spontaneously offering whatever was the last behaviour we taught her (god I wish I'd never taught her 'paw' - she keeps boshing us with her paw now whenever she wants attention but I totally fall for it as it's so cute)

I don't want her to start barking every time I get the clicker and treats out!

Belindarose did you just have to have a clicker and treats on you at all times on the offchance that she started barking then? Or did you set her up to bark?

I'll keep you posted on how we get on! I'm going to try teaching him to push post it notes with his nose today, as a precursor to learning to shut the door (DH born in a barn...!). I love the way they hopefully offer their whole repertoire when they see the clicker. I'm hoping to make it as extensive as possible so he doesn't try the bark much! Actually, I don't think he randomly offers a behaviour once he's got it on a cue word. I certainly haven't seen roll over or shake hands for weeks unless asked for, so that's what's supposed to happen with the barking I suppose...