Barking issues

So Pippa is now getting into the habit of barking at everything. She doesn't generally bark when we leave her, in her crate or otherwise, as she knows we ignore this. The times when she barks are:

At the cats - Pippa gets on ok with one cat, but the other one has taken a disliking to her and she is afraid of him. If he sits in her way she will bark and won't go past him. Also, she sometimes goes to where they sleep and just stands there barking at them when they've done nothing at all.

For a toy - Pippa barks when she loses a toy, for example when a ball goes under the sofa. I know that by us coming and getting it back for her we are reinforcing this, but I imagine also that it is quite frustrating for her to be unable to get to something that she was happy playing with.

For attention - Now I know this one is one we should simply ignore, and we are trying that. The difficulty is knowing why she is barking, so I will often hear her and then go to see what she is barking for. I then realise she is barking for no other reason and by coming to see, I have inadvertently reinforced this. She is not under-stimulated, we have long walks and we play and train a lot, and she has lots of toys and chews, and I understand she is a puppy, but occasionally I do want to just sit down for half an hour!

To go outside - This is definitely our fault, and I will freely admit this. She went through a bad patch of toileting in the house again so we went back to basics with toilet training. It got to the point where she knew she had to go outside, and so when she needed to go she would stand by the door. We thought this was good progress, rather than her going indoors, and so would go and open the door. This has now progressed into her going to the door and barking for our attention to go and open it so she can go to the toilet.

I know there are various ways of dealing with the barking, and I don't want to use collars or sprays etc (I did spray her with a water bottle a couple times at one point which worked but the sight of her little eyes screwing up just from seeing the bottle come out has meant that I can't possibly do this any more). So how do I tackle each individual behaviour, and are there any tricks to know when the bark is for which reason?

Other members will be able to better advise you than I can. Bentley was a terrible teenage barker and we have learnt to manage it well. I don't know if what we did was the best way though and we are still trying to get him to stop the 'attention barking'! We did not/will not use any kind of anti bark device.
The suggestion I do have, is to attach a rope with a bell to the door handle and train her to 'ring the bell' when she needs to go out. So then you'll be reinforcing bell ringing rather than barking if that makes sense
Good luck! It's absolutely exhausting living with a barker

Surely barking to go out for a toilet is a good thing? My yorkie will bark to be let out, it good that she's telling us rather than holding it in or going in the house. She does stop as soon as we get the door though!

But sometimes she barks by the door, so we let her out, and she doesn't go toilet she just wanted to go outside. When im at someone else's house and have to keep an eye on her in the garden all the time, and we are eating dinner for example, it is not acceptable to me to have to keep getting up and letting her out at her every whim. If we don't open it, at the moment she will continuously bark at the door. She has many wee breaks so there is little chance she is actually desperate to go.

It is already improving slightly with us being very strict about the attention barking. However it gets worse at night, she seems to sometimes almost get stuck in a rut of barking - possibly seeing reflections or lights outside, or hearing noises, i don't know. When she does this i don't think its for attention so i have been trying to distract her and then put her in her crate. It almost seems like a relief for her aswell as us, as she never makes a fuss in her crate. But i do feel bad doing this. Tonight she ended up going to bed at 2100 because of this, as getting her out again just starts her up again.

We have got a dog staying at the moment that barks a lot. If I want to sit down and relax for a bit, I have to put her on a lead and then just reinforce lying quietly with a treat at intervals. Good luck!

I think you should definitely give the bell on the door handle thing a go. I understand what someone else said about barking to go out being a good thing, but when it's not what you want then it needs to be trained out of her. Bentley goes to the back door when he wants to go out and sits there. If we ignore him, after a few minutes he will bark once, rather frustrated and we know that he really does need the loo. The good thing about the bell for you would be that when she rings it, you can acknowledge her 'just a minute' and then wait, if she doesn't ring it again then you know she didn't really need to go out.

Some dogs just love to bark! I'm sure someone with a lot more experience of 'barkers' will be along soon to give you some advice x

Pippa is a clever girl. She's quickly worked out when barking does and doesn't work

Is there any way of managing this better? Perhaps moving the cats' beds to a different place? Could you help out by asking the cat to move for her so that she learns that it is acceptable to ask the cat to move over? Can you interrupt her standing and barking and turn her attention to something more interesting?

You've answered this one yourself. You are reinforcing her for doing it. If you don't want to labour the point by ignoring her barking for you to get the toy, perhaps roll up a couple of old towels and block off the underneath of the sofa for a while until she has forgotten the game (because I'd be my bottom dollar that this has become a good game for her)

again, you've answered this yourself. If you can't help but reinforce because you need to see why she is barking, then at least make the outcome more boring. If the barking is for no reason, don't say a word, just turn around and go back to what you were doing.

Nothing wrong with her barking to go out to toilet. If she's doing it just to go out into the garden, then make sure you don't go with her to play or nag her. If she doesn't go, just call her back in and close the door and go back to what you were doing before the barking started.

There's no need at all to deal with this through aversives. Your girl has worked out what works so uses it. Stop it working and the barking will stop

Just picking up on a few
For this, I'd go to her but ask her to "Down" and then when she does, get the toy for her.

I see this as part of human/dog interactions, she is bright and only knows barking works, as she can't speak, so help her understand the "how" of communicating so it's not annoying and so she also gets what she needs.

If you do have to go and see what she is up to, do so but then ask her for "Quiet" (train this separately using rewards). Make sure she gets lots of praise and rewards when she is making the choice between barking and not barking in these circumstances.You can reward dogs and thus teach them, for NOT doing something

Also I tend to each a word such as "that's enough" which basically means "I can't interract with you for at least 5 minutes". I taught this using a toy, saying "that's enough" when I put it away and then transferring this to other situations

......
Overall, remember that barking is simply communication and take it from there. Sometimes it is ok for her to bark, but not al the time and not being overly attention seeking. She sounds clever
So train her certain exercises and help her communicate in the way you want. And oh yes, train a good calm Settle too.

I do this by choosing a time when the dog is naturally likely to be quiet. Set up for success by doing this. Then put on lead and have closeto you, one foot on the lead. When she realises she can go nowhere, she will lie down eventually. Gentle calm praise and a treat. After a few moments, release.Use a word for this. Practice daiily until she lies down automatically and then you can add the cue word such as "Settle" and gradually extend the time of this and take the lead off ..... you will be so proud when she does this for you
Wys
x

Thanks for all the suggestions, some really good ideas. Im definitely going to try the 'Settle' training too.

Training is going well, 'quiet' is well on the way and 'settle' has worked wonderfully. We are now up to 30 seconds of her lying there quietly (she might do more but im not pushing it too quickly!) and no lead.