Yappy Little Dogs

[haulingthescoreup]

Oh, I'd forgotten squirt guns!

I've used them in the past for cats, but the difference is, you can't let the cat see you squirting. They need to think that the plant that they're eating, or the couch that they're scratching, or the table that they're jumping up on are doing the squirting.

Otherwise, they'll just wait until the Stupid Annoying Human is out of the room and do whatever they wanted to do.

Classic difference between dogs and cats!

[Anonymous]

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@Uborrow-Upay wrote:

Txjohn, I've had some pretty good training results with other breeds (including Heinz 57) using nothing more than a squirt gun.  I've never had a Jack Russell, so I don't know if this would take.

Bad behavior gets a squirt, right at doggie's nose.  Continued bad behavior gets additional squirts.  The key to this, as in most dog training I think, is that the squirt has to come ASAP with the bad behavior, so it's associated.

It's a bit of work at first, and we had squirt guns in every room of the house AND in several spots around outside the house for convenient and immediate reprisals for bad behavior.  After about two weeks or so (maybe more, now that I think about it), all we had to do was just point as if we had a squirt gun, and it was just as effective as if we'd actually squirted whichever dog was misbehaving in the nose again.

Eventually, the bad behavior ceased, but if it resurfaced, a real squirt was in order, just as a reminder.

This has worked for us for barking problems, and most notably for nipping problems.  One of our dogs (as a rescue pup) just wouldn't leave one of the other dogs alone, constantly biting at him.  The squirt gun solved that when nothing else seemed to take. 

Only had one dog this didn't work with.  He actually LIKED it!

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Duke, our Jack Russell, does like quirt guns, the hose, water in general.  He bites at the streams as though trying to catch it and will actually beg for more.

[Uborrow-Upay]

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@haulingthescoreup wrote:
Oh, I'd forgotten squirt guns!

I've used them in the past for cats, but the difference is, you can't let the cat see you squirting. They need to think that the plant that they're eating, or the couch that they're scratching, or the table that they're jumping up on are doing the squirting.

Otherwise, they'll just wait until the Stupid Annoying Human is out of the room and do whatever they wanted to do.

Classic difference between dogs and cats!

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That's hilarious!

Great post, HTSU!

[Anonymous]

We had these neighbors that backed up to our old yard (where all the fences met) the dogs would bark in the middle of the night.. They were sheltie's.

The would come down to the corner of the fence and bark like FREAKS until the wee hours of the morning. Called the police, two days they stayed inside then it started back up again. When they were gone at work, we left a polite note on the door stating that if the yapping didnt stop we were calling the local animal rights office and telling them the dogs didnt have food or water outside for two days..

The yapping stopped, the dogs were in the house at night from then on.

[Anonymous]

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@Anonymous wrote:

We had these neighbors that backed up to our old yard (where all the fences met) the dogs would bark in the middle of the night.. They were sheltie's.

The would come down to the corner of the fence and bark like FREAKS until the wee hours of the morning. Called the police, two days they stayed inside then it started back up again. When they were gone at work, we left a polite note on the door stating that if the yapping didnt stop we were calling the local animal rights office and telling them the dogs didnt have food or water outside for two days..

The yapping stopped, the dogs were in the house at night from then on.

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We crate them at night.  I would NEVER allow my animals to bark all night or bark part of the night.  I don't let them bark too much during the day.