Practically anytime you visit a breeder, rescue, or shelter you will hear the often times very annoying sound of puppies barking.  While I’d almost expect to hear puppies barking in these common dog areas it’s often an unacceptable behavior when you bring your adorable new puppy home.  Every puppy is different, but it is very important to start your puppy training on the right foot by not encouraging a barking puppy.

Puppies barking are a part of normal puppy behavior.  However, there are things we can do to encourage and discourage these behaviors thus making the awful cacophony of barking puppies a more controlled behavior.

Puppies Barking

As I said earlier most people would consider the sound of puppies barking an unacceptable behavior in the comfort of their home.  That is why we are here:

• We know most puppies bark for one reason or another and as we mentioned this is perfectly normal behavior, but excessive barking we want to avoid.
• We know it can be difficult to get puppies to stop barking.  Owners often don’t know what to do and even worse they don’t know that they are encouraging their puppies to bark.
• We know how to get puppies to stop barking.

Why Do Puppies Bark?

Not all puppies bark for the same reason.  They may be barking because

• He wants attention.
• He has to go to the bathroom.
• He wants to go outside.
• He is bored.
• He is scared.
• He is lonely.
• And a myriad of other reasons.

Throughout this website you will find tons of useful information solving the all important question of how do I get my puppy to stop barking?

What Else Will The Puppies Barking Website Cover?

We will hit on several other important related points including:

• How to stop barking when house or crate training puppies?
• How to stop two common barking breeds?  Labrador barking and Terrier barking.
• Sometimes it’s not your dog.  When the neighbors dogs are going bonkers you might want to know: How to stop barking dogs?

Now that you know what the Puppies Barking website is all about please keep reading and find out how to get your puppies and dogs to stop barking.

Technorati Tags: Puppies Barking, Puppy Training

Puppies Barking At Night

Over the past five years I’ve raised a litter of 7 puppies, a litter of 3 puppies, my Aussie mix rescue puppy, and 2 guide dog puppies in training.  The litters of puppies seemed to bark and cry at night in unison wanting their next meal or just some attention.  However, most nights they were quiet and happy to be in the company of their fellow litter mates.  I had far fewer issues dealing with the litters of puppies barking at night compared to the individual puppies.

My first puppy was a night barking puppy.  It all started with his first night at home.   We picked him up from the shelter and he unfortunately was not very healthy at the time.  He passed out early and I transported him to his crate just inside the garage (I had him sleep in the garage the first couple nights because he was infested with fleas).  After a couple hours my little puppy began barking, crying, and whining.  I took him outside, he pee’d, brought him back into the house and he went back to sleep.  This ritual continued for the first two nights.

So what did I learn?  Young puppies often times cannot make it through the night without having to go potty.  In general they will not pee where they sleep.  Puppies will bark, whine, or cry to let you know they need to go potty.  Most puppies do not have full control of their bladder until they are 10-12 weeks old.  Stop giving your puppy water a couple hours before you put him to sleep this minimizes the amount of times your puppy will wake up in the middle of the night.

Puppies Barking At Night Part II

After a couple nights, a visit to the vet, and a drastic improvement in my puppy’s health he had more energy and apparently a different reason to bark at night.  Here’s my theory: The first few nights he barked for basic necessities — to go potty — now that he was feeling much better he had a different reason to bark — he was lonely and missed his litter mates.

How did I solve my night barking puppy this time?

I tried plenty of different methods, but the one that worked best was to first move the crate into my bedroom.  Unfortunately this didn’t completely solve the problem as my puppy still barked at night.  Instead of sleeping in my bed I got a pillow and blanket and laid on the floor next to my puppy with my hand and body right up against the crate.  Apparently he felt comfortable with this layout and my little puppy finally stopped barking at night.

I continued to sleep on the floor for a couple weeks until my puppy got used to his new home and surroundings and eventually stopped barking at night without me sleeping on the floor next to him.  YAY!  Mission accomplished.

How about you?  Have you been in a similar situation with your puppies barking at night?  How did you solve your problem?

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Singing Barking Puppies To Sleep

How can you not just love that?  As I mentioned earlier we may not all have the skills (vocal) to soothe our puppies barking with our singing.  I’m a horrible singer and I’m sure most people cringe when they hear me at the karaoke bar.  Don’t just assume that it’s all about the great singing.  As I mentioned in our Labrador Barking article and the Solution To Labrador Barking I basically carried on a conversation (gave praise over and over with a happy tone of voice) with my Lab puppy to get him to stop barking during his crate training.  Eventually he even fell asleep…I must have a soothing voice

So, if you’re having problems getting your barking puppies to fall asleep then try your skills as a singer and in a soothing tone try singing: “Good night sweetheart yeah it’s time to go….” Or, if you’re like me and can’t carry a tune try giving your puppies praise in a happy soothing tone.  Your voice may be all they need to stop their barking.

Have you ever tried singing to get your puppy to stop barking?  Did it work?  Do you have any other suggestions on how to stop puppies barking?

Technorati Tags: Crate Training Puppies, Labrador Barking, Puppies Barking, stop barking puppies

Part I – Labrador Barking

What was the solution?  How did I stop my Labrador from barking?

Lets start off with

Barking In The Car

A labrador barking can be a very annoying thing especially in a small confined place like the inside of your car.

As a guide dog puppy raiser I had to bring my puppy to work every day as a part of his socialization…and every day he insisted on barking in the car until we arrived at work.  The first thing we are told to do when our dog barks is to use a command such as “Quiet” to let him know it’s time to be quiet.  The other common command to use is the “shhhhttt” sound.  I found the second option to work slightly better for me.  However, neither worked very well they just interrupted my puppy before another barking session began.

So what did work for me?  This may be difficult for you to handle (if you have a barking puppy), but ignoring him until he became quiet for just a second and them giving him tons of praise saying “You’re such a good boy…” in a very happy tone was what eventually got my lab to stop barking in the car.

Barking In The Crate

I used a similar method to stop his crate barking.  However, his crate training was much more difficult.  He never had potty accidents in his crate, but he would bark non-stop for hours on end in his crate.  Since I needed to sleep this called for drastic measures.  His crate was right next to my bed and the method that worked best for me was to:

• Ignore him when he was making noise (barking, howling, crying…)
• As soon as he stopped barking give him praise like “You’re such a good boy…
• Instead of just stopping at “You’re such a good boy…” I continued to praise and talk to him in a happy tone as long as he was quiet.  As soon as he started crying or barking I’d stop praising.  I’d go on for up to 5 minutes praising and almost talking to my puppy and eventually he’d fall asleep.  I think it was almost like listening to a lullaby for him.

After about 4 weeks of following these simple rules my little guy stopped barking.  In fact, I only remember him barking one time over the next 12 months and it was because he was bouncing up and down at the front door.  I didn’t notice him and he let out a big “WOOF!”  I hadn’t heard him bark in so long I didn’t even know what his voice sounded like.

I won’t guarantee that the above will get your Labrador Retriever to stop barking, but it worked for me.  Every dog is different and will have different reasons for barking.  This is just one way to stop Labrador barking and hopefully it will solve your problem.  If not, delve deeper into this website as we will talk further about the many different ways to stop barking dogs and puppies.

One final note:  Always remember the 4 keys to successful puppy training:

Make sure that you are:

1. Consistent
2. Persistent
3. Insistent
4. Patience

Is Labrador barking something that plagues your home?  Have you found some good methods to stop a barking dog?  Let us know what has helped you in the comments section below.

Technorati Tags: Crate Training Puppies, Labrador Barking, Stop Barking Dogs

I’ve been raising guide dog puppies for the past 3 years and during that time not only have I raised two puppies from 7 weeks to over a year old, but I’ve also puppy sat over a dozen Labrador Retrievers.  You now might be wondering what the heck is a Guide Dog puppy raiser and what is puppy sitting.

A Guide Dog puppy raiser is responsible for teaching a puppy basic obedience and socialization.  We raise our puppies (70% are Labrador Retrievers) from 7 weeks to approximately 18 months of age.  Around 18-22 months of age we turn our puppies back in to the program where they go through formal training and learn specific Guide Dog commands and walking with a harness.  A Guide Dog puppy sitter is also responsible for basic obedience and socialization, but a puppy sitter usually only has a puppy for a short amount of time from a few days to maybe a month.  Puppy sitters basically watch Guide Dog puppies when the full time puppy raiser is on vacation or for some reason can’t care for their puppy.

Now you’re probably wondering what does all this have to do with Labrador barking?  I apoligize for the short summary on puppy raising, but I was just trying to present my experience with Labrador Retrievers and puppies…hopefully presenting me as an authority on Labrador barking which I must say I’ve experienced a lot of over the past three years.

Labrador Barking

I wouldn’t consider the Labrador Retriever breed to be a tireless barker…I’ll leave that for the hounds.  However, because Labrador Retrievers are the most popular dog in the United States possibly the world the question of how do I get my Labrador to stop barking is very common.  So let me tell you a little bit about my experience.

My first experience with an excessive barking lab was my first guide dog puppy.  He was a male black Labrador Retriever and little did I know picking up this tiny 7 week old Lab was the beginning of very little sleep for me over the next month.  I got the little guy home, played with him, worked on his potty training, let him play with my other dog, introduced him to the entire house, and then introduced him to his crate for bedtime.   Our guide dog program requires us to crate train our puppies.

He absolutely hated his crate and for the next four weeks every time I was ready for bed I brought my little labrador to the crate put him inside and out would come the crying, howling, whimpering, barking, and any other unusual dog noise you could think of.   This wasn’t the only time he would bark.  He also considered riding in the car pure torture.  Once again crying, howling, and barking were his usual behavior on our ride to work ever morning…

This article was a little longer than expected and has been broken down into two parts.  We will release the second article in the next couple days and include a link when part two is available:

Part II – Solutions to Labrador Barking

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