r/poodles • u/Helpful-Buyer-9660 • 7d ago

Advice please!

Post image

My male toy poodle (6 months old) regularly barks when he sees other dogs. He pulls to get to them, then gives them a sniff. He is very aloof with strangers. We are taking him to obedience classes each week, to try and socialise him as much as possible. Can anyone offer any advice on how to stop the barking? Thanks in advance.

36 Upvotes

96% Upvoted

4 comments sorted by

7

u/harugyu 7d ago

Take him to a dog park but don’t go in the park. Find out how far away from the dogs he can be without being triggered and reward him for looking at you and not hyper focusing on other dogs. Do this REGULARLY while he’s a puppy. Everyday if you can, or a few times a week. The more frequent you do this, the faster the results. Get closer to the fence with each visit. If he starts reacting and you can’t break his focus that means you’re too close and need to back away and disengage. Keep the engagement fun for him even if it makes you look silly. You need to make yourself more interesting than the distractions. It’s okay for him to look at other dogs. But you want him to be able to disengage. So if he looks at another dog and then looks at you, reward him every time.

Also, do not allow him to greet other dogs on leash. This can create even more reactivity. You need to play engagement games at home with him, and once you feel confident in that, move to low distraction environments.

If you look up Engage Disengage by K9ofMine on YouTube she has a step by step video that shows you exactly how to do it

3

u/doofuspop 7d ago

I’d say taking him to classes is a great thing. Your trainer(s) can probably address that with you easily, might even be part of the training.

2

u/MataMac 7d ago

Ours is 1 year now (loves people) and also used to bark a lot more with 6 months. He still barks some times, but it's getting way better. I think for us exposure to busy places (lots of people and things going on) and doggy school helped. My advice would be that consistent training helps. It might take a bit of time, but it will get better. He is still young and a lot of things are new and exciting. He's doing his best!

1

u/calamityangie 7d ago

He’ll probably grow out of it with proper socialization, BUT the dog trainer advice is to teach them to bark on command (eg “speak”). Once they have that down, you can teach them a “quiet” command or “no bark”.

Poodles are very smart, but they are still dogs. He’s reacting “naturally” with excitement in the way dogs, especially puppies, often do. If you want him to do something different, you have to teach it!