Barking at Visitors to the House

[michaelk]

Hi:

Happy to report that my chihuahua has made great strides ( outside ) with all the suggestions and tips I picked up here. She used to be scared of her shadow outside and now happily walks calmly next to me when we pass the ' really scary things " like fire hydrants and leafs blowing in the wind .

The only thing that has actually gotten worse is in the house when people come over. In he beginning when we got her she just used to timidly approach our visitors and just go into her bed.

Now everybody ( except my wife and I ) gets literally attacked by her the moment the come onto our patio. ( really aggressive barking and nipping at the heels ).

Luckily I can redirect it fairly easy with a food treat, but the moment that is swallowed the barking and going after peoples feet starts again.

The moment I pick her up she quiets down completely as long as we have some distance.

She will eventually calm down, especially when our visitors give her a treat, but it seems very temporary - the moment someone ' dares ' to move somewhere it starts all over again.

Since I can figure out what her behavior actually represents to her , I am at a loss how to help her. Maybe somebody could chime in.

Thanks for your help

Cheers

Michael

[Lee Charles Kelley]

All dogs get a sudden urge to bite whenever there's any movement around the "den" door. Most of them offload that urge into other behaviors: barking, spinning around in circles, jumping up on guests, licking their hands, etc.

I think the best way to deal with this issue, generally speaking, is to teach the dog to go grab a toy and bring it to the "intruder." Think of the toy as a kind of pacifier. Here's a link to an old article of mine on the subject.

In your situation, I would teach the dog to go grab a toy every time you come through the door.

I hope this helps,

LCK

[michaelk]

Hi Lee:

that made all the sense in the world to me; let me find that old sock of mine ( her favorite )

thank you

cheers

Michael

[neilsattin]

Hi Michael,

Glad to hear that you continue to make progress. Please keep us posted on how things go with Lee's suggestions - there are a few other things that you can try...but one step at a time!

[michaelk]

Hi Neil:

thanks, ..well at this point, while the sock is her favorite toy, it doesn't seem attractive enough to channel her excitement.

The only thing that works 100% to 'redirect' her energy is food! Not sure if that's the proper thing to do, but that's what we have to do right now.

cheers

Michael

[Adriane]

Thanks for bringing up this question, Michael! We struggle similar issues but we have recently had a BIG success.

One of our dogs is very energized when the doorbell rings and when there is any movement outside our house (person, crow, dog, box blowing in the wind, etc.). To address the "launching self at the windows" issue, I have been using a quick game of tug (literally about 2 tugs). The progress has been amazing! Within a few days Obi Wan went from a growling lunging maniac at the windows to just doing a bit of huffing and puffing. Sometimes I call him to me and sometimes he huffs and then comes looking for me on his own! I keep the tug pretty low intensity. Honestly, I can't express what a change this is. This behavior has been a pretty big issue for about 2 years. Of course, we did all the dominance based techniques which obviously didn't work because I didn't teach him what to do with his energy!

Can someone provide some feedback on how I can incorporate this into redirecting OW when visitors come over? Do I address the issue before I open the door? Maybe both before and after the visitor actually comes into the house? I am going to move onto practicing this as soon as I find some willing victims. . . er. . . I mean volunteers.

Thanks so much!

A

[BrownieNJoyce]

Hi. Enjoyed reading Adriane's post. It is amazing to me too when my dog looks to me which is still occasional not frequent but it's so much more than before.

[neilsattin]

michael - yes, if food works for you, then I would work on pushing when you have guests arrive. The best way to tackle it is to actually have your dog on lead and set up a situation where a "visitor" (planned) is coming over. Then you can focus on your dog (and not have the visitor feel lonely). The leash will allow you to redirect if your dog is too wound up to hear you call her name.

And just to be clear, here is my article on how to redirect a dog's energy using pushing. In an energized moment.

Adriane - it sounds like you're on the right track. (the advice above also applies)

One further thought: once I'm successfully redirecting when guests arrive, I like to transition to a down/stay - on a box or bed - basically on a well-defined place (i.e. not just "in the corner" or "on the floor"). Typically, if you can get your dog to stay there for 10 minutes (make sure that your guests IGNORE the dog), and then release your dog from the stay ULTRA-casually, enough of the energy of your visitors' arrival will have dissipated to keep your dog relaxed from that moment on.