Very noisy at agility!
Posted: 26 Jun 2014, 22:11
Agility schnauzers, I need some advice on curbing the barking if that's at all possible!
We're currently on week 6 of an 8week block. We've previously done obedience where she's pretty barky on arrival but she's occupied with practicing various tricks etc and only really starts getting noisy when the teacher stops us to tell us something.
Cookie goes absolutely mental at agility! Not when it's her turn on the course, but when we're waiting and watching the others. Her bark is so crazed and quite different from normal and it's really difficult to pull her attention away. She's driving me nuts!
Generally she's not too bad with barking (considering she's a schnauzer!). She barks at the front door and when people walk past the back fence, which is fine by us, but not much else indoors.
On lead, she often does a bit of a manic bark and pulls to get to see whoever it is she's excited about seeing but as soon as she gets to them she stops.
Off lead she doesn't really bark that much, it's generally just a little roo that she does when she sees something that takes her interest.
So my thinking is that she's barking at agility (and in general) because she can't get to what it is she's excited about ie another dog going round the course. But short of letting her join in I can't think what we could do about that!
Last week at agility I managed to distract her most of the time when we were waiting by playing tug of war with her but feel like I'd just replaced one form of excitement (watching the other dogs) with another.
The only other thing that works quite well is using treats; making her sit, wait, lay, rollover, find it, all that stuff. It's achievable for the most part to keep her attention with this, however she's still in quite a high state of alert and I'd quite like for her just to be chilled and relaxed! Plus with using the treats I end up feeding her a whole treat bag and then some during a one hour class. Kongs don't hold her attention for that long.
So, any success stories of reducing the excitability/ barkiness of your schnauzer? Is it something she might grow out of (she was only 1 in April)? Or do I just have to put up with it?!
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We're currently on week 6 of an 8week block. We've previously done obedience where she's pretty barky on arrival but she's occupied with practicing various tricks etc and only really starts getting noisy when the teacher stops us to tell us something.
Cookie goes absolutely mental at agility! Not when it's her turn on the course, but when we're waiting and watching the others. Her bark is so crazed and quite different from normal and it's really difficult to pull her attention away. She's driving me nuts!
Generally she's not too bad with barking (considering she's a schnauzer!). She barks at the front door and when people walk past the back fence, which is fine by us, but not much else indoors.
On lead, she often does a bit of a manic bark and pulls to get to see whoever it is she's excited about seeing but as soon as she gets to them she stops.
Off lead she doesn't really bark that much, it's generally just a little roo that she does when she sees something that takes her interest.
So my thinking is that she's barking at agility (and in general) because she can't get to what it is she's excited about ie another dog going round the course. But short of letting her join in I can't think what we could do about that!
Last week at agility I managed to distract her most of the time when we were waiting by playing tug of war with her but feel like I'd just replaced one form of excitement (watching the other dogs) with another.
The only other thing that works quite well is using treats; making her sit, wait, lay, rollover, find it, all that stuff. It's achievable for the most part to keep her attention with this, however she's still in quite a high state of alert and I'd quite like for her just to be chilled and relaxed! Plus with using the treats I end up feeding her a whole treat bag and then some during a one hour class. Kongs don't hold her attention for that long.
So, any success stories of reducing the excitability/ barkiness of your schnauzer? Is it something she might grow out of (she was only 1 in April)? Or do I just have to put up with it?!
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
So we will be at week 2 the same time and can compare notes 