Rocket Has Been Barking At Me Whenever I Want To Lay Down On My Bed.

[Guest Rocket]

Hi all,

Rocket has been doing very well adjusting to life as a pet! He has been doing a lot of communicating with us lately.

Over the past week, Rocket seems to become irritated or mad whenever I want to lay down on my bed to nap or watch TV. He gets right up in my face and barks. I have no idea why this is happening - he isn't hungry, has already gone out etc... Sometimes he just wants to play, but other times I think it is something else. My husband thinks he doesn't like us napping during the day for fear we are sick.

Anyone else have this issue? I am thinking of using his muzzle the next time he tries this.

Amy

[Guest june]

Redirect him to do something else. Does he know "settle" or "go to your bed?" If he doesn't know these (or a simiar) command, you need to teach it to him. It sounds like he is trying to tell you what to do.

You do not have to be harsh, but he needs to listen. He should not be doing this.

[Guest jetska]

Yeah I would teach 'go to your bed'. Mouse barks at me sometimes - it's a demand-bark for attention, but she's never done it right in my face. I usually just tell her 'no' or send her outside. She gets into moods where she is precocious and demanding.

[Guest Wasserbuffel]

The muzzle won't stop barking, and shouldn't be used as a punishment.

 

Teach him to settle and leave you alone. There is a couple in my local group that adopted a grey who would poke them awake with her nose if they fell into an afternoon nap, then wander off. They figured she was just checking that they were still alive. After getting used to their home she stopped.

[Fruitycake]

Monty tried the barking for attention thing at one point (though it was when we were watching TV). We just had to ignore him completely.* If you talk to him, get up at his command, try to calm him down by petting him, you're being trained by him that when he barks you give him attention (at least that's what he's thinking - "I bark, I get attention = this works for me!"). At most I'd give him one statement and only once: "No" or "Nope, go to your bed" and then ignore all else from him.

 

(Actually, it was a little more than that: Monty'd had some seizures and it seemed that they wiped his mind clean of everything but his name - *everything* was new to him again! - and his bark wasn't his big-boy-bark, it was a high-pitched puppy bark. From a 75 lb, 1.75 year old greyhound we got a squeeky high pitched bark. We tried to ignore, but I couldn't take his little tiny puppy bark coming at me from such a big dog, and I laughed at him. Every time. It was just so ridiculous. I think, actually, that's what cured him of it. He'd get very a disgruntled look on his face and heave a huge sigh and go lay down on his bed again. But I don't think that'd work in any other situation....)

[RedHead]

Don't reinforce the barking at all...even making eye contact or talking to the dog can reinforce it. I would totally ignore it, don't even look at him, and he will eventually get bored and stop. I don't know how much exercise/activity he is getting, but you may want to increase it if he seems antsy or hyper.

[Guest iconsmum]

Don't reinforce the barking at all...even making eye contact or talking to the dog can reinforce it. I would totally ignore it, don't even look at him, and he will eventually get bored and stop. I don't know how much exercise/activity he is getting, but you may want to increase it if he seems antsy or hyper.

 

 

 

smart woman, that RedHead )

[silverfish]

Our very first greyhound (Jim) did this one day to my husband and scared the pants off him. He was a great dog, and totally non-aggressive, but we'd only had him a few days at that point and DH didn't know that. Story is, he'd gone out to the garage and had laid down on the floor to do some work. Jim came right up to him and starting barking almost in his face. It turns out that he simply wasn't used to seeing humans laying down and it was a kind of 'I have no clue what's going on here and I'm confused' displacement activity. Once Jim got used to the fact that human beings did lie down randomly in the middle of the day he was fine and completely ignored it.

 

Dogs can be confused when people to things they don't expect. It's often recommended that if your dog won't come back after an off-leash run, you just lie down in the middle of the field and the chances are he'll run over to investigate this strange new phenomenon.

 

If you think this might be the reason for his behaviour, then I would sit up a bit and reassure him, then lie down and reassure him again, and then ignore him. If this doesn't work and/or his body language is playful (wagging tail, playbowing, bright happy eyes, etc) then ignoring him will probably work (doing as RedHead says). You could also try redirecting his behaviour: at another time, teach him a command like 'sit', or 'lie down', or that good old standby 'settle'. This will also help with anxiety-based behaviours because dogs love to be given something positive to do when they are unsure of what their response should be.