Came home from work tonight and let the dogs into the garden as usual. Pon/chi charges out to the back of the garden and starts barking. The neighbour at the back politly puts head over the fence and sees usand has told me that his wife who is often in the garden and often at the bottom by the veg patch is upset buy the baking from little dog. Now I can see her point as the barking drives me mad,I have tried everything , treats positive reinforment and now squirting with water but to no avail. I swear she  can hear a blade of grass move.If she is in the garden and starts I try and bring her in pretty quickly being very aware of not disturbing the neigbours.Now this has just been made worse by the new children at the bottom of the garden who I have just realised were standing the otherside of their

fence mimicing pom/chi baking so here we go round in a circle and guess what next to them is another small dog who also starts barking and between the 2 dogs and the kids well.... I spoke to the kids hopefully without upsetting them they are only about 7 and said they could meet her but please do not bark at her because it makes her noisy.
Anyone any more ideas and how do I measure reasonable I happen to be someone who hates noise anyway so I really do understand and having a dog that barks for no real reason is alien as my gsd and previous big dogs were no problem . i dont want neighbour problems or the police on me

Treats are the only thing that worked for me with my newest dog, the others have always been good.
How long did you stick at each thing, from my experience you have to keep things up for a long time. My youngest is a TT and i have to be in the garden at all times and as soon as she looks like she's going to bark or i hear someone walking past i call her, make her sit and reward her. keeping her attention until she is calm. She will still bark sometimes if i'm in the house and not keeping on top of things so it does take a lot of time and patience. If she does get too excited and keep barking she comes in straight away even if i'm staying in the garden.
I have a very noisy dog next door to me and i will not allow my dogs to bark as i know how annoying it is.
i have been doing things this way for about three months now and her barking is very little, although i get an odd bad day. Think you really do have to keep up the training how ever long it takes and it should work in the end or at least help.
The people next to us sometimes try and stop their dog barking but never stick to things long enough or sometimes they just don't bother and the dog just gets more confused.
At night before bed i take my TT out on a lead to the toilet so she concentrates on the job in hand and then straight back in. i'm sure if ijust let her out with the others she'd find something to bark at in the dark.
Hope you find a solution to your problem as we've just about fallen out with our neighbours after i had a really friendly chat about their dog barking and i hate bed feeling between people. 

it sounds to me that you are trying your best to keep your dog from annoying others,
you said that you had just let the  dog out and she went straight up to your back fence barking and the neigbough complained straight away seems a bit much if thats the case i mean is the dog barking all the time or could it have been that the other dog was barking that had allready upset the neighbour , and then you happen to let yours out so they complained to you,

as for the kids i hope they listen i had to tell off some just yesterday as they were teasing mine from over the fence and then i spotted a little girl throwing stones into my garden at the dogs gotta say i wernt impressed as their parents were sitting on a wall outside drinking beer letting the kids do it,

all id say is to try to reward your dog when she is quiet my youngster was getting a bit yappy and i started saying Shhh firmly and when he sat quiet id treat him if he barked id ignore him he soon learned that he gets nothing if he sits and yaps at me ;-)

Yes its a difficult one because of the other dog that also barks so they can set each other off. Also the neighbours problem is that hiswife enjoys her garden and is often out at the bottom. gardening The gardens arn't big 45ft as soon as Mia hears her off she shoots to the corner barking. She certainly is n't barking all the time because she is indoors most of the day as I work and her people who let her out for a wee then goes back indoors when they go and is walked by my dog walker. Its only really after 5 and at weekends Personally living so close to each other and with 2 dogs who are prone to barking really makes it hard for everyone. It may well have been that they hear a dog barking a lot during the day and because we are directly behind  them it makes sense to speak to me as it easier.
Well i think its off to get more treats and as bear said maybe perserverance is the key as usual !

Btw chealseagirl thats awful about those kids and what ever happens it will always be the dogs fault or yours for talking to their kids.

i think the treats would be the best idea maybe you could go out into garden with her for first 10 minutes or so and try to keep her distracted from the women behind the fence but like bear said it may take time maybe talk to the neighbours also and explain to them that you are putting into practice some new traing to stop your dog annoying them or anyone else,
it may make them give you a bit of lee way when your dog does slip up and at least they will be aware that you are trying to do something about it,

i  know i mean i blame the drunken parents myself the kids are just bored , id feel so ashamed if anyone fely they had to have a go at my son while i was their (but i wouldnt let that happen) but these lot didnt even look up,

Yes i told the gentleman that I agreed with his wife that she does make too much noise (my dog I mean LOl) and i didn't think it was nice. I told him I was squirting her with a water pistol among other things (doesn't matter if that is true or not)  and was trying to improve the situation he was sat least pleasant not angry and said it was a problem as dogs barked.Have been out with the cheese just now and will perserve. Just hope he can tell the difference between which dog barks and that it is not always mine and she isn't left out there for hours not even more than 5mins i wouldn't think if she is barking.

> she isn't left out there for hours not even more than 5mins

I wouldn't leave her outside by herself atall untill you have sorted out the barking problem, as you need to distract her before she barks (if using the treat method, wich worked to stop my dog getting exited when we passed a garden with barking dogs), each time she gets to bark it just keeps the habbit going.  Some dogs appear to enjoy barking at things (my last dog did) which makes it self-rewarding - another reason not to leave her unatended in the garden, as again, every time she barks it just re-enforces the habbit.

I see what you mean about not letting her bark at all but although the complaint was about the garden she does bark indoors if she hears something. How do I deal with preventing that other than having her stuck to me all the time. Also her hearing is far better than mine. not surprising really is it as I am only a mere human with very limited senses by comparison LOL!

I've had similar problems [with children as well].  I've fenced my garden half-way so my dogs can't rush off to the other end without me.  I've just used puppy pen panels tied with garden ties, it's enough to keep them away from danger spots when I'm not there - in the garden that is - I can leave the back door open so they can go in and out as they please so long as there's no barking - I bring them in if they start. 
Something else you might try is to take your dog on a lead to the bottom of the garden and introduce your dog to the lady next door and even try to get her to give her some treats.  Alternatively you could do the same but use the leave it command.  Try to avoid getting anxious though this'll just transfer to your dog - I know I get like that sometimes.  I'm training myself to use a calm voice and say 'Thank you - it's OK' when we're all out in the full garden and they start barking at people.  There's been a good improvement but it's taking a very long time - especially as we have problems with kids teasing, chucking stones, banging/kicking balls at the fence....  I keep trying to train the kids too.  I'm getting a bit of a reputation round here though!

Thanks for all your ideas I am working on it,might try to getthe lady to make friends with Mia. mind you we have lived her for 20 years and our gardens just about back on tto each other. So far i believe this is the second communication we have ever had they have an amazing way of keeping their heads down to avoid eye c0ntact. I did try say hello in the early months but they clearly want to keep them selves private and didn't really respond.
I shall will have to rethink how I let the dogs out, its a shame because my gsd is no problem and the two generally follow each other about
This is new one to me after 20 years of dogs but my first toy breed.

Furriefriends

> might try to getthe lady to make friends with Mia

Perhaps you could drop a card through her door, thanking them for letting you know about the barking and explaining what you are trying to achieve.  There's no reason why you can't say this is your first toy breed so a new problem for you - if you write it with a smile I'm sure they'll understand, and the odd exclamation mark can work wonders :)

See whether she fancies coming for coffee to meet your barking babe.  Hopefully if you dog gets to know her she won't find it so important to bark at her.  I do know how frustrating it can be though, we have a barker who can hear a car door shut from ½ mile away!!

Before we moved house we opened up a knot hole in the fence for our boy to spy on our neighbours (very friendly ones I might add) and as soon as he could see it was them, he stopped barking at them.  He just used to do a heavy breathing Darth Vader impression instead.  Barbara gave me a pic some months later of her newly painted fence with a hairy snout poking through...  On the other side where we had a 'prefer cats' neighbour we planted a prickly berberis to dissuade our dog from exploring that part of the garden - it helped a lot.