hey all,

My wheaten terrier wont behave in the car she has a cage that we put her in and all she does is constantly bark and bark and bark!!!! This is a problem that we need to sort out cause we get a new puppy soon and i dont want this one learning bad habits! Has anyone one any ideas how to help?

thanks,  sarah xxxx

You could try covering the cage with a blanket.  Sometimes it is excitment at seeing all the movement going on around the car which causes them to bark.   Sometimes it is genuine fear/arousal.  If your dog pants, sweats and sheds hair in the car and eliminates immediately she is out it is more likely to be fear than just excitment but it is not always easy to disginuish between the two.

If covering her cage doesn't work, I would suggest not caging her ate all. Instead, try using a doggy seatbelt on her. My two Siberian huskies both have seatbelts as they were very excited when riding the car. Wearing the seatbelts keeps them safe and prevents them from moving around all over the car, but it also allows them to look out the window if they want to or they can lay down across the seat. My Kieron sits up straight and looks out the window and my little Houdini lays down on the seat and sleeps the whole ride.

I wonder if maybe your girl barks all the time because she can't see anything. Are you sure she can look out the window? If she can't see, she might be scared because she has no idea what is happening to her. With a seatbelt, she will be able to look out the window and be aware of what is happening to her.

Good luck! =)

Hiya

You are right to want to stop this behaviour quickly! (ive travelled in a car with a barking dog i know its NO fun!).

Have you travelled her any other way than crated?
Where does she go when you go in the car?
Does she bark all the way, or just when she 'knows' where she is going.
Does she bark on the way there, the way back or both.

The answers to those questions should give a clue as to whether she is:

Barking because she is excited at going somewhere fun.
Barking because there is so much excitement all around her, that she can see out the window.
Barking because she is in the crate?

If its anticipation of going somewhere, then put her in the car, in the crate. As soon as she starts barking, stop the car, if she is quiet, go again.
If she isnt even quiet whilst you get in the car and set off, take her out and go back inside, try again later.
Do that slowly, it may take weeks. Make sure that in everything you do (as well as the car thing) barking = end of fun.

If its because of all the things she can see, try covering the crate, that can work wonders.

If its because of the crate, try a seat belt instead of the crate.

Something that might benefit you, is clicker training her to NOT bark. IF you arent familiar with clicker training, the 'click' marks the behaviour you want repeated. Wait until she is barking, and then when she stops, click and treat. (you will need to 'prime' her to the clicker, just sit with her and click/treat every so often, until when she hears the click, she looks for the treat).

If you are going to clicker train her NOT to bark, dont use any command to try and shut her up so taht you can click, just wait. You should be sat there iwth a pot of treats and the clicker. Presuming she knows that clicker = treat it shouldnt take long for her to work out that she needs to do something.

One of the big problems with a barking dog (especially a terrier!) is that if YOU shout, they think you are joining in, and bark more!

Good luck.

Em

Thanks for your replys i think from answering you questions theemx its an excitement thing and i think using the clicker training is a good idea cause ive used it before and it worked really well.

Anyway we better get a move on and try and stop this problem, cause early this morning we had a phone call from our friends saying that during the night our puppy was born!! :D :D :D The mother had 3 little boys and 2 little girls and they are all a good weight and are having a check up later today :)
cant wait to see them :D

thanks for you advice
luv sarah xxxx

Hhehehe, puppyyyyyyyyy!

Well, youve got 8weeks ish, to get it sorted out, so time to take it slowly, but NOT time to sit abck and say 'ill do it later!'.

Just do everything you can to show her that barking gets her nowhere, and that going in the car is more often BORING than it is exiting.

I presume its your parents who will be doing the driivng, so you will have to make it quite claer to them, that if her barking doesnt stop, she WILL teach the pup to do it too!

It will involve a LOT of faffing about getting in and out of the car, but its worth it!

Good luck, this should keep you busy whilst you wait for the puppy!

Em

Have you tried teaching her to bark on command.  Sounds strange but it does work.  We have taught our BC to bark in the last three or four weeks and now when he barks at a stranger walking by as soon as we say 'quiet' he is immediately quiet whereas before it would take three or four times to get him to be quiet.

Rosie (the barker) took 7 years to learn how to sit!! :D Where as lizzie could open inward doors and everything. :)
My mom and dad are both into to dogs so they know what will need to happen but i thought i'd see if anyone else had delt with this problem. Anyway how did you go about teaching him how to bark on comand dvnbiker?

sarah xxxx

me again.

Clicker train both a 'speak' command and a 'enough/quiet/shutit' command......

I would go for the 'enough' command first. Thats reaaaaaaaaaaly simple (k, not quite, but not hard).

Just click for a quiet dog. Do it anywhere, any time, any place, no matter what the dog IS doing, so long as it ISNT barking. Couple it with the word you want to use.

Then, teach the dog to bark. Frustrate/wind up the dog with a toy, that they cannot get. At the first sound, click. Progress until the dog knows that sound = click. Then narrow it down to the bark you want, and only click for that. Then put the word to it.

Then do 'speak' click, and then 'enough' click.

That way, you have an on and an off switch.

On its own i doubt it will solve the barking in the car, and certainly i wouldnt try using the 'enough' command to stop barking if the dog is doing her nut in the car, as all that will achieve, is to teach her to ignore that command.

Put together with teaching her that barking without being asked to do so, in the car, results in NO fun, and that the car doesnt always = fun, and it should work pretty well.

Em

That sounds like a really good idea and i will try that the only problem is we need a dog guard for a landrover discovery. We tryed to get one on ebay but one person had a fake ID and the other guard wouldn't fit. Any ideas where we could get one as weve only got eight weeks to train her we will pay about £50.
Anyway the puppys are all alright and the breeder is really happy with them cause they are so advanced for their age still trying to decide what to call its between Daisy, lottie, ellie, megan, and phoebie which one do you think we should call her?

luv sarah xxxx

Mmm

id say keep trying eBay........

You wont get one new for that money anywhere else, unless you or your parents know of someone who could make one to measure.

You can start on making the car more boring, by just putting her in there, and then getting her out again, and not actually going anywhere.

Also, once you have got the 'speak'/'enough' thing working in the house/garden/park then you can try it in the back of the car whilst its stationary.

HTH

Em

Hello Sarah

I think theemx has just about covered it all really so not much to add, just patience and hard work!

Claire

Thanks for that i couldn't reply because i had computer problems, anyway just got to get a dog guard for the middle of the car now cause when we put Rosie in she jumped straight through and sat in the drivers seat!! :D
Anyway the pups are getting really strong and are realy moving fast when they want to and we are still thinking of name. I think its gonna be called Lottie, what do you think?

luv sarah xxx

Lottie sounds great.  Its a really sweet name.

Took us ages to find our dogs' names as I like to be different.

Claire

thanks for your reply, What are your dogs called then?

luv sarah

Jai and Kyan (Ky for short).  They were named after two guys from Living TV's queer eye for the straight guy.  I know very sad!

AHHH!! there cute names :) I would go for something different if there wasn't 7 people in my family all of whom want to call it what they want. One of my brothers wants to call it pipkin after the Norman Wisdom films!!! :D

sarah xxxx