My 8 month old american cocker is still barking at anyone who comes to my house to visit. She barks and growls at them and I dont know what to do about it.

She also barks at strangers outside the house when we are walking or anywhere there are strange people. especially if they come anywhere near her or me. She is so adorable that everyone wants to touch her but she wont have any of it. I do dispair with her as she is a lovely good dog in every other way. When I bought her I had visions of her being a friendly dog that anyone could come up to and stroke, but I am beginning to think she will always be like this. Dont know what to do, any suggestions.

I take her obedience training every saturday and she is ok with that and the other dogs there. If someone at the class wants to fuss her as long as she approaches them she is usually ok.

Hi,

We have a 12 month old Cocker Spaniel bitch and she recently went through this phase.

Her first 9 or 10 months were great, she was really sociable and because she's a cutie she would get lots of attention when we were out and she seemed to lap it all up but almost overnight she changed, she would bark at strangers when we were out walking, growl at people she wasn't familiar with when they came to visit the house and the final straw was when she barked at a little girl who wanted to stroke her. She's never been nasty and I'm pretty convinced she was only doing it to protect her family and establish herself.

I'm not sure how our solution came about, it certainly is no expert answer because we are relatively inexperienced owners but once whilst she was barking at a passer-by when we were out on a walk I had a bottle of water and after her paying no attention to my shouts of "No" I squirted her with it, her head immediately spun around and she stopped barking. I only had to show her the bottle the next time she barked for no reason at a stranger and she stopped. We took the bottle on our walks for a few weeks after that and now she's back to how she was, we no longer need the bottle because she now pays no attention to anyone on our walks unless they speak to her and when they do she's fine.

I think the answer lies in finding a trigger to which when used she knows she is doing wrong. Ours was definitely more luck than judgement!

Hope you manage to sort it out :-)

When you say "barking" - is it aggressive or is it more excitement ?
Lel

No its aggressive- last weekend I had an estate agent round and she barked so much i had to put her in the kitchen - I let her out after 10 minutes and she came into the room and sat in front of me quietly. As soon as the woman made any movement she was up and barking at her. I then was so embarrassed i picked her up. The woman wanted then went on to try and touch her and she growled at her nastily. She barks at anyone who comes into the house even when the doorbell sounds. If the person coming in tries to talk to her or make eye contact she gets even worse.

Hi,

Do you often pick her up when she barks? This could be part of the problem.

I would suggest clicker training with her, you need to get Elizabeth Kershaw's book "Go Click" and this will give you the basics. Once you have conditioned her to the noise, you can set up situations with friends and willing volunteers to come and talk to her, ring your doorbell, knock on the door etc and slowly work her out of it.

What is she like as a dog, is she shy, outgoing, friendly with people and other dogs? What do you feed her?

Manda
X

She is friendly if she knows you or likes you. She is fed on James Wellbeloved dried food and a little tuna or chicken.

Shei s not aggressive and is just an normal happy puppy.

You can not say that she is a happy pup when she is growling at strangers. IS she a red Cocker spaniel?? The red can carry an agressive gene.

Best way is get her fixed. MAybe this will calm her down. Also is get her in the puppy class. Get her trained she is dominant.

Good luck

If you get her 'fixed' you may well be storing up even more problems - I am assuming by 'fixed' you mean spayed. Spaying is a very sensible option for many people however it is essential that the puppy is allowed to develope fully both mentally and physically before this major operation is carried out. We have seen so many bitches who have incurable problems due to spaying before the first season you would not believe, even the small breeds who mature much earlier can remain in baby puppyhood for life if the hormonal development is stopped by being neutered, then there is the incidence of urine leakage - need I say more.

In respect of neutering helping easing aggression problems - it works by reducing Testosterone so unless you bitch is very unusual by removing her female hormones you could actually increase her problem rather than reducing it.
Kirsty

yes she is a buff/red cocker and she has been spayed already. And no I dont ever pick her up. I only picked her up once because I did not want to scare the lady who came round when she got up to leave. We also attend puppy classes each saturday and she is as good as gold.

This sounds as if it could be defensive or protective territorial barking, trying to keep strangers off her 'patch'. If you pick her up she will become worse, as she may feel that you are nervous too, and are relying on her to drive people away.

Best thing, in my view, is to ignore her completely when she barks like this. If you are trying to have a conversation indoors and you can't make yourself heard, quietly take her out and shut her in another room. She'll soon learn that barking gets her isolated.

Hope this helps.

I had the exact same problem with my B.C. She is 15 months now and has stopped barking at strangers when we are out but she still barks at strange men when they come into the house, and judging from the growling it definately isn't excitement. Megan started this behaviour at about 9 months old. She is a very nervous dog generally, but when she was younger she was much friendlier towards others. She is friendly towards people that she knows, even men, whom she previously hated. What we did was whenever we kept her on lead for a while and every time we saw someone we thought she might bark at we geot her attention on me by holding a treat to her nose until the person had passed. Once she had stopped being so defensive we tried to socialise her with strangers, sometimes (if i felt brave enough) i would ask a friendly stranger to offer her a treat so that she associtated people with treats. I also tried the bach flower remedy, mimulus, which i think may have helped, it is for known fears. She is still slightly nervous but it is just her general temperament, i think her age has helped, especially once she had her first season at 13 months. Has your dog had a season yet, i suppose 8 months is quite young for that. ]
As for barking at strangers in the house, i am still searching for an answer, there is one particular man that tries so hard to be friends with her. He has been visiting regularly since she was a pup, but she has got a bee in her bonnet about him. Once he enters the room she goes mad, barking and growling. We daren't let go of her. But once he is sat down she will happily go and lay next to him and eat treats that he offers her. Dogs, aren't they the strangest things?! :-)

We have a year old BC and has always been a bit strange with men. But a couple of weeks ago my parents visited and my dad caught his foot in a rug and fell towards her - not actually falling right over - but since then she just barks and growls every time he moves, coughs, etc. However, like your dog - when he is sitting in a chair she goes over to him lets him stroke her - demands his attention - even when we are out he can hold her on the lead - seems very odd - not sure how to cure it - might try the water pistol as mentioned earlier.