Anyone else trained their dog to alert them when their GF job finishes?

[pubultrastar]

Good Dog!

[marmak3261]

@JeremyNielsen. Hey. I hope all is well with you. Neat experience there.

[kittski]

I’m not sure if you were serious about training ideas, but just in case you were…

It’s most likely just warning barking at the “dangerous” thing making a scary noise. They’re probably feeding off of each other, and once one decides the GF is dangerous, the other does too. And it’s a bit of a self-taught behavior just like barking at the mailman; they bark in warning to scare the bad thing away, and then when the GF stops (or the mailman leaves), they think, "It worked! My warning chased that bad thing away. I’m such a good dog! " And when they bark and you give them any reaction at all, it just reinforces it.

So to break the cycle, you have to teach them they get no attention and you will remove them from the situation if they bark at the GF. If they are excited even when the GF is off, start by teaching them they can only be around you and the GF if they remain calm. Just take them near the GF, get them to looks at you by saying “look” (or whatever command), and when they make eye contract with you even for a moment, tell them “yes!” and treat/praise them. When they are calm and will look at you with the GF off, start doing the same thing with the GF running. Just as soon as the GF starts up, tell them “look” and then praise. (Timing is super important and you have to be quick so they understand they get rewarded for making eye contact with you.) Pretty soon they will start looking toward you for a treat instead of barking when the GF starts.

And if they are so bonkers they’ll not even stop to look at you, work one at a time on lead. As soon as they bark at the GF, tell them “no” with a gentle little pop of the lead and then walk them out of the room until they stop. Then only praise them when they walk a few steps toward the GF without barking; if they bark again, back out they go. Then rinse, repeat over and over until they get the idea that they can’t stay if they bark. (This is obviously just a really basic idea of how to retrain them, but hopefully you get the idea.)