Help, my English Bull Terrier doesn’t stop barking! How to stop barking dogs

Home » Help, my English Bull Terrier doesn’t stop barking! How to stop barking dogs

Excessively barking dogs can be annoying. Bull Terriers usually are not known to be excessive barkers. However, even among them there are individuals that can become pretty vocal.

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My English Bull Terrier Mila, for example, is a frequent barker and besides that a very vocal dog in general. She is using a whole variety of noises to communicate. Some of them are a little annoying, while others are utterly cute. Her predecessor Fancy had a crisp “barking phase” at a younger age, when she would notify us of things happening beyond our front door. Later in life this completely ceased and we hardly ever heard her voice.

Many owners don’t mind theirs dogs barking in general. After all barking notifies strangers of the presence of a dog. But a lot of owners would like to have better control over time and length of the barking.
To handle the issue it is important to understand triggers and the dog’s intentions.

Why do dogs bark?

The reasons for barking can be manifold:

  • excitement
  • or quite the opposite: boredom
  • to alert their humans
  • distress or fear
  • to communicate with other dogs or animals

only to name a few possible triggers.

How to stop barking dogs

Barking may need a combination of different measures to become controllable. 

In order to work on the barking, we first need to identify the situations that trigger the barking in order to learn more about the dog’s motivation and possible counterstrategies.

Are there any things we can actively do to discourage barking?

Some people don’t ask why the dog is barking, put a shock collar around it’s neck instead or use air or water and shock or spray until the dog stops barking.

This is an aversive training method. All of you, who have read across my blog, know that I am not a fan of training/ learning through punishment.

Not only does it bear the risk of an aggressive reaction in many situations and can damage the dog’s trust in the owner. In my opinion it also is the least effective way of communication for learning purposes.

If using punishment to “cure” barking, all the dog learns is that it is simply not allowed to express itself, no matter if the reason is distress, boredom, dominance or pain.

Therefore tips on how to use a shock collar etc. will not be part of this essay.

But there are still several things owners of barking dogs can try.

Aversive training methods are also often chosen, just because they show results more immediately than other methods. Positive reinforcement, for example, is a much more positive way, but it usually takes A LOT MORE TIME.

I personally do not bother, because I know that I can always manage as long as my trained behaviors are not quite 100% in place yet. No biggy.

Read more about how to deal with dogs barking at home on the next page.

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Ruby navarro
7 years ago

Hello,

I am having a hard time trying to train my 4 month old bull terrier, Pluto is his name. He is full of energy and I have a few questions to figure out how to make him stop acting up. He is always ripping the carpet in my house, He starts to get crazy (happy and excited) when he sees people, or other dogs, he doesn’t stop barking even if I speak to him in a calm voice, and in the car he will continue to bark at me or try to get on my lap. I really want to get some help on how to train him because I don’t want him to get out of control when he gets old or become aggressive. Please help me.

Paige
6 years ago

Hi, we have a 8 month old English bull terrier named Bently, we purchased Bently after our previous English bull terrier passed from bladder cancer. We have raised them both the same way, all women in the house so we are very loving with him but also strong voices so when he is naughty we’re very vocal to let him know. But he is by far the naughtiest dog we’ve ever had, he chews EVERYTHING up and demolishes anything in his path, we bought a non chewable bed for him, he chewed it to pieces. He is very playful, and can be quiet vicious when he is, I don’t think he realises it but you can tell when you’re playing with him he’ll be playful and doesn’t bite hard but he passes a barrier and will just sometimes randomly attack you to the point you bruise and bleed from him, especially if you’re walking him, sometimes he can turn and will attack you on his lead in public. We can handle all of that but what’s most annoying is that because he chews all of the furniture up we only let him in the living room when certain people aren’t in there (as he attacks them constantly) and if there is somebody that can pay constant attention on him to stop him from chewing these things so when he’s in the other room seperated by a baby gate he barks, continously, for hours on end none stop, nothing will stop him, I must admit we have tried many things, shock collars aren’t one because we don’t agree with that, we have admittedly tried the spray gun but he just thinks it’s fun and tries to eat the water, telling him no doesn’t stop him, we’ve tried the treats method trying to train him with treats, we have this device which lights up when he barks I’m guessing sending out some kind of noise that he can hear when he does but that doesn’t bother him one bit. We’ve tried everything, our previous English bull terrier was a beaut, no problems would never harm a fly even if you tried to play with him he’d think he was biting to hard and would stop, he never barked unless he heard something he just loved attention and being close to us, the only issue we had with him was he was VERY lazy, to the extent to walk him you had to drag him as he’d sit down and refuse to walk. We’re all out of options. We just miss having a calm, loving dog. He does seem un trainable! Also another thing, We wanted our previous English bull terrier to be trained so we did take it to professional training centre which was very expensive they had dog pools and everything, they turned him down after a couple of sessions saying he was un trainable and that’s when he was a puppy so I’m dreading thinking that Bently can’t be trained because he really needs it.

Melanie
6 years ago

Hi there how do I stop my bull terrier from barking st his shadow and chasing his tail

Chicobean
4 years ago

I have a bull terrier , hes a great doggo . His names chico , he was dropped off by a friend i have no clue how old he is n even due to the weird circumstances he has grown to trust me n behave n listen . He barks at people he knows around the house though , my little siblings , my uncle n aunts , n no he hasnt barked at me . They all show him the same affection , &’ we havent done anything to frighten him in anyway . Please tell me what triggers him to do this n how to resolve it ! <3

Destiny Nasir
4 years ago

My Staffordshire bull terrier recently started barking while inside his cage. It started this weekend when my 5 yr old nephew came over, and he has been coming over for months. My nephew left last night we first suspected that it was jealousy but he is still barking. I don’t want to give him back to the shelter, but I don’t know what to do. I’ve tried exercising him, rewarding him when he stops barking, giving him attention when he stops barking, putting him outside, letting him sleep with me, and now vibrating collar. I don’t want to but I don’t know what else to do. what way can I stop him from barking?

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