OT: Dog spray collars to control excessive barking

[houseof3boys]

Has anyone used one of these? Our wonderful dog, Gordon, has upped the level of barking past my tolerance these days with the new dog next door and his newfound disobedience for attention. We are about to have some renovations done in the house which will require lots of different people to be in the house and the barking needs to be controlled. I know the citronella collars are more humane than the shock collars (which his obedience school recommended) so I just wanted to see if anyone had opinions as far as effectiveness was concerned. They are pricey too with my initial research so I just want to make sure they work.

We have tried everything we can to stop the unnecessary barking/howling but it's just in his nature as a hound dog. When he went on anti anxiety medicine shortly after Ryan was born, the barking lessened but I don't want to medicate again!

TIA. :)

[g-mama]

We tried the spray collar on our dog and it worked....for about a week. And then he just got used to it and figured he'd have to learn to live (and bark) with it. :( But you never know, maybe Gordon isn't quite as persistent as Lipton is. ;)


Kristen
Paolo 11-00
Benjamin 8-03

[zen_bliss]

i recommend them. try eBay to save $$$. they are indeed very effective and most dogs learn very quickly, so you may not need it for very long, and it will certainly help with barking at the contractors. however, it is possible that he'll just learn not to bark -- when the collar is on. that's what happened here! my super-smart one used to shake and duck repeatedly as soon as i put it on to empty all the citronella. then she went about her day without having to worry. sometimes, she would stand near the other dog and bark to set hers off and torment her. (that dog is quite a character -- she was good preparation for toddler antics.) overall, it did help to reduce the alarm barking.

another funny story: the other one, the main barker dubbed the neighborhood 'bossy boots' by our dog walker, still had hers on when we stopped at the dog park one day. out of nowhere, a huge rottweiler came running at her, head down and snarling. my heart stopped because there wasn't much time to react. she waited until he got up close, then gave one big bark, shooting the spray directly into his face. he stopped dead in his tracks like a cartoon and ran off. he didn't come near us again. she looked up at me, and i swear she was laughing. that still cracks me up.

good luck!

[momtoemma]

We have a persistent barker at our house too, and the collar worked great at first, but as the pp said, he got used to it after a few days. My dog is pretty stupid though and I'm not sure whether he just didn't care if he got sprayed or if he can't make the connection between his barking and being sprayed. I do have to say that the first time we put it on him and he got himself sprayed, I nearly fell down on the floor laughing because his reaction was so hilarious! It was almost worth the cost just to see it! Seriously though, we got to where we were refilling the darned thing at least once a day and now the battery is dead. Our vet told us that for some dogs, it just isn't effective, but you don't know until you try it. Our vet actually rents the collars so that you can test it on your dog and return it if it doesn't help.

[npace19147]

We had a lot of luck with one that used a high-pitched sound rather than a spray or a shock. Our dog would go nuts barking in the car, we couldn't take him anywhere. The collar totally eliminated it. We got it at Petsmart and I think it wasn't too expensive - maybe around $50 or so? We went with the cheapest option first and it worked! HTH!

[steph2003]

Debbi -
We've actually had some success with the citronella bark collar. My dog hasn't figured out how to outsmart it yet. And I think because we only use it in limited time frames ie NOT all day....she has learned that when it is on, no barking.

HTH - shop around the net, I think I paid maybe $80 for ours after seeing some that were $100+.

[houseof3boys]

What a story about bossy boots. That is hysterical!

[houseof3boys]

I froogled it and found one at Northern Tools that rivals the ebay prices so far. I'll keep looking, but thanks for the input!!!! I appreciate it.

[hjdong]

My dog figured it out VERY quickly and literally would bark in rapid succession to emtpy the container and then bark at her leisure. She hated the citronella but wanted to bark that badly.

What finally worked for us, although it was a real pain, was for about a month not letting her out without a leash and whenever she went to bark at the neighbor dogs correcting her. It really broke her of excessive barking. And it was free!

HTH,