Coton de Tulear, BB, Not Barking Anymore (Sort of)

by Steve and Regina
(Staten Island)

Hi everyone -- here is a long one, but worth reading.

BB has had a busy month! We brought in a trainer and in 60 minutes two major behaviors changed -- barking every time he went out on the deck and him not coming to his mommy when called.

First, his mommy issues. I was always the one who put him in his crate to sleep -- which he hates. He came to associate me with crating. Trainer had me squat down, put my hands between my legs, clap lightly and call him. Within 60 seconds he came to me and now almost always comes to me when called. If not, I just bend down and repeat the move. He has learned to trust me all over again, and we are best of pals. Daddy is still his favorite, but I'm right up there.

More important was the barking issues. We have a deck that extends into a park and have many visitors -- racoons, birds, possums, cats. There were even baby racoons under the deck. Each time BB went out, which was about 25 times a night, he would race out barking, check the perimeters, huff and puff, and bark, and bark.

So the trainer comes. He (the trainer, not BB) sits down. I open the back door. BB goes to do his routine. But just as he starts, the Trainer tosses a bean bag in front of BB and growled. BB stopped in his tracks. Backed up. Looked at us. We reassured him that everything was okay and he could go. He runs out -- no barking.

Turns out that the reason why he was barking was to protect us from our visitors. He still runs out, he still checks the perimeters, but he doesn't bark. Every couple of days, we go out with him and check the edges of the deck with him and let him know everything is okay and we thank him for checking.

The important thing is that he does still bark sometimes (we wouldn't want him to lose his voice)but we have been able to teach him good barking from bad barking (front door yes, back door no).

I know this is getting long so one last thing. We learned to talk his language. When he misbehaves, we growl at him. A low gutteral growl, just like he does. He gets it! Of course, we do this in public too, which just makes us look crazy.

Bottom line, definitely worth the money! So for all you Coton owners, learn how to growl. It was almost too easy a fix, but it is working for us.

Hope this helps. Our angel is even better than before (as if that is possible).