Obviously the cat we let do her own thing, because, well...she's a cat. Cat's are not trainable in the same way dogs are. Dogs enjoy doing tricks in order to get attention. Cats, well...they don't. As long as you feed them, clean their cat box and occasionally give them attention (when they ask for it) they are happy and content.
We have tried all sorts of training for our dogs: pet store training, clickers and expensive in-home training. Our dogs are perfectly well-behaved individuals. INDIVIDUALS. When they get together, their minds turn into mush and they just go nuts. The bark and jump on people, it annoys the heck out of us, so I can't imagine guests appreciate it too much.
The in-home training experience was great. The trainer had this infinite amount of patience with us and actually made us include our Princess and Little Dude in the training process. I understand the importance of the dogs recognizing the kids as people they need to listen too, however I do not have this required patience. Dogs and children have a limited attention span, getting them to work together when that attention span is on the same page....impossible.
Since the training worked so little on them together, we have pretty much given up. Most of the time, they spend time in the yard on a time-out when people come over. The only thing we haven't given up on is the barking. Anytime someone gets within 100 yards of our house, or god forbid rings the doorbell, the house turns into this awful mess of noise. Dogs are barking, children are screaming at the dogs, and the adults are yelling at everyone to just shut it off! It's awful. The poor postal woman actually sneaks up to the door, drops the package, rings the doorbell and sprints back to her vehicle.
So now we have gotten into a situation that just got worse. We are buying a house in a new neighborhood many miles away. While this probably makes our current neighbors excited, we are terrified.
During an inspection of the potential new home, we discovered there was no barking. Our first thought was "Oh crap, the HOA doesn't allow pets." But then my kids eagerly pointed out that the next door neighbor had a German Shepard and a Chihuahua. Wait a second, a chihuahua that didn't bark?! We started noticing people throughout the neighborhood actually had pets....and they were quiet! Now our second thought was "oh crap, we are going to be those neighbors!"
One week later, we receive our shipment of no bark collars. These are actually pretty cool, they sense the dog's throat vibration and then a gentle electric shock is delivered. If the dog continues to bark within a 20 second "training period," the gentle shock grows in intensity.
My husband calls it the 110 Wiggle, we laughed about it...then it started working. The dog would bark and you would see them shake their heads. We were amused because it seemed to be working with no amount of pain. Well, our dogs aren't the brightest. I mentioned the "training period" of 20 seconds...the intensity does indeed increase. Gracie was barking and wouldn't stop, so the next shock stopped her, so quickly she whimpered. My heart broke. She's barked a few times since, but now when the doorbell rings she runs and hides.
Maggie, on the other hand, stopped barking the second we put it on. So now the doorbell rings or a person knocks on the door, it is blissfully quiet. Granted our dogs are now hiding at door noise, but it's quiet, right?!
Well, except for my mother-in-law's dog, Charlie. Charlie is an 11 year-old, Sheltie with 3 legs. It seems he enjoys the shock and he may bark even more than previously. He is still a work in progress.
poor Charlie, If I tighten the strap anymore he won't be able to breathe. IDEA!
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