The natural thing to do when a neighbor complains about dog barking is to get defensive. “My dog? Causing a problem? How dare you?!”
Don’t go there. Defensiveness exacerbates hostilities, escalates tension, and encourages your neighbor to make a mountain out of what you perceive to be a molehill. Remember, it’s all about perception, and your neighbor’s perception is his reality. Instead of being defensive, try these things:
1. Listen intently to your neighbor’s complaint.
Unless one of you plans to move, defusing the situation beats all-out war. Set defensiveness aside, and listen to what your neighbor says. Assume there’s some nugget of truth to his complaint. You need to find it, so you can figure out what to do with it. He says your dog barks all the time, underneath his bedroom window, and wakes him up. That may be an exaggeration, but chances are your dog is barking some of the time, especially if you leave her out in the yard, or if she has free backyard access through a doggie-door.
2. Empathize and apologize for your dog barking.
Without admitting guilt, empathize with your complainer. “It must be frustrating to have to listen to barking dogs when you’re trying to sleep.” Be sincere. Tell him you’re sorry he’s being disturbed by barking. Reassure him that you don’t want your dog to be a nuisance, and you want to help find a solution to his concerns. Ask him to bear with you while you work on the problem. Bake him chocolate chip cookies.
3. Investigate your dog’s nuisance behavior.
Ask questions that won’t make your neighbor defensive. “Is there a time when it’s most annoying?” “Are there other dogs that are barking too?” “Other than giving up my dog, what would make you happy?” Set up a video camera or voice-activated tape recorder to document your dog’s activities when you aren’t home. Alternatively, take a day off and watch your own house from a distance, to see what goes on that might make your dog bark. Check the neighborhood to see if there are other dogs whose barking might be blamed on your dog. Ask other neighbors if they hear your dog, and if so, when and how much.
4. Respect all community dog laws.
Make sure your dog is currently licensed, and obey all local animal control laws. Maybe your neighbor is complaining because your dog runs loose and he feels threatened (even though you know your dog is a pussycat), or because you don’t clean up when you take her for walks. Those are legitimate grounds for complaint (as is excessive nuisance barking) even if your dog is a pussycat. You don’t want animal control to find you in violation of anything. Obey leash laws and scoop laws, and respect your neighbor’s discomfort with your dog – don’t let her off-leash even if you’re just walking out to your car. If she runs over to happily greet him, you’ll fuel the fires.
5. Take action to modify your dog’s behavior, and your own behavior.
Make changes to accommodate your neighbor and protect your dog. If his complaint is early-morning noise and she’s barking when you let her out at 6:00 am while you shower, alter your routine. Get up earlier and go out with her. Let her eliminate, then play with her. Keep her quietly occupied rather than leaving her to find her own entertainment. If it’s random throughout-the-day backyard barking while you’re away, bring her in and close the dog door. She doesn’t have to be outside all day. If things get ugly, leaving her out unattended exposes her to great risk from an irate neighbor. If necessary, pay someone to let her out for a noon potty break. If the complaint is about barking even when you are home, behavior modification is in order. (See “Modifying Your Dog’s Barking Behavior“.) If it’s something other than barking, determine how you can modify the situation to mitigate the problem. Some examples:
-Your dog charges the fence. Your neighbor fears for his children’s safety. Make the fence solid, or put up an inner fence so there’s an “airlock” between dog and kids. See, “Solve Fence Aggression with a Better Designed Dog Fence,” for more info on fencing.
-Your dog came over and attacked his dog. You think your dog was just playing, but whatever. Vow that your dog is never off her leash in your neighborhood. Even just walking to your car.
Keep your neighbor informed of your efforts to address his concerns. Document your actions in a journal in case you do have to face animal control. Ask your neighbor to let you know if he sees improvement – and document that. Save receipts for anything you buy to modify your dog’s environment. If you see your neighbor deliberately antagonizing your dog, document that with a video camera. Keep your dog safe. Be considerate. Keep baking chocolate chip cookies.
This article just panders to shi**y dog owners Number 1 should have been stop your dog from disturbing people immediately Instead it suggests making your neighbour some cookies while minimizing how aggravating poorly trained dogs are. Shove your cookies and shut your dogs up. Ive got kids and dogs, if you actually train them and take responsibility for them instead of forcing your community to deal with the fallout then youll quickly learn “kids scream dogs bark” is a cop-out excuse only lazy owners/parents say
Blimey. Remind me never to move to America. Do you have to be so aggressive?
‘that might be an exaggeration’?
screw you
indeed i have been woke for years – multiple TIMES PER FUCKING DAY – on end by barky fucking assholes
and one of yours now pissing on my front door
FUCK ALL SELFISH DOGTARD HUMANS — bunch of narcissistic losers who need asslickers around all day cause they don’t love anyone but themselves
and continue to try figuring that out
Why is it that our neighbor calls us “intolerant” when she’s the only one in the neighborhood who lets her dogs bark? We’ve suggested bark collars, dog training and working with them to curb the annoyance. Every neighbor complains about her and the dogs but she blames the barking on someone passing her house, the other neighbors’ dogs, the squirrels, the birds, the planes, you name it. Refuses responsibility. We called the Dumb Friend’s League to ask for help to a solution. Along with suggestions, she finished her comment up with, “there are very few bad dogs, but a lot of bad dog owners”.
Dog owners are c*nts.
TRULY
loser neighbor: my dog needs to piss on your home to mark territory
followed by 5 more dogs now pissing on my house within 2 hours
and somehow lazy loser justifies by – ‘oh thought it was a commercial property’
OH REALLY? SO WHAT !!! no one wants to smell your dogs piss on concrete
losers – all of you tiny city apartment dog owners – all DOGTARDS
Game on mother sucker! No cares here! One bitch now destroyed! So now I have no problem with death!
Intolerance between humans and animals, loud music , trucks engines roaring because you want your vehicle to be noticed, small cars with loud mufflers, I think dogs has Rights to communicate and Bark , dogs are smarter than humans, and humans are dumb enough not to understand
Emotions of a disturbed person always reflects itself towards others , Regardless
so someone else being an asshole justifies you being an asshole?
not honey – not true
so are you saying I should just stop giving a shit about everyone and be as loud as I like all day – walk down the streets singing out loud?
gee thanks for your permission DOGTARD-HUMAN
Oh my God!! I’m not gonna bother writing anything except there’s a lot of fucking Karen’s on here… Get a life people…. sad
Leave your bulldog outside all fucking day to bark? Just a wild guess. Drive a Harley per chance, Karen? Damn snowflakes all dog owners that can’t be bothered to take personal responsibility for their dogs.
Agreed, you should have to undergo stringent tests to have the chance to apply to own one single dog. These people have no regards for any fellow humans, and generally are as dumb as their dogs (small brains with lots of grey matter).
There is such an array of opinions on here but there have been a few comments that suggest continual barking is OK, or even “natural”, and I vehemently disagree with that.
I am currently in the middle of a neighbourly dispute for this very reason. We have been dog owners most of our lives but, since losing our last and having children, we are not. Our neighbour’s dog barks incessantly. It typically happens when they are not home but it is not limited to this. It can be LOTS of short episodes of 5-15 minutes, or it can last for hours. Eventually, it will tire itself out and switch to whining. It has access to the garden so it is a mix of inside and outside. Yes, it helps to shut our windows (theirs are apparently broken) but that is just not feasible in the long term, especially in summer heat, needing to keep the children’s rooms cool (and also, why should we have to?). It can happen any time of the day – we have episodes at midnight, 3AM, middle of the day, you name it. Unless you have experienced barking on this scale, it is difficult to describe how much of a challenge to your sanity it can be!
It can wake all of us up. It can prevent us from getting to sleep at night. It can prevent us from enjoying our home. It can prevent me from concentrating on my work (for hours). Our neighbours have not behaved in the way mentioned in this article. They have been defensive from the start. They make no commitment to change the situation, or compromise and, at one point, even stated that we shouldn’t have bought the house if we didn’t like dogs, which is both unfair and factually incorrect.
We have had the “dogs bark, get over it” argument from them as well and it amazes me that this mentality exists. I would never let my dogs bark continually and I used to routinely check in with neighbours that they weren’t being disturbed whenever I was out. I didn’t do this primarily for the welfare of my neighbour (albeit it didn’t hurt the relationship), I did it for the welfare of my dogs. It is important to know whether your dogs are settled when you are not there.
Our relationship has deteriorated to the point where it can no longer be resolved amicably and we are left considering next steps. However, I can’t stress how important it is to take neighbours complaints seriously, put yourself in their shoes and try to work together to solve the situation if you can. This “I love dogs. Everything my dogs does is fine” mentality is both dangerous and, in some cases, probably incorrect. I know every situation is different, and some people do exaggerate their concerns, but having a suspicion they are does not absolve you of the responsibility to make sure – for both your neighbourly relations and your pets.
I hate to be dramatic but I dealt with this for about 10 years over a 13 year period. No sleep for years. Destroyed my health and livehood. I was a homeowner with no recourse whatsoever, surrounded by 3 barking problems on different properties at one point.
FOR THIS ONE REASON – I will never buy again – unless so rich or truly away from another’s home.
So I move into this apartment and 2 years in the whiners win and get dogs. Dealing with the PTSD. Totally sucks. Luckily none of the same level of barking but truly get sick of cleaning up poop and smelling the piss.
Thanks for the article! Do you have any suggestions when the neighbor complains about your dog, but their dog is causing your dog to misbehave?