[YorkieLove77]

Originally Posted by violet voon

Trust me, Sugar and Jojo are the same, this bad behavior continues until today

Oh boy, hopefully we'll both figure out a way to lessen their barking soon!

Originally Posted by paddys mom

I think its hard to get a yorkie to stop barking at noises all together because they are such great little watchdogs. But I've tried a few methods on my 3.5 yr old yorkie Paddington who looooooooves to bark at noises that at least get him to stop after one or two barks rather than 500.

First..teach him to speak. Sounds counterintuitive but once you teach them to speak on command then you can teach them to be quiet.
So once he is consistantly speaking on command.(which you can train by whatever method..clicker/treats etc) then tell him quiet...if he stops barking for three seconds reward him. I use treats sometimes/sometimes throwing a ball for him(sometimes toys don't work as well for me b/c paddy is sooooooooo crazy about balls he'll sometimes start barking more..he uses his brain a little better around food lol.) Over time wait for longer periods of quiet before giving a reward.

Now...since yorkies are oh so clever...he will probably decide it is fun to just start barking at you when not asked to get you to reward him for then being quiet. To prevent this becoming a fun game for him. Ignore unsolicited barks in the beginning. Progress slowly to practicing when he barks at doorbells/wind/cars once he has a consistant idea of what "quiet" means. And you don't necessarily have to use the word quiet. you can say enough or
ahh or anything that will make him stop barking for a few seconds. Eventually you should also be able to phase out rewards.

Its a slow process but i have definitely gotten at least some control over the amount of barking using it. And he never really barks unless we are home orsomewhere where he spends a lot of time...so i think it is territory protection. Good luck and hope this helps!

Originally Posted by BellaDonna

One thing you can try will take a little time but it can work if you only have 1 or 2 dogs.
First you teach the dog to bark and respond to you when you say "Speak". You train them to do this on purpose barking and treat when you say "speak" and they do. Then you continue that trick by teacking them to stop speaking when you say "Enough". So what you are teaching them is to bark on command but also to stop on command. Like I said this works very well if you have only one dog and for up to 2. If you have a pack it is much less effective.

I've heard this is a good method, and I have actually tried it, but I can't seem to figure out how to get him to "speak". He just looks at me like "huh?". He gets confused and sits, lays, tries to give me his paw...lol. All he sees is a treat in my hand and has no idea what he's supposed to do to get it! But if this is so effective, I'll continue to try it.