Pixie doesn't bark too much... Unless we're playing and she gets riled up, but that's understandable.
When we first got her, so would howl and howl at night and wouldn't stop. We ignored her. Just turned our backs and completely ignored her. She stopped the whining after about four or five nights... Each night the whining time got shorter and shorter until it was none! We would only give her attention when she's being quiet. She caught on quite quickly. She could only come out and play after she'd been quiet a full 5 minutes.
I felt bad ignoring her, she just pulled and pulled at my heart strings with her little whines and howls... but we knew she didn't need anything (she has her own fenced in area of the room with her bed, food, water, piddle pads, toys... there's nothing else she could've needed). Again, I felt bad, but I think it helped to show her who's who in the house, and that my husband and I are alpha, not her.
Granted, I wouldn't do this with a very young puppy or if you're trying to housebreak/crate train.... they might be whining to go outside. Pixie was already over 4 months when we got her and had been paper trained (or so we were told), so I was confident she was okay to be alone in her area all night. |