Barking at Phone Calls

[Bruce Bowen]

We have a 3 year old Shih Tzu, Luke Skywalker. He is generally kept in the kitchen with a divider that keeps him from going into other parts of the house. We have a wall phone in kitchen & another in the living room. It also has a TTY which we use for communicating with a deaf person. When the phone rings, he goes "crazy" barking so loud we can't hear the person on the other end. If we choose to go to the living room to answer it, he continues barking and tries to lead us or follow us as we go through the gate. He has nipped me a couple of times as he is so excited. No problem if we just want to call someone, only when phone rings. I do have a cell phone so can activate the other phone any time we want. We have just dropped a treat on the floor and that distracts him for the moment. Also, if we get up from the table he starts to bark at us loudly until we stop or ignore him. We do have the Sit, Stay, Fetch book that has helped us with other issues but don't see this phone issue in it. Thanks for your help and advice.
Bruce Bowen

[KOPsBecks]

Hey Bruce,

This sounds like a very irritating problem! I think I have a few suggestions which may help:
- Firstly don't drop a treat on the floor to distract him, this is only rewarding him for his behaviour.
- When the phone rings and Luke starts barking, tell the person on the line to wait a second and turn to Luke and loudly and assertively say "NO!"
- You need to retrain luke that when the phone rings he is not meant to bark, he is obviously conditioned to this and thinks he is doing the right thing. So put luke on a lead and get someone else to help and call the phone at set times so that you know when it's going to ring. As soon as the phone rings observe Luke, if he starts to bark yank on the lead sharply and say "NO". If he stays silent for even the shortest amount of time then reward him with verbal praise and/or treats! If he starts barking again then repeat the process.
- This will need to be repeated several times a day for quite some time. You need to be consistent with him.

Hopefully this helps, if I think of anything else I will post it on here,

Good luck,
Becks