We picked up a mother/daughter pair... a four year old Boston Terrier/Pug mix (I guess they call 'em Bugs) and her six week old baby, whose father was a purebred Chihuahua. The pup is now about five months. Mom is a nearly ideal pet... quiet, and snuggly. The baby, although hyper, is a thoroughly lovable animal... but over the past few weeks she's picked up a serious barking problem. It's mostly tied to her desire to play... she wants to wrestle with her mom, and mom is an extraordinarily lazy animal who is mostly just happy to lie around. So the pup barks. We can distract her with a rope sometimes... but since what she really wants is to wrestle, it doesn't always work. Also, if she's in one room and the humans are in another (there are some rooms in which she is not allowed), she barks. It's driving everybody bananas. Exacerbating the situation is my wife's mental health condition, which makes her sensitive to repetitive noise like that. This issue HAS to be solved.
I've been ranging up and down the internet trying to find training solutions. The going answer seems to be... wait her out, then reward her when she shuts up. Trouble is, that can be HOURS. We can't outwait her without having everybody in the house ready to rip one another's heads off. I'm sure there's a way to do this, but I'm also sure I don't know what it is. Also be it noted that I live in the middle of nowhere and there isn't an obedience school in reasonable driving distance. Can anybody suggest or link to a training solution for this problem?
I've been ranging up and down the internet trying to find training solutions. The going answer seems to be... wait her out, then reward her when she shuts up. Trouble is, that can be HOURS. We can't outwait her without having everybody in the house ready to rip one another's heads off. I'm sure there's a way to do this, but I'm also sure I don't know what it is. Also be it noted that I live in the middle of nowhere and there isn't an obedience school in reasonable driving distance. Can anybody suggest or link to a training solution for this problem?