What to Do If Your Dog Barks at the Mailman

For this Santa Monica dog training session we worked with 3 year-old Spaniel mix Sven; sharing tips on how to help when a dog barks at the mailman.

We covered a number of dog behavior fundamentals including a refresher on using marker words, secrets to develop good behavior like celebrating and how to recognize dog consent and cut off signals.

I also went over how to use the positive interrupter. This is really the best way to say no to a dog. It’s not the same of course, more of a distraction. But if you pair it with hand targeting, it can be a great way to redirect a dog and move them away from things.  It can even be an effective way of stopping dog barking at other sounds.

Distracting a dog from practicing unwanted behaviors is something I recommend all of my clients work on. But I also want to show them how they can modify their dog’s behavior using modern, positive dog training methods.

What to Do When Your Dog Barks at the Mailman

One of the main things Sven’s guardians wanted to work on was his habit of barking when he hears the lid of the mailbox being opened. Many stories, songs and references of when a dog barks at the mailman tells me this is an old dogbehavior problem that we needed to fix.

An easy and effective way to stop a dog who barks at the mailman is to change how the dog feels about the sound. I like to do this using counter conditioning and some desensitization. This is the best way of stopping dog barking because the dogs tarts to look at the sound as a positive.

If you have a barks at the mailman, you can use the free positive dog training video below to stop your dog’s barking. The best part of this dog behavior trick is how easy it is. And you can use this method to stop dogs from barking at sounds of all kinds. All you need are some high value treats and the ability to control how loud the sound is as you practice.

Right after we shot the video on how to stop when a dog barks at the mailman, I walked Sven’s guardians through the same exercise. We kept at it until they were able to open the mailbox lid and close it as loud as the mailman does without any barking.  I loved watching the human’s facial expressions as we made the sound over and over with no barking from Sven.

I recommend the guardians practice this exercise to help when thier dog barks at the mailman once or twice a day for the next couple of days in cycles that include breaks. You want all this pracitce to be successful and practicing with shorter more frequent sessions is the best approach if your goal is stopping dog barking. Practice too long and the dog gets tired or frustrated and can start barking.

We ended the session by going out for a sniff walk in midtown Santa Monica. It was a beautiful day and we were able to share some tips to stop Sven from barking at other dogs like the find it away game and U-turns.

We’ve even ran into a couple dogs that we were able to practice some of the engage disengage game. It was great to see how well Sven and his guardians did. I shared a couple of additional tips like how to use the exterior of a dog park to practice and some loose Leash walking tips on our way back home.

By the end of the session, Sven was pretty tired. We had covered a lot in this in-home Santa Monica dog training session. I wanted to make sure the guardians remember everything we covered so we filmed a roadmap to success summary video that you can check out below.

Im looking forward to progress reports from Sven’s guardians. They are some wonderful, loving people who are extremely motivated to help their dog. I enjoy helping anyone with thier dog, but some people inspire me through their passion for helping thier dog and this was definately one of those cases.

Based on how well he responded to the dog training tips we covered in this session, im guessing their days wont be filled with reports that their dog barks at the mailman anymore.