Some Tips to Get a Dog to Stop Barking at Strangers

For this LA dog training session, we taught 1 year-old Cattledog mix Kodak to stop barking at strangers.

Because Kodak has a barking problem when meeting new people, I had his guardian meet me outside of his home. Meeting new people in a neutral environment, preferably outside where there’s a lot of distractions, is always advisable if you have an anxious or insecure dog. Once Kodak gets to know you, he is a real sweetheart, kind of a goofball actually. But until he knows them, he can look like a scary barking dog.

After making friends with Kodak, we headed up to his home so that I could go over a number of dog behavior tips with his guardian. Fortunately, his guardian had been doing a lot of research so we were able to skip a lot of the basics. I did make sure that we went over dog consent, some creative forms of exercise, the importance of rewarding desired behaviors, and some other dog behavior tips.

How to Get a Dog to Stop Barking at Strangers

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We headed down to the lobby of his apartment building so that I could show the guardian how she can help a dog learn to stop a dog from barking at strangers. Kodak is a bit of an unusual case as he usually only barks at strangers who are inside his building.

I handed my phone to his guardian so I could demonstrate a few exercises to stop dogs from barking at unknown people. If you have a dog that barks when meeting new people, you should definitely check out the free positive dog training video below.

By practicing at times where the building is not busy or using friends that Kodak does not know, the guardian can really set him up for success. It’s always best to practice dog behavior modification in a controlled situation or environment. Often times, people set their dogs up to fail because they put it in a situation that it’s not prepared for because they do it int he course of their day. Planning ahead with a strategy makes a big different when teaching a dog to not bark at strangers.

By exercising Kodak, first, picking the appropriate time, and then enlisting the help of a friend or family member, his guardian will be able to make better progress and get quicker results. The key is to make sure that we are going at Kodak’s  pace. Learning how to read his body language and then moving him away from anything he feels uncomfortable about before he reacts is one of the secrets to stopping a dog from barking at strangers.

To help the guardian remember all of the dog behavior tips we shared in this in-home LA dog training session, we recorded a roadmap to success video that you can check out below.