Have you heard the saying, “March comes in like a lion and goes out like a lamb?” I remember my grandmother saying that to me when I was a child. I figure it means, crappy weather in the beginning of March and beautiful, nice, spring like weather towards the end.
By all accounts if you look at the calendar, we are closer to the end of March than the beginning. And since March started with snow and extreme colds, a rational person would think now that we are on the far side of the beginning of March, nicer weather is on the horizon.
Someone please tell the weather people this.
Because holy crap! It’s damn cold outside. We had almost a whole week with daytime temps in the upper 40’s lower 50’s, snow was melting like soft butter on warm pancakes and then BAM! I walk outside yesterday morning and almost froze my ass off.
She has a point and she’ll get to it, she’s just a little long winded.
Which explains me, trudging along behind Sampson and Delilah at 6:15 yesterday morning, trying to keep my brains and limbs from getting frostbite.
I don’t know about your neighborhood, but where I live, it’s quiet at 6:15 in the morning.
Extremely quiet.
The stillness of the morning is broken by the sound of a dog barking. I can hear the dog barking, except the dog is in her house and her house it two houses away.
Two houses!
We’re talking large lots here folks, the lots are over-sized and best guess is we are at least 300 feet away.
Naturally Sampson and Delilah decide the best spot to stop, and sniff is directly in front of the barking dog’s house.
I have a full-on confession here. I don’t know the names of most of the people in my neighborhood, but I do know the names of a good many of the dogs. This dog’s name happens to be Zara.
Of course, us stopping in front of her house drives Zara nuts. She stands at the dark front window, barking. All I can see are two glowing eyes staring out at us.
The barking follows us down the street for another few hundred feet.
Zara isn’t the only dog that barks this way in our neighborhood, there are at least two more that come quickly to mind when I think about it.
And think about it I did.
There is Chloe, who stands at the fence and barks. Five minutes before you get to her house and five minutes after you pass her house. I often comment as I stroll by, “I’m glad I don’t live next to you.”
There is a little dog across the street from Zara, and sometimes this guy starts barking well before we pass his house.
What really boggles my mind is why their owners don’t work with their dogs on the barking.
My dogs have two distinct barks. One lets you know when someone they recognize pulls into the driveway. Sampson roos and Delilah, well she is trying to roo, but she’s not quite there yet.
The other bark can be for the garbage truck, an oil truck, another dog, a cat, squirrel, person walking, deer, leaf. Okay it’s mostly Delilah who barks at these things, but Sampson will bark if another dog walks by.
When it’s daylight and the dogs bark and run to the window, I walk over there, look out and depending on what I see I will either let them out, or assure them it’s nothing to worry about.
Nothing to see here, move along.
When my dogs are outside by themselves (not likely these days with Delilah’s continuing addiction) and they bark continuously I go outside to see what they’re barking at. Then I call them inside and it’s over.
My dogs are not allowed to bark incessantly. In fact, one of my neighbors actually said to me, “What good dogs, we never hear them barking.”
GOOD! Barking dogs would make you a cranky bitch, and I don’t want to deal with that. Besides, once we let our dogs bark like fiends, what’s next? Piles of shit for you to look at?
A couple of times Delilah has barked in the middle of the night.
After I pick my heart up off the floor and stick it back in my chest, I’ll get up, (preferably with my phone and a weapon of some kind in my hand) and go check it out. If my dog runs to the window or door I will either turn on the outside light, or if there is no light, I will make sure that door or window is locked, then shine a flashlight out there to check for scary things. After I determine nothing is out there (and I’ve cleaned the crap out of my pants from being woken from a sound sleep) I will let the dogs outside, or we go back to bed.
I just don’t understand how people can listen to their dogs bark constantly and not do something about it. Especially if they’re barking continuously.
What do you do when your dog barks more than a couple of times?
A special Happy 21st Birthday to my precious niece Taylor, I love you T, have a great one. Love Hauntie.
I can’t stand barking dogs, either!! I’m pretty sure that it’s because I used to work in a grooming salon. Barking aggravates the crap out of me. The other day my neighbor’s dog barked for 8 hours straight. No joke. I was ready to throttle that dog. I don’t allow mine to bark more than alert barking and then we tell thanks, good girls now go lay down.
She’s 21 already??
When did I get so old?!
Cupcake knows the families in our building, but if someone new comes in or passes by, she barks. I kind of like a woof or two, since we’re alone here, but beyond that, she is trained to stop when I shake her throwing chain. We learned it in obedience school. I have never needed to actually throw it. Just picking it up makes her get quiet and head for her safe spot – her chair. It even works when she’s telling off the mailman.
Hi! Cranky bitch here! I can’t stop that little jerk from barking! He makes me insane!
She tells me to shut up and that usually works but I am not too bad a barker anyway. Certainly not in the morning being a bed head. Hope your weather brightens up soon. Have a tremendous Thursday.
Best wishes Molly
We don’t bark much, but we do enjoy a nice howling chorus on occasion…usually when Mom walks Katie and is far enough away she can hear us but can’t do anything about it. It lasts about a minute. Normally we would be in trouble for it, but by the time she is back, we are nice and quiet. When she is home and we get loud, we have to come right inside. No leaving us out to make noise forever.
I can’t stand barking dog either! Our neighbor has a small little “dog” that yips at everything. Absolutely everything. My three dogs will sometimes join her but once they do a simple “shut up!” usually quiets them now after years of training. Even the beagle will stop barking which is a feat in and of itself. Where we live our houses are close together, like the width of our single lane driveway plus maybe 3 or 4 feet between houses. So if my dogs are outside and either neighbor is outside for any reason the bark their heads off like we are under attack. Still working on that one, but so far, calling them in with treats works as long as I get their attention.
I don’t know why, but I sometimes feel guilty when I walk by someone’s house and their dogs go crazy barking. I feel bad that I’m the one causing the disturbance. Why do I feel bad? Why don’t they train their dogs to not constantly bark at people passing their house? Maybe they don’t mind all the noise.
Haley’s pretty good about only barking when there’s a good reason, but every spring when I open the windows, it takes her about a week to settle into accepting the random outdoor sounds and smells. So, there are a few middle of the night wake up calls from her that scare the crap out of me when she barks. Luckily, it only lasts for about a week. Sorry, neighbors! 🙂
I do not like barking dogs either. Unfortunately mine seem to think a leaf blowing in the wind or someone walking by while I am in the shower or on the pot is THE most opportune time to bark incessantly at what ever bird, squirrel, child coming to/from school. Which being stuck in the situation I am in keeps me from controlling said behavior. My chug Vera Wang is the worst of the four. (actually three, one is my son’s german shepard a very well behaved mister). Any advice as to how to keep barking to a minimum would be greatly appreciated. The only time Jake truly barks a lot is when in the back yard and to the next door neighbors dogs.
We work so hard on appropriate barking. I have a spray bottle full of water for when it gets out of hand. But sometimes, I confess, I let them, because I love to hear Chewy’s tiny howl. It’s singing, and I love it. I’m such a bad dog mama.
Love those early morning quiet walks and do notice barking dogs then. When it’s extremely cold and/or dark out, it breaks my heart that those dogs are outside and probably have been all. night. long. I just want to lock the owners outside with no coats, gloves or shoes and see how they like it. Grrr. Sam’s not much of a barker unless someone walks by or rings the doorbell where this sweetie ‘goes all Oprah’ on them. Once it’s been established they are not some sort of a serial killer, he’ll wiggle himself senseless trying to get petted. The dog is shameless to the point of embarrassment. 🙂
I kind of like barking…not the incessant barking but enough to let intruders know: DOGS LIVE HERE Misty almost never barks, she doesn’t want to offend potential guests. So I was glad to add a couple of dogs that let me know when danger might be afoot. I did have to introduce the concept of QUIET as a loud command.
Oh yes, barking dogs turn me into a crazy bitch! I can’t stand it!
I’m that neighbor who will knock on your door to ask you to please address the problem if your dog happens to bark all day. And if you aren’t home i’ll leave a note about it, and then if things progress I begin calling animal control and complaining.
Thankfully i’ve only had to call animal control once, but seriously! When I’m at home and can’t open my windows because the neighbors dog barks ALL DAY I get kinda cranky! I’ve spoken to a couple people and it always gets better, and we’re on good terms.
Dante and Ziva only bark to let me know when someone is at the door, or in the driveway/our yard. Busted a jerk letting his dog poop in my front yard when my dogs went all nutso bonkers at the door.
I’m with you….being woken up in the middle of the night by a bark scares the crap out of me, and my heart pounds so hard I think I’m going to have a heart attack! Usually it turns out to be the cats downstairs doing something and making noise.
We do not let our dogs bark incessantly. That is so irritating….I know, because I’ve had neighbors who let their dogs do that. We had to call the police dept one night because of it….and it was the police chief’s dog next door that was barking (he was actually out of town)!
Luke is proving to be a bit more work in this department, but we’ll keep working on it. Our neighbors aren’t that close so I think it’s more irritating to us than anyone else, and it’s mostly during the day that he’ll get going at least.
There’s one large dog in our neighborhood who barks incessantly twice a day because his people put him out in the backyard and leave him there for at least a half hour (even in the cold) – which would be okay if he WANTED to be out there, but clearly he doesn’t and he complains LOUDLY. It’s really annoying because it starts Daisy barking back at him. Other than that if she barks, she usually points us to a window or door where she heard something, and once she sees us check it out, she’s quiet. Also, if we know everything’s definitely okay, we’ve trained her to stop barking once we say “Thank you, Daisy” to her. It’s nicer than “shut up!!” 🙂
Weather-wise – same thing here. Early spring temps followed by frigid weather yesterday and today – and we’re expecting 1-3 inches of snow tomorrow!! Right on top of our newly-sprouted daffodils!
Pretty much every single neighbor has a barking dog. The worst offenders are my next door neighbors. Their dogs bark when I am in my own back yard. I’ve lived next to it for years, so most of the time I can tune it out. Thankfully, Blueberry is not much of a barker; and when she does bark, I can tell her to pipe down and she actually listens. Her bark is hilarious though. You can tell she doesn’t use her voice very often because it sounds so hoarse. It’s still startling, but not in a scary way. Poor girl, she tries to be tough, but with a name like Blueberry, I don’t think her tough act is taken seriously.
Ugh…I can’t stand neighbors that let their dogs run the fence all day, barking, and don’t do anything to stop it. We have several in our neighborhood too, and I agree, I’m glad none of them are next door.
As for this: “I don’t know about your neighborhood, but where I live, it’s quiet at 6:15 in the morning.” I don’t know about my neighborhood either, as you’ll NEVER catch me out walking that early. LOL!
Hi Y’all!
BOL! I only bark when I’m actually talkin’ to my Humans! or if the doorbell rings.
Y’all come on by,
Hawk aka BrownDog
Barley’s not a huge barker–she usually barks if someone she knows pulls into the parking lot, but as soon as I go stand by her she’ll just put her feet on the windowsill and watch for them to get to the door. Then she has her snarl for the UPS guy that lasts as long as it takes him to put a package on the front step and sprint back to the truck. If she does bark more than a couple times, we practice our “what’s that?” command and get her to focus on something more exciting like a treat 🙂
Callie & Shadow rarely bark much more than a few times any more…just enough to let us know they heard or saw something. Ducky’s another story. When Sam’s not around, I usually just ignore the barking and it stops fairly quickly. Unless she has to go outside. But Sam hasn’t figured out for himself yet that all his impatient yelling at her just makes her bark more. God knows I’ve tried to tell him that; but, well let’s just say he won’t listen. Instead he just gets bent out of shape. So, I take Ducky (and her sisters) outside or downstairs to get us all away from his tirade.
crack me up! first a barker then piles of shit! love it! Nellie is a terrible barker at any little noise in the house, I silently fart and she will start barking like mad, it drives me nuts. Glory is a barker to, takes after her mom but at least she doesn’t bark at my farts. Gambler is very quite and just looks around with the girls are busting a gut barking. I yell at them and tell them to shut up as I can’t stand barking. I do like it thou to alert me of an intruder.
My dog Savanna will bark at things that make noise like trucks and motorcycles. She used to drive me crazy barking at every truck or motorcycle that we passed when we were driving somewhere in the car. I definitely had to work to train her to remain calm when confronted with noisy vehicles, but now she remains calm and quiet during car rides.
The only dog that doesn’t bark in our house is Thunder. But Storm and Freighter are more the alert-you-to danger barkers with Storm being the worst of the three. lol