# 8 month old shepherd barking at night -- strategies?



## misterW (Apr 25, 2010)

We currently live in the country, so there has always been times when she will hear something outside (maybe a deer snorts or something) and bark and want to investigate. That seems like normal dog behavior and I am fine with that. After all, one of the benefits to having a dog is to have someone to alert you to things. And in general, as a puppy she has always barked/whined very little. In fact, there have been a number of times when I have been surprised to see someone in my yard (UPS guy, propane company filling the tank, etc.) and she has not made a sound. 

This has changed recently at night. For the past week, I can count on something setting her off at least once during the night, usually around 1 AM, then perhaps later on as well. Her bark is VERY loud. And the problem is, once she gets started, she seems to rile herself up and she has trouble stopping -- she will keep going for many minutes. Tonight, she started around 1 AM and then had periodic outbursts for the next hour -- you've got be *&^%(% kidding me!

It could be that there are different sounds/smells with the changing season or that deer are unusually active now...... but I need a way to deal with this (I'm writing this right now at 2:40 AM!)

My approach so far:
I have not let her outside when she starts barking. I don't want her to think barking will get her outside, and I don't want to set a precedent of getting up in the middle of the night.

Tonight, I tried teaching her "quiet." When she barked, I said "Eva, quiet" and gave her a click and treat when she stopped for a second.

My questions:

(1) What else can I do?

(2) When she stops barking, should I click and treat once? Or continue to treat for prolonged silence?

(3) Perhaps avoiding the issue, but.....anybody ever try anything with background noise? Was just thinking that if there was some background noise in the house, she might not hear whatever it is that is setting her off (if she is in fact hearing something)

Thanks for any responses!


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## LazyGRanch713 (Jul 22, 2009)

misterW said:


> We currently live in the country, so there has always been times when she will hear something outside (maybe a deer snorts or something) and bark and want to investigate. That seems like normal dog behavior and I am fine with that. After all, one of the benefits to having a dog is to have someone to alert you to things. And in general, as a puppy she has always barked/whined very little. In fact, there have been a number of times when I have been surprised to see someone in my yard (UPS guy, propane company filling the tank, etc.) and she has not made a sound.
> 
> This has changed recently at night. For the past week, I can count on something setting her off at least once during the night, usually around 1 AM, then perhaps later on as well. Her bark is VERY loud. And the problem is, once she gets started, she seems to rile herself up and she has trouble stopping -- she will keep going for many minutes. Tonight, she started around 1 AM and then had periodic outbursts for the next hour -- you've got be *&^%(% kidding me!
> 
> ...


I did some background noise before. We had some serious barkers in the kennel once, and a radio and a fan stopped 95% of it. If the sounds were drowned out, it seemed they had nothing to bark at.
(Psst...I love the name Eva for a female GSD  One of my favorite GSD's of all time was named Eva, she was a heck of a good dog.)
I can't sleep in silence (see my post about Auz's toy and the cats paws patting all over the place, lol); I have always slept with a fan running on low. Auz used to occasionally bark at night at things unseen, but I learned the difference between his "I'm BO-RED and I think I HEAR SOME-THIIING..." bark and his "HOLY *@*#" bark. When I hear the deep, throaty, lion roar bark, I know something up. (To date, it's been deer, coyotes, and one on occasion, an early morning farmer pulling his truck back to a parked combine). 
Best of luck.


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## misterW (Apr 25, 2010)

yeah, i think i will give this a shot if it keeps up. i'll have to find where i stuck that fan. i was just thinking that when we were visiting in DC for the past week and a half, she didn't bark once at night, even when other dogs in the building were barking. perhaps its because there is too much background noise there to hear when the monsters accidently step on a twig or rustle the grass or whatever the *^^*% she thinks is going on. 

i swear, this dog... somebody knocks on the door and enters the house and she'll absentmindedly look up briefly from the bone she's chewing. but god forbid a chipmunk or whatever is out there should make a tiny peep -- sound the red alert for that one!


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## Yvonne (Aug 6, 2010)

Is she possibly entering her first heat and males are coming around at night? Giving her a treat is going to make her bark more not less. How much exersize does she get? She could be maturing enough to need more mental and physical stimulation like perhaps a workout in the evening before her bedtime?

we just posted same time so I am confused she is normally outside at night but you had her with you in dc and she was with you at night? If you had her with you and then separate her away again I am thinking she is not liking it as gsds love to be with their people.


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## qingcong (Oct 26, 2009)

My dog is similar, we used to live on Main Street in downtown where there was noise 24/7. He never barked at any of that noise. When we moved to a quieter suburban house, he got spooked by just about anything and poofed at seemingly nothing. The ice falling in the fridge set him off. They've started construction down the street and the constant racket doesn't phase him. What can you say? Dogs don't really think. Based on my experiences, the background noise, or any sort of constant noise is a good idea. It's not as startling to the dogs.




misterW said:


> My approach so far:
> I have not let her outside when she starts barking. I don't want her to think barking will get her outside, and I don't want to set a precedent of getting up in the middle of the night.
> 
> Tonight, I tried teaching her "quiet." When she barked, I said "Eva, quiet" and gave her a click and treat when she stopped for a second.


You've got the first part right there, to not allow her to reward herself for barking. I think you may have the second idea backwards. I can't vouch for the effectiveness of this technique because my dog doesn't have a barking issue, but one thing trainers do is to put the barking on cue. Then you never give the cue to bark. If you try to teach it the other way around, by trying to put quietness on cue, then you likely end up with a dog who is only quiet if you give the cue.


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## misterW (Apr 25, 2010)

Yvonne said:


> Is she possibly entering her first heat and males are coming around at night? Giving her a treat is going to make her bark more not less. How much exersize does she get? She could be maturing enough to need more mental and physical stimulation like perhaps a workout in the evening before her bedtime?
> 
> we just posted same time so I am confused she is normally outside at night but you had her with you in dc and she was with you at night? If you had her with you and then separate her away again I am thinking she is not liking it as gsds love to be with their people.


I don't think she is entering heat yet -- haven't seen any signs of it, or of other dogs being around.

She gets a good amount of exercise. A 45+ minute walk twice a day that includes running unleashed through a wooded area. 

No, she is always inside with me at night. I said that we took a trip to DC recently and noted that she did not bark at all then. She was inside with me on that trip as always.


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## LazyGRanch713 (Jul 22, 2009)

misterW said:


> I don't think she is entering heat yet -- haven't seen any signs of it, or of other dogs being around.
> 
> She gets a good amount of exercise. A 45+ minute walk twice a day that includes running unleashed through a wooded area.
> 
> No, she is always inside with me at night. I said that we took a trip to DC recently and noted that she did not bark at all then. She was inside with me on that trip as always.


At 8 months old, I tend to agree with Yvonne--she's probably maturing and becoming a GSD(og), and is leaving her GSD(puppy) months behind. Auz discovered his voice when he was about that age; and I really didn't think much of it until he became quite obnoxious about roar-barking at anything that moved outside. Training helped obviously, but eventually he learned that roaring at things didn't really make anything happen. Now-a-days he doesn't do that unless there's a real reason, and it's reinforced--I stop what I'm doing and look out the window  What kind of active training are you doing with Eva?


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## misterW (Apr 25, 2010)

qingcong said:


> My dog is similar, we used to live on Main Street in downtown where there was noise 24/7. He never barked at any of that noise. When we moved to a quieter suburban house, he got spooked by just about anything and poofed at seemingly nothing. The ice falling in the fridge set him off. They've started construction down the street and the constant racket doesn't phase him. What can you say? Dogs don't really think. Based on my experiences, the background noise, or any sort of constant noise is a good idea. It's not as startling to the dogs.


I noticed this w/ her some months ago as well. We used to sleep downstairs -- she wasn't able to climb the stairs as a young pup -- but transitioned to upstairs when she got older. For some reason, the acoustics are different up there. I noticed that I heard things (cars passing on the road, the sound of the nearby stream) that weren't as apparent downstairs. And for the first few nights, she barked at the new noises. Then she settled down. Until recently. 


> You've got the first part right there, to not allow her to reward herself for barking. I think you may have the second idea backwards. I can't vouch for the effectiveness of this technique because my dog doesn't have a barking issue, but one thing trainers do is to put the barking on cue. Then you never give the cue to bark. If you try to teach it the other way around, by trying to put quietness on cue, then you likely end up with a dog who is only quiet if you give the cue.


So are you saying (the poster above as well) that it is impossible to teach the command "quiet"? That you can only teach the command to bark (and then not give it)? Why is this? Is it that a dog cannot grasp the absence of an action? 

Are there no dogs who can be interrupted once they start barking?

The night that I started teaching her "quiet", it seemed to be doing _something._ I will grant you that I doubt she grasped what "quiet" meant, but she did get the idea to stop barking, come over and wait for the treat. She would start barking again later, but the chain of barking had been disrupted. Perhaps I could get the same effect by just calling her over and giving her any command. 

I am very curious about what you are saying about a dog not being able to learn the "quiet" command. I feel like I've seen people yell at a barking dog to knock it off and it having some effect. And I doubt there was much careful training that went into that.


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## Cracker (May 25, 2009)

This may mean a sleepless night or two (not that this is not already happening!) but I would do several things:

Add the "white noise" that is being discussed. The country is SO quiet that every little noise seems big to a dog. This will help diminish her squirrel alert barking.

When she barks at night, assess the bark (fear or alert or demand barking) and only respond to fear/alert barking. Look out a window, use a cue like "Thanks" and go back to bed. If it's demand barking ignore it OR go get her, leash her and put her in a down stay for a couple of minutes. The "unnecessary" barking will lessen after going through an extinction period (gets worse before it gets better)..but she will also know that if she IS really concerned about something that you WILL listen to her and "check it out". 

I would be very careful trying to teach to speak on command if you already have a barking issue...timing issues on behalf of the trainer can create a very happy barker...who finds it even MORE rewarding to bark than to NOT bark. If you do decide to do the click treat program I would be very sure to reward the Bark with kibble and the NO BARK with something pretty dang special and work on duration asap so that she doesn't learn I bark and get rewarded, then quiet, then bark, then quiet, then bark...well you get the picture. It's not a pretty behaviour chain. It's also not a behaviour (barking) that you want to put under full stimulus control...for what IS a GSD WITHOUT a bark?

Edit to add:
After your last post. Yes some dogs can be interrupted and some CAN be taught quiet (like my thankyou cue), but many many dogs find a yelling QUIET!! to just be another bark, the owner Joining in on the Fun. Context is very important. Barking is a communication, recreational barking is just fun. You need to make the communication relevant to the dog and the recreational barking less rewarding.


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## misterW (Apr 25, 2010)

LazyGRanch713 said:


> At 8 months old, I tend to agree with Yvonne--she's probably maturing and becoming a GSD(og), and is leaving her GSD(puppy) months behind. Auz discovered his voice when he was about that age; and I really didn't think much of it until he became quite obnoxious about roar-barking at anything that moved outside. Training helped obviously, but eventually he learned that roaring at things didn't really make anything happen.


What sort of training do you feel helped the barking?


> Now-a-days he doesn't do that unless there's a real reason, and it's reinforced--I stop what I'm doing and look out the window  What kind of active training are you doing with Eva?


Training now consists of regular reinforcement of basic stuff -- sit, come, etc. Stay is being reinforced and developed more (longer time, longer distance, adding other distractions). Still perfecting loose leash walking. 

Just recently I started teaching her how to run along w/ me on roller blades; hope to do the same w/ bicycle once she gets the hang of that. 

Other than that... frisbee or ball retrieving now and then....teaching her to carry and hold an object. Thats about it.


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## Cracker (May 25, 2009)

misterW said:


> .
> 
> Just recently I started teaching her how to run along w/ me on roller blades; hope to do the same w/ bicycle once she gets the hang of that.


Off topic but:
Be very careful with this sort of exercise, her growth plates are not closed.


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## misterW (Apr 25, 2010)

Cracker said:


> This may mean a sleepless night or two (not that this is not already happening!) but I would do several things:
> 
> Add the "white noise" that is being discussed. The country is SO quiet that every little noise seems big to a dog. This will help diminish her squirrel alert barking.
> When she barks at night, assess the bark (fear or alert or demand barking) and only respond to fear/alert barking.


That is the thing that has made this interesting. She is generally a dog that very rarely barks or makes noise. But ALL of the barking at night has been the fear/alert sort of barking (were u also distinguishing between the two? if so how?). I mean the sort of barking where she is quietly lying down, then all of a sudden jerks up her head, looking at me with a wild eyed "Holy *&%*! Did you hear THAT?!" sort of look, before exploding into a deep, roaring, eardrum shattering series of barks. 

That's what has made it difficult. I want her to let me know if stuff is going down outside. Getting woken up once in a while by such things is to be expected in the country I would think. Just not every night and every couple of hours! 

Last night she was better. Maybe there is just a lot of deer activity now. There are a ton of deer all around us, so I wouldn't be surprised if that is what it is about. 


> Look out a window, use a cue like "Thanks" and go back to bed. If it's demand barking ignore it OR go get her, leash her and put her in a down stay for a couple of minutes. The "unnecessary" barking will lessen after going through an extinction period (gets worse before it gets better)..but she will also know that if she IS really concerned about something that you WILL listen to her and "check it out".


Yeah, I've done that with success if she is barking at something during the day. She tends to lose interest after I make a show of looking around, sniffing the air, then thanking her and walking away. I just REALLY didn't feel like constantly getting out of bed ...


> Edit to add:
> After your last post. Yes some dogs can be interrupted and some CAN be taught quiet (like my thankyou cue), but many many dogs find a yelling QUIET!! to just be another bark, the owner Joining in on the Fun. Context is very important. Barking is a communication, recreational barking is just fun. You need to make the communication relevant to the dog and the recreational barking less rewarding.


Funny you should say this as I have recently made that same observation and conclusion. I was just telling my girlfriend about that. Yelling quiet or shut up to her seems to make her bark MORE. I had decided that she interpreted the loud, excited gibberish (to her) that I was yelling as encouragement or joining in or something along those lines. 

Now, if, as a last resort, I do end up trying to teach her "quiet".... do you know of any resources/vidoes to point me to so that I can do it properly?


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## Yvonne (Aug 6, 2010)

I agree she is way to young to run beside blades and bicycles.

I teach mine to bark on command then enough when I want it stopped. This helps with ok you warned us its night enough go back to sleep. However if you treat for alerts and the dogs says omg I want a treat I am going to alert bark or if your dog is acting like the boogy man is out there and getting an emotional its okay baby nothing out there its all alright it will reinforce the actions.

During the day training you take whatever the dog dearly loves be it toy or food treat and get them so excited by not giving it to them jumping around whatever will get a strong bark out of them. When they bark praise and instant give the object. One bark they get it this helps so that they dont do a bunch of yapping later. After they have connected bark with the command you give while praising and have it down pat you whisper the command in hushed voice and tell them whisper give command and only reward if they huff quietly... all mine have learned to whisper. I do not have problem with barking dogs after I teach them to bark I teach them to stop barking on command. I tell them "enough" stern tone after one or two barks. I do not encourage them to bark if nothing is there by not rewarding and by giving a "Phooey" "no" whatever you wish to use if they bark and it is not a genuine reason and put them in a down. They quickly learn false alerts are not fun and will not do it.


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## misterW (Apr 25, 2010)

Cracker said:


> Off topic but:
> Be very careful with this sort of exercise, her growth plates are not closed.


I'm glad you mentioned this -- I was about to start another thread as I have been wondering about it. So far, I've just taken her down to some empty tennis courts where we practiced doing some laps. 

How much concrete running can she do now? 

At what age can she start actually running longer distances on concrete?


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## Yvonne (Aug 6, 2010)

I would not do it till at least a year and half old and I would also protect her feet from the concrete with the use of a ointment or booties. You mentioned she is still not fully leash and command trained so I would also do that before this activity.


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## misterW (Apr 25, 2010)

Yvonne said:


> I agree she is way to young to run beside blades and bicycles.


I have done this very little at this point for this reason (see my latest post)....What age do you do this sort of stuff with your dogs?




> I do not have problem with barking dogs after I teach them to bark I teach them to stop barking on command. I tell them "enough" stern tone after one or two barks. I do not encourage them to bark if nothing is there by not rewarding and by giving a "Phooey" "no" whatever you wish to use if they bark and it is not a genuine reason and put them in a down. They quickly learn false alerts are not fun and will not do it.


Can you say more about your "stop barking" training? How do you teach them to stop? Can you stop them from barking if there is an actual reason for them barking (animal, stranger, etc.)? Or only stop them once you command them to start?


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## Yvonne (Aug 6, 2010)

Please look up you have missed some of my posts:

I teach mine to bark on command then enough when I want it stopped. This helps with ok you warned us its night enough go back to sleep. However if you treat for alerts and the dogs says omg I want a treat I am going to alert bark or if your dog is acting like the boogy man is out there and getting an emotional its okay baby nothing out there its all alright it will reinforce the actions.

During the day training you take whatever the dog dearly loves be it toy or food treat and get them so excited by not giving it to them jumping around whatever will get a strong bark out of them. When they bark praise and instant give the object. One bark they get it this helps so that they dont do a bunch of yapping later. After they have connected bark with the command you give while praising and have it down pat you whisper the command in hushed voice and tell them whisper give command and only reward if they huff quietly... all mine have learned to whisper. I do not have problem with barking dogs after I teach them to bark I teach them to stop barking on command. I tell them "enough" stern tone after one or two barks. I do not encourage them to bark if nothing is there by not rewarding and by giving a "Phooey" "no" whatever you wish to use if they bark and it is not a genuine reason and put them in a down. They quickly learn false alerts are not fun and will not do it.


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## Elana55 (Jan 7, 2008)

I agree that she is coming into her "own" and barking. I also think it is important for you to know that barking can be a very self rewarding behavior and you do want to nip this in the bud now. 

I have silent dogs. I work hard to have silent dogs. Barking is simply not something I want the dog to do. Of course, the dogs are often silent when I want them to bark.. but I can deal with that.. the ol' .12ga Savage Pump is right there. 

My dogs also know "enough" and "quiet." Enough means "leave off that activity" and quiet is self explanatory. To train this I diverted the dog's attention and when they were quiet and focused on me they got a reward. Never had this not work..never had the dog use barking to get a reward (I put some bit of time between the cue to be quiet and the barking). 

I did have a problem with one dog who barked incessantly in a crate. I fixed that by covering the crate. 

I suggest that for now (not forever) you crate your dog at night and cover the crate. See if that works along with a fan running. The point is to start out getting the dog to not bark through the night. Once you have a quiet night you can stage by stage do things like removing the crate cover (keeping the dog crated and with white noise) and then letting the dog loose or losing the white noise.. and eventually losing the crate as well. Take you time.. like 2-3 weeks.. as you work thru this to get your dog to be quiet. 

Of course, this is advice based on what you describe and it may not be worth anything without seeing the dog.


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## misterW (Apr 25, 2010)

Elana55 said:


> My dogs also know "enough" and "quiet." Enough means "leave off that activity" and quiet is self explanatory. To train this I diverted the dog's attention and when they were quiet and focused on me they got a reward.


Sounds similar to my initial attempts the other night. How much time do you leave in between the command and the reward?

I think the crate idea makes sense. I have been thinking about moving her crate upstairs for a while. I think that would make her area upstairs seem more like a cozy place for sleeping and less of a place for watching over things and guarding the house from zombies. As it is now, she has been sleeping on a rug at the top of a stairway leading directly to the porch outside. It puts her in a prime position to hear every single thing that goes on outside and see every flickering shadow through the door's window. She looks very watchdog-like at the top of the stairs -- she may be embracing this image a bit too fully.


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## qingcong (Oct 26, 2009)

misterW said:


> So are you saying (the poster above as well) that it is impossible to teach the command "quiet"? That you can only teach the command to bark (and then not give it)? Why is this? Is it that a dog cannot grasp the absence of an action?
> 
> Are there no dogs who can be interrupted once they start barking?
> 
> ...



I'm not suggesting that dogs can't learn a cue to be quiet, but you are only teaching the dog to be quiet if given a cue. Since you are into clicker training, what Skinner discovered with his experiments was that the driving force behind behavior is the antecedent, not the precedent. In other words, consequences dictate behavior, not commands. So even if you do successfully teach the "quiet" command, I'm not sure that you solve your problem of sleepless nights, since you will be up all night giving the command. 

Personally, the things I would try are 1) background noise, 2) crate her if she barks and then release her when she's quiet, and 3) crate her and cover the crate with a blanket if previous doesn't work. 

Teaching her to bark on cue teaches her to control her barking; as Cracker says, it puts barking under stimulus control so that it's not just a reactive behavior. A local trainer I talked to did this for her barky terrier and it's a method I've read about from Pam Dennison and Karen Pryor. So I'm not just making this up, but I will say that I haven't tried this method (putting an unwanted behavior under stimulus control), so I'm not the person to ask on how to successfully implement it.


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## Elana55 (Jan 7, 2008)

misterW said:


> Sounds similar to my initial attempts the other night. How much time do you leave in between the command and the reward?


No more than a few seconds.. she has to look at me and be silent. If she looks at me and barks, no reward. When she looks at me and is silent I say, "YES!!" (marker word) and then give food. Sometimes when she is silent I will say "YES!" (mark it) and when she looks at me hold the food back about 3 seconds and then feed it. Silence is as much diverting the dog as it is about silence I think. 



> I think the crate idea makes sense. I have been thinking about moving her crate upstairs for a while. I think that would make her area upstairs seem more like a cozy place for sleeping and less of a place for watching over things and guarding the house from zombies. As it is now, she has been sleeping on a rug at the top of a stairway leading directly to the porch outside. It puts her in a prime position to hear every single thing that goes on outside and see every flickering shadow through the door's window. She looks very watchdog-like at the top of the stairs -- she may be embracing this image a bit too fully.


I don't know about dogs embracing guard stance behavior, but I think giving her a less reactive environment (crate in a quiet corner upstairs) would be a good idea.


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## KBLover (Sep 9, 2008)

qingcong said:


> I'm not suggesting that dogs can't learn a cue to be quiet, but you are only teaching the dog to be quiet if given a cue. Since you are into clicker training, what Skinner discovered with his experiments was that the driving force behind behavior is the antecedent, not the precedent. In other words, consequences dictate behavior, not commands. So even if you do successfully teach the "quiet" command, I'm not sure that you solve your problem of sleepless nights, since you will be up all night giving the command.


What if you show the dog that barking gets it nothing and quiet gets it rewards? Won't the dog then choose to "offer silence" in hopes of a reward?

And then it becomes a habit over time? 

Don't necessarily use an overt cue, but more of a shaping-esque approach where the dog can figure out the behavior you want on his own. 

Would that work more successfully in your opinion?


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## qingcong (Oct 26, 2009)

KBLover said:


> What if you show the dog that barking gets it nothing and quiet gets it rewards? Won't the dog then choose to "offer silence" in hopes of a reward?
> 
> And then it becomes a habit over time?
> 
> ...



Yeah, possibly, I dunno. In this case my approach would be based more around P- than R+. I just want the dog to relax and sleep, and I'm not sure that it's possible to teach a dog to sleep using shaping/R+. The whole purpose of positive reinforcement and shaping is that it gets the dog in a seeking state, where the drive is up at suitable level for the activity. With the mind active in seek mode, is it really possible to truly relax? I dunno.


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