I have been doing a bit of research on the effectiveness of the citronella bark collar and have found a mixed batch of reviews.  I’m still of the opinion that improper use of the collar is the cause of failure in most instances. It could be too, of course, that some dogs don’t respond so well to the collars. I read somewhere that dogs have been known to simply put their head to the side and thus avoid getting sprayed! Pretty smart dog!  Fortunately little Trissie isn’t that smart.

It seems too that the barking is reduced most effectively when the dog doesn’t wear it all the time.  That could be the reason why it worked so well with Trissie, seeing that she only wore it at night, just before we went to bed. I’m seriously thinking about taking it off her completely now, to see how she’ll do. I’ll keep it on hand so that if the barking begins a problem again I’ll have it to slip back on her again. I’m worried that she might either learn to turn her head to the side to avoid the citronella spray, or she might just plain get used to it and start her barking again.

In any case, I’m certainly very happy with the citronella bark collar and the very positive effect it has had in stopping barking with Trissie, and I would recommend it to others to at least try.  It’s a bit of an investment, but well worth it if it does the job it’s meant to, of stopping barking. Next task is to work on her flea problem, which we didn’t realize she had right away. Looks like it’s time to flea bomb the house again, sigh!

In the course of my research I read where someone was using it to try to stop overly aggressive behavior in dogs, however it doesn’t seem to me that it would be very effective in that instance. I think, with an overly aggressive dog, the only solution would be to enlist the help of a good trainer, rather than slapping a citronella collar on and expecting that to do the trick.  But for stopping barking dogs, it does seem to work well.

We recently inherited a 9 month old female cocker spaniel, her previous owners were friends of ours but they were leaving this country and heading back to their own country. Of course we inherited not only the dog, but food bowls, chains and collars, brushes and her Frontline Dog Medicine.  Trissie is a very cute, cuddly little dog, but she has a bad problem.  For no apparent reason she starts barking right on dusk, at shadows or anything that moves.    Neighbors to our right are a couple of elderly sisters, with pretty low tolerance for children, dogs, or anything that encroaches on their peace and quiet.  As you can imagine, they were not very pleased with the latest addition to our family.

We tried bringing her inside and that worked, at least while she was inside. Because of allergies though, we can’t have dogs in our living room or the sleeping areas of the house and we didn’t want to leave her in the kitchen area at night. She was used to sleeping outside at night, and we brought her kennel, kennel decking, bed and blankets with her so no need to feel insecure there.

So, at bedtime dear little Trissie the dog would be sent off to bed.  She’d do her business, sniff around a bit then trot over to her kennel.  When we were sure she’d settled down we crept off to bed. No sooner were we lying down though, and the barking would begin.  We’d be up and down for most of the night trying to shush her, finally we’d bring her inside at around 5 a.m. so we could get some shut-eye at least.

Yes, I know, we were rewarding bad behaviour but to be honest we didn’t know what else to do for those first few nights.  It was probably the result of her being insecure but we couldn’t have her in the house all night, nor could we have her barking and keeping the whole neighborhood awake.

I’ve used the citronella bark collar before, quite successfully and I thought it might be what was needed for Trissie.  I bought the citronella bark collar home after work and managed to get it on Trissie before she started her routine nightly barking.

You should have seen her, the first time she barked and the spray shot out.  She turned her head from one side to the other, trying to figure out what on earth was going one.  We noticed an immediate improvement in her learning not to bark, though she’d still try it from time to time during the night.  The citronella smell doesn’t sit so well with her, which is partly the reason for using a citronella bark collar. Other spray anti bark collars work too, but there’s something about the citronella that most dogs find unappealing.

Here we are one week or so later, and I have to laud the citronella spray collar as being the solution we were looking for.  Now she barely barks. If she does try it out, it just takes  a few times for her to remember that whenever she barks she gets a little surprise!

I am not leaving the anti bark collar on her during the day, as I don’t think her barking during the day presents much of a problem. She mainly has a bark at the kids passing by on their way home from school, or when the postman drops off something in the letterbox.  Dusk and nighttime was the problem, so I simply slip it on her when I get home at work and then take it off her again the next morning.

When I bought the citronella spray collar, I went ahead and bought replacement citronella refills as well as a couple of new batteries. The spray collar goes through batteries pretty quickly–another reason for my decision not to leave the collar on her all day.  They’re pretty easy to come by checking out online dog supplies.

Anyway, if you’re looking for a fairly quick, safe and easy to use solution to help train your dog not to bark, I would highly recommend trying the citronella bark collar above all other types of anti bark collar.  It works in about 85% of cases, and I have my thought that the 15% of the time it doesn’t work is due to improper use.

This type of anti bark collar is said to work in approximately 85% of cases.  Not only can this collar be used to train or to stop a dog from barking incessantly (and driving everyone up the wall at the same time) but if you purchase a remote controlled anti bark collar you can also use it to curb other unwanted activities such as chasing other dogs or cats, jumping up on people to greet them, chasing cars, damaging their dog cages, etc. Virtually any behaviour that you would like to modify could be done using the remote anti bark collar.

How to use the remote anti bark collar

Naturally you would need to be at home to use this collar, and preferably hidden, out of sight so that your dog doesn’t see you. If the dog sees you he might associate you with the unpleasant spray from the anti bark collar, and you don’t want that!   For example, if you were expecting visitors and your dog always jumps up on people when they come up to your front door you could hide inside the living room and peek out at the dog from behind the curtains. When the visitors arrive and doggie goes jumping up, you activate the spray. The dog will most likely be so startled and curious as to where the spray came from that he will stop jumping up immediately. You could do the same for a dog that chases the cat, or digs holes in the garden.

How the regular spray anti bark collar works

With the regular (not remotely controlled) anti bark collar, each time your dog barks a microphone included on the collar detects the barking and the anti bark collar releases a fine jet spray of liquid. The sound of the spray and the sudden feeling of the spray distracts the dog from barking. Over time, this trains your dog that every time it barks it will get sprayed. In order to avoid getting sprayed, the dog will limit its barking.

Most citronella spray anti bark collars include a spray refill when you buy the kit, and some also come with replacement batteries.  If not, be sure to buy extra spray and extra batteries when you purchase the collar.  Depending on how much you use the citronella spray anti bark collar the battery can run out pretty quickly, and if your dog is just starting to ‘get it’ you wouldn’t want to have to run out to get new batteries in the middle of his training.

Look for a spray bottle that has a see-through window so you can see what level the liquid is at. Many collars allow you to adjust the strength of the spray to either a short or a long duration. Collars also have an on/off switch, remember to turn the collar off when you’re not needing to use it to conserve your battery use.

One drawback with anti bark collars that are set off by sound is that the microphones  can sometimes pick up other dogs barking.  Usually they try to calibrate them so as not to pick up on other sounds, but if you have more than one dog living close together you may need to keep an eye out for this. It would be horrid if your dog was sprayed every time the neighbors yappy little pup barked!  This generally shouldn’t be a problem, the more likely scenario would be if you have two dogs.

A final caution, the effects of the Anti Bark collar cannot be expected to be permanent, no matter what behavior you’re trying to modify.  You might want to keep a collar on hand, even once the bad habit of barking is alleviated, and use it again from time to time if you see the problem behavior recurring again.

Whether your barking dog is annoying your neighbours, keeping you awake at night or scaring everybody who walks past your gate, it’s a problem.  While one immediate solution may be to use an anti bark collar, it’s not the total solution. There is a reason your dog barks and in order to effectively change this habit you need to work towards eliminating the root cause and employ other dog training methods.

Think about dogs in the wild. Do they incessantly run back and forth barking just to be annoying, or for the fun of it?  No, not generally. A dog barks to warn his fellow pack members or to warn away an unwelcome intruder. A female dog barks at her pups to let them know of danger or to call them to come to her. Sometimes, though not always, dogs bark when hunting to startle or scare their prey.

Constant barking is not normal for any dog.

If a dog is barking they are trying to tell you something.

They’re either:

• Afraid or in danger
• Uncomfortable in their surroundings
• Warning intruders to keep away from their “territory”
• Trying to get your attention
• Bored
• Manipulating/Training you–trying to get you to do something to get them to stop barking
• Or they’ve developed a bad habit of barking previously, due to one of the above reasons, even though their situation has changed.

Once you have figured out what the problem is, then it’s time to do something about it.

What is the immediate solution to training a puppy (over six months) or a dog not to bark?
An Anti Bark Collar

If you are looking for a more immediate solution, which you would need in a case where the dog has to be retrained or needs time to overcome whatever problems caused it to bark in the first place, you may want to take a look at the anti bark collar.

Just looking on line you will see quite a variety of these collars.  There are three main types to choose from:

• Static Shock Collar
• Sonic Dog Collar
• Spray Dog Collar

The Static Shock Collar is the oldest type. Many deem it to be inhumane, as when activated it sends a rather nasty little static shock into the dog’s throat.  These collars are usually activated by the vibration of the dog’s vocal cords, but they can also be activated by noise–usually the sound of the dog’s bark.  However, they have also been known to activate at the sound of another dog barking. Not only is that unfair to the dog, but it really doesn’t accomplish anything as far as teaching the dog not to bark.

The sonic dog collar emits a high frequency sound whenever the dog starts barking a lot. A big advantage with this type of collar is that the sound is usually of such a high frequency that it can’t be heard by humans.  Dogs detest the sound, and it is quite effective in stopping a problem barker. I also recently saw a device for sale that looks like a birdhouse, but which appears totally normal hanging in a tree.  A perfect way to control the neighbour’s barking dog!

The spray collar is common now, and readily available at most pet shops. The citronella spray collar is also activated by the dog’s barking, however this collar sends a spray of a harmless liquid up to the dog’s face. This surprises the dog and dogs generally find citronella to be quite distasteful.

The anti bark collar is not cheap; current on line prices run anywhere between $40 to $100. It pays to shop around, one shop offered a 60-day 75% return on any item that did not meet up to your expectations.

As far as dog training aids go, the anti bark collar could be just what you need to see you through a rough patch with your dog, or to help stop habitual barking.  Whatever the case though, it remains important to determine what it was that caused your dog to bark and to do something about it.