My Father the Dog Trainer

W. Bruce Cameron
Fri, 27 Feb 2015 21:00:00 -0800
Lifestyle

My parents are the kind of people who believe that dogs understand full sentences, like this: "OK, we're going to the store, we'll be gone a couple of hours, please stay out of the trash and don't lie on my bed, that's off limits and you know it!"

What the dog thinks: Bed!
Updated: Sat Feb 28, 2015

My parents are the kind of people who believe that dogs understand full sentences, like this: "OK, we're going to the store, we'll be gone a couple of hours, please stay out of the trash and don't lie on my bed, that's off limits and you know it!"

What the dog thinks: Bed!

So my father is perplexed that his two canines continue to bark at everyone who comes to the door, even though he's sternly delivered his sermon "Thou Shalt Not Bark at the Person at the Door Unless He Is a Criminal." When it's my dad at the door, the dogs bark even at him, though they are always wagging their tails to indicate they know he is not a criminal.

"Stop barking or no dinner!" my father thunders at them.

What the dogs think: Dinner!

The dogs are named Nick and Carly — Nick is a large jet-black male, and Carly is a smaller blond female. Observing them carefully, my father concludes that it is Nick who is the perpetrator — Carly barks only because Nick is barking.

To test this theory, he feeds Nick doggie snacks as a neighbor comes to the door — and, sure enough, Nick is distracted by the treats and doesn't bark. Nor does Carly bark, either because Nick didn't bark or because she's focused on the question of whether she'll get a treat herself.

With this proof in hand, my father orders an anti-bark shock collar in Nick's size. When it arrives, the dogs bark at the delivery man. My dad shows them the box, but the mere threat doesn't seem to bother them, and they keep barking until he gives them dog treats.

My father doesn't want to physically harm his dog, so he decides to test the collar on himself first. He puts the collar around his neck and makes a barking sound, then screams. Excited, the dogs bark.

"It hurt!" he complains to me on the phone.

"It's a shock collar — did you think it was going to feel good?" I ask him.

"Well, I'm not going to use it on my dog," he says.

He puts the collar away to give to my mom for Mother's Day and orders a non-painful bark collar.

"It shoots a mist of concentrated lemon juice out of these two nozzles when he barks," he chortles.

It sounds harmless enough, but when my dad tries it out on himself, it squirts lemon juice in his eyes. He staggers around the room, blinded, the dogs barking excitedly.

"It burned my eyes! I'm not going to do that to Nick," he says. "Plus, I hate the smell."

"You hate the smell ... of lemons?" I ask cautiously.

"You would hate it, too, if it ever got squirted in your eyes from a bark collar."

Thinking about it, I decide that's not likely to happen.

The next device looks like a small plastic speaker. It emits an annoying, high-pitched sound every time the dogs bark. He sets it up and looks at it expectantly. The dogs decide to take a nap. My dad barks. Nick begins to snore.

"Nothing is happening," he complains. "I've barked and barked."

"Maybe it can tell the difference between a dog bark and a gynecologist bark," I suggest.

My dad goes to the door and opens it, then shuts it. "I'm home!" he shouts. The dogs don't wake up. He stomps his feet. "Hello! I'm a stranger, breaking into your house!"

What the dogs think: He's really losing it.

Eventually, a neighbor comes over.

"They started barking and then wouldn't stop," my father bitterly informs me.

"Almost as if they were irritated by an annoying noise," I muse.

"I had to feed them dog biscuits to get them to shut up," he says.

I ask him whether maybe he shouldn't try just giving them dog biscuits when someone comes to the door and they don't bark. He doesn't think it will work but admits there are no more gadgets to buy.

The positive reinforcement is successful: They don't bark when someone is at the door anymore.

However, they do bark whenever he gets out the box of dog biscuits.