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Are anti-bark collars necessary?
Results so far:
| Yes | 25% | 70 votes | Total: 283 votes | |
| No | 75% | 213 votes |
Yes
by Jane Martin
Created on: May 01, 2010 Last Updated: May 03, 2010
This is a tough one. I have a sheltie. Shelties, proper name Shetland Sheepdog, bark all the time. I mean all the time . . . at everything. They don’t bark to annoy you. Most herding dogs are big barkers. They were bred to alert the shepherd that a wolf was nearby. They weren’t supposed to attack the wolf, because they would most likely lose the battle and the shepherd would be out a good herding dog. Shelties are burglar alarms. Izzie, my 2 ½-year old sheltie, barks every time I open a window. Imagine a hot day and I’m opening fourteen windows. She follows me from window to window barking, well, like a mad dog. Only she isn’t mad, she’s having an absolute ball. She repeats the performance when I close the windows at night, secure that she has done her job and protected her flock.
Shelties are notorious for barking at the door, the dishwasher, the vacuum cleaner, the television, and the washer and dryer. If a piece of stainless steel or silver happen to flash a reflection on the ceiling, that is enough to send Izzie into a fit of barking. I have a stainless steel tea kettle and I drink a lot of tea. I could buy a different kettle, but Izzie is my fourth sheltie, and I love my tea kettle.
Why haven’t I done a better job of training her? Well, I’ve tried. I make her sit and stay. I open the window as slowly as possible or cover the kettle with a kitchen towel. She sits like a vibrating turnip, and even though she isn’t actually barking, she’s moaning and whining to do her job and alert me to the dangers of opening a window and putting the kettle on the stove. Why don’t I get a different breed of dog? Because shelties are beautiful, sensitive, intuitive, smart, fun loving, and they love their owner with a fierceness that melts my heart. I’m addicted to the breed.
My daughter has an 80-lb. black Labrador retriever. Otis is too strong for either of us to walk safely. When Otis gets it into his head to go after that dog across the street, he’s going and you are going with him. My daughter uses a shock collar to control him. Without it, I’d have landed in the hospital more than the one time I tried to hold onto him. The funny thing is, Otis doesn’t mind the shock as much as the warning buzzer. It’s all about control. My daughter has taken Otis to training classes, hired a professional dog trainers, read books, listened to tapes; she’s done it all. Otis needs a shock collar.
I don’t have an anti-barking collar to control Izzie’s barking. I’ve had enough experience with shelties to know the deal. But, if I lived in an apartment and the choice was giving her up or getting her a shock collar, I’d get the collar in a heartbeat. It seems cruel to me, but dog owners have cut their dog’s vocal chords to stop them from barking. Giving up a barking dog seems cruel to the dog and the owner. The anti-barking collar seems a whole lot more humane to me.
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No
by Robert Laws
Created on: September 12, 2009 Last Updated: September 13, 2009
Anti-bark collars for dogs work by detecting the sound of the bark and responding by either releasing an unpleasant smell (usually citronella) or emitting an electric shock to the dog. Effectively, the collars are punishing the dog each time the dog exhibits unwanted behavior (i.e. barking). The idea being that the dog associates the punishment with the barking and learns that barking is not pleasant, ultimately making it possible to remove the collar when the dog has learned this lesson.
These anti-bark collars do work in many cases, but to state they are necessary suggests that there are no other means to reduce and prevent unwanted barking. However, there are other training methods to reduce and prevent unwanted barking that are equally effective, albeit often more time-consuming for the owners.
The collars do not consider the cause of the barking and they do not differentiate between times when barking is desirable (e.g. when someone is breaking into the house) and times when it is undesirable. Collars simply react to the bark and attempt to suppress ALL barking.
The secret to preventing unwanted barking without a collar is to identifying the cause. What is the trigger? Often, dogs will bark because they are afraid, because they are excited or because they are seeking attention. Without going into too much detail, it is possible to train dogs to respond to voice commands, to ignore common sounds and to express their needs in less vocal ways, using distraction and positive reinforcement techniques.
If you choose to use a collar in a situation where there is a strong trigger for barking, like neighborhood kids teasing your dog, the dog may become immune to the effects of the collar. That is, the urge to bark is greater than the punishment of the collar and as the dog experiences the effect more regularly, it has a lesser impact on preventing the barking. You should therefore seek to identify the cause of the barking, even with a collar.
Training a dog is similar to training a child or an employee. There are 2 basic methods; train using fear and punishment for unwanted behavior or train using rewards and positive reinforcement of wanted behavior. Obviously, training humans is easier because we can explain verbally what we want, but the underlying principles are the same.
I do not believe anti-bark collars and other forms of punishment for pets are necessary and I prefer to use positive reinforcement to train pets. However, unlike some people, I do not consider the use of such collars to be cruelty, any more than I would call smacking a child cruelty.
Learn more about this author, Robert Laws.
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