You might be asking how to make your dog stay Calm when guests arrive? We know it. Unlike their feline counterparts, dogs love people and want to be their center of attention. This might be an adorable thing every once in a while, but too much bounciness can lead to trouble especially when guests are coming over.
The sound of doorbell ringing or people knocking at the gate can sometimes make dogs overly excited. They’ll start barking excessively, goes zooming back and forth, or worse, start chasing and jumping at guests that might put them in an uncomfortable situation.
Putting some sort of barrier or a baby gate is the quickest, short-term solution you can do to make your dog stay calm when guests arrive. But this is more challenging if your dog is big and can jump high.
Also, there are several cases when dogs persistently try to cross the barrier and hurt themselves in the process. So definitely, what we want to do is to permanently train our dogs to stay calm even when guests arrive, and here’s how you can do that.
Train your dog in advanced
Start with the basics. Tricks such as “Sit” and “Stay” are quickly learned through positive reinforcement training. Once your dog masters the Trick, proceed to door exercises.
The goal of door exercises is to establish authority and to avoid dog-dashing. When opening the door, you should be the one to lead and your dog should wait for your signal to follow. Here’s how you can do this trick:
- Step 1: Slightly open the door, and observe your dog’s behavior. If he tries to rushes out, shut the door close again.
- Step 2: Ignore your dog or do not give him a treat if he becomes overly excited seeing the door open.
- Step 3: Once he calms down, repeat the drill until your dog acknowledges that he needs to wait for your “release” cue before going out.
With constant training, your dog can learn this trick in no time.
Reward good behavior
Every time that your dog does a good behavior, you should reward him with a treat. In this way, it will be implanted into your dog’s mind that he will only get his favorite treat if he behaves and follow your command. This is called positive reinforcement training. This type of teaching method is highly effective in establishing new tricks and rituals.
Do a dry run
Now that your dog is familiar with some tricks, the next step is to see if he will continue to listen even if there’s a new person in the picture. You can seek the help of a friend or family member who will act as a guest. Observe if your dog would be able to follow your commands and resist being overly playful.
Be in control
It’s true, dogs can sense our emotions. If you’re anxious around your dog, chances are he will be too. Once the guests arrive, remember to stay calm as well.
You should be assertive while also being sympathetic to a dog’s perspective. If your dog makes a mistake, do not yell at him because he might perceive this as being enthusiastic and therefore will make him jumpy instead of calm.
Keep in mind that dogs are natural protectors. Yes, it can be annoying that they bark every single time that you have a visitor, but from a dog’s standpoint, it’s because he wanted to keep you away from any harm.
Once you see this, it will make you more compassionate and persevering on training them because you now understand that your dog never wanted to cause trouble, but instead only wants the best for you.
If you love this article, please be sure to read our recent post about how to calm an anxious dog?
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