Guard Dog

[Labradorks]

I've always had Labs that never, ever barked, with few exceptions anyway. Which was great because I always lived in apartments. Now I have Linus, who isn't a barker, but will bark if someone knocks on the door and has barked in a few other cases when he got spooked. He is definitely my most vocal Lab, even if it's just once a month. He is also my very owner/handler-sensitive Lab, not just in sports but in life.

Last night I was on the sofa and saw very bright flashlights through the window. Then I saw human forms. It took me a few seconds to realize it was about a dozen policemen on foot walking up my street. My window was open and I didn't hear a thing, and neither did either dog.

I sort-of froze as they stepped into my yard and onto my property with their flashlights shining in my face. Still, they were silent. So, I figured that they were trying to do their job and that I should not open the door to talk to them. If they had something to say, they'd come to the door. I looked at my neighborhood Facebook page (there are a few people hooked on police scanners who report everything going on) and discovered there was an armed and dangerous man running and jumping fences and the police were trying to track him down.

Once the cops moved on, I made sure all doors were locked, shut and locked all windows, and turned on all outside lights. I then went to bed with my window fan in because it's hot. I debated about the window fan as I lay there...when all of a sudden Linus jumps up from a dead sleep and goes off. He was standing on the bed, hackles raised, teeth bared, barking his head off toward the back yard. He was FREAKED OUT.

I let him bark because he sounded vicious and if someone was around I wanted them to know that there was a big dog in the house. Needless to say, I shut and locked my bedroom window! I checked the rest of the windows and doors again and looked outside. Nothing.

When I went back to bed, he settled down, but if my foot moved into him, he would startle awake and let out a bark. He was really on edge, just like I was! We finally drifted off to sleep around 3AM. As far as I know, the guy is still out there.

[zd262]

Yeesh that's scary! Also reassuring that I'm sure Linus scared off anyone who might have been lurking around. Bubba did that once while camping, but it wasn't reassuring because I'm never sure if a dog will attract predators or scare them off.

[silverfz]

Dogs work as great deterrent. We had a great watchdog . He was a miniature dachshund. 11 lbs . But he was hyper vigilant. He would make such a racket that no one bothered us as it would echo in our raising ceiling and people thought we had a massive dog.

we do miss that with the lab.

[TuMicks]

Whoa! Very scary. Most of my married life my physician husband has taken call and I would be alone through much of the night (I don't know why people like to have seizures and strokes in the wee hours... but that's just how it goes. We did have a lady call us at 2AM to tell us she couldn't sleep. Funny... we couldn't either.)

I never discouraged my labs from barking whenever anyone came to the door. And my labs always did bark. (Maybe the older labs always taught the younger ones that that was their job.) I wanted the world to know there was at least one big dog sharing the house with us.

I've been told by pro's that this is NOT a good thing in a trained retriever. Indeed, Rocket Dog was extremely vocal as a pup (but that came baked into the pie. I'm sure that allowing her to sound off at the door with the older dogs did not help, but... oh, well.)

Anyhow, bottom line, I don't see any problem with having a dog bark at the door or anything else that didn't seem right in the night, particularly if they are living with a single lady. IF he has a good "PLACE" and "QUIET" on command.

[POPTOP]

All our labs were quiet but if they did bark, boy did I take notice. I always trusted them. However, none of them barked at the dang skunks.

Archie is more of a barker but not uncontrollable. If he alerts, I check doors, windows, etc., then tell him it's OK and he's a good boy to alert me. He settles down right away. If he kept it up, I'd be dialing 911.