Comments on: Why Dogs Bark So Much

By: elbarko

elbarko — Tue, 21 Jul 2009 01:03:36 +0000

dogs are as smart as any creature that can interact with the environment to fulfill necessities for survival… ie…

not-very. and limited.

cats are the ones who are trying to take over the world using a trained primate army.

By: Mark Smith

Mark Smith — Fri, 17 Jul 2009 16:05:51 +0000

#7 The last paragraph in the article you refer to is completely asinine and certainly does NOT address the dog that goes to the back door at 10 p.m. and barks to be let out! That is most certainly an intentional message from dog to human, and if it’s a “learned cue” then it’s the same kind of learned cue that your kid knows when asking “Can I have a drink?” Suggesting that there’s no intelligence behind it is just foolish…

I happen to have a dog that performs this behavior, but not just at a fixed time. Whenever she needs to hit the restroom in the backyard she walks to the back door and issues a single ‘woof’, then waits for somebody to come let her out. If nobody shows up within a minute or two she woofs again.

I think the lady who wrote the article must not know too many actual real-life dogs. Or maybe only the dumb ones!

By: vonskippy

vonskippy — Fri, 17 Jul 2009 01:22:19 +0000

Dogs bark because their owners are morons. Trained dogs hardly ever bark.

By: elbarko

elbarko — Thu, 16 Jul 2009 20:14:02 +0000

what dogs mean … is the equivalent of the phrases “rabble” and “shenanigans” from South Park.

Where’s my post-research grant.

By: Skipweasel

Skipweasel — Thu, 16 Jul 2009 18:22:37 +0000

Yup, dogs bark for two reasons. One is to annoy the hell out of me. The other is ‘cos one of our cats is showing the superiority of being able to sit just out of reach on top of a fence. It doesn’t need to stick its tongue out and shout “Ner ner na ner ner”, that’d be uncool.

By: ozoozol

ozoozol — Thu, 16 Jul 2009 17:19:36 +0000

#6, suggest you read the article, because the last paragraph addresses situations like those you describe. Also, bear in mind the specific definition within the article of what is a considered a bark, and that not all vocalizations qualify–just because it’s a sound a dog makes doesn’t mean it’s a bark.

I do agree with #5, though, that it is a difficult-to-prove theory.

By: xultar

xultar — Thu, 16 Jul 2009 16:25:14 +0000

That is the dumbest analysis of why dogs bark. My dogs will go to their bowl and bark, then when I look at them then lower their head towards the bowl…meaning feed me bitch.

My dogs will also bark @ the door when they need to go out.

By: Mytake

Mytake — Thu, 16 Jul 2009 14:04:15 +0000

This is interesting, but ultimately it’s just a theory, and a very difficult one to test at that. There is too much stuff on evolutionary biology that sounds overly tentative and ambitious for science’s usually rigorous standards.

By: LisaL

LisaL — Thu, 16 Jul 2009 13:48:05 +0000

What a load of horse balls.

By: ozoozol

ozoozol — Thu, 16 Jul 2009 13:20:06 +0000

Looked up domesticated silver foxes. Interesting. Didn’t look too hard, but maybe breeding for domestication is partly what causes the “internal conflict” that this article suggests is responsible for barking?

By: Neal

Neal — Thu, 16 Jul 2009 13:02:42 +0000

I thought it was just to piss me off. Seriously, if you have ever been stuck living next door to a relentlessly barking dog (whose owners just don’t care) then you know what hell is.

By: Mr Pudifoot

Mr Pudifoot — Thu, 16 Jul 2009 10:01:05 +0000

The Domesticated Silver Fox experiment seems to suggest that barking is a byproduct of when you breed for domestication.