Teaching Your Dog What To Do When Someone Knocks On The Door

My dogs bark anytime someone knocks on our door. It saves us from needing a doorbell. Tanner is a door-dasher and will run over any one who opens the door. Daisy will go straight to their feet to try to tear into their toes. Kota is more sedate and will walk outdoors, though lately he is not as dependable about coming back when you call.

Teaching them to go into the laundry room will be useful when someone knocks on the door to keep the dogs confined until we know whether to let them out or not. The idea is to have them magically go to the laundry room when they hear a knock on the door. I still want them to bark a couple of times to let us know someone is their but I also want them to walk to the laundry room so that I don't have to chase them around.

I knocked on the door from the inside a couple of times and told them "bed". I use "bed" because that is the place they sleep at night. I walked over to the laundry room and rewarded them when they entered. The first couple of times I had to retrieve Daisy. So I realized that I needed to use a better treat to lure her in. I had my daughter sneek out on the last try and really knock on the door from the outside. It took a little more coaxing because they though someone had actually come to visit. With work hopefully a knock will trigger something in their brain and they will immediately go to the door.