Just wondering what the general consensus here is on bark control collars. Reason being is I just got my new pup last week. He's 9 weeks old today. He's from solid working lines and I have very high hopes for this little guy in Schutzhund. My plan is once he's old enough to have him primarily outside at least until the foundation of the bitework is good. I don't want to have him be restricted from certain things in the house that may lead to issues on the field. I had that problem with my rottie.

So, the reason for the interest in the bark collar is that occasionally if we go on a day trip and are going to be gone all day, we'll put our 2 established dogs in the kennel outside. Even though we live on 10 acres, we have a couple neighbors that will sometimes complain about the barking. I'm quite sure that once Armor goes outside, he's going to bark alot. I can crate him inside at night if necessary, no problem. But during the day, even though legally they can't do anything, I don't want to have a neighbor war. So I'm looking for ideas to keep the barking down once he goes outside.

How old will he be when you start using the bark collar?

I've seen many people put bark collars, citronella and shock, on dogs and then expect the dog to stop barking immediately. You do have to train the dog with the collar. In all honesty I think nine weeks is a little young for any type of aversive collar.
Most dogs bark excessively out of boredom. Sometimes people inadvertently reinforce it by giving attention, negative or positive while the dog is barking. I train my dogs starting fairly young not to bark, unless there's a reason.

I certainly would never put it on him at 9 weeks. I'm thinking into the future when he does go outside. What age I'm not exactly sure yet. We are coming into winter and I'm not going to put him out there if its freezing cold. I put him out there Friday for a couple hours while I was doing yard work and he pretty much spent the entire time whining and trying to bite through the fence. He's acclimated to the crate pretty well. He will at times whine some but it stops within a minute or two. So maybe I get lucky and he does that in the kennel but I'd like to be prepared with a solution if he doesn't.

When I finished my yard work I got some treats and walked up to about 4' from the kennel. When he'd stop whining I would mark and reward.(I have already charged the mark with him). I did that about 10 times and every time I stepped back from rewarding him the whining started back up. That's only the first time working on it so I don't know if it was clicking or not. It didn't seem to be. He just wants to be with me 100% of the time, which is good. I just want to know how to control the barking when he's outside and noone's home or we're inside or whatever.

Are you giving him anything to do while he is in the kennel?

I've only put him in the kennel once. I did put a couple toys in there. He had no interest in them. Just wants to be with me. I'm really just trying to be prepared in case it becomes a problem.

How about trying a kong stuffed with something yummy? Give it to him, put him in the kennel, do some work right near the kennel and then go get him as he finishes up the kong.

If you're going to do Schutzhund, you will be trying to elicit barks later on. I'm not sure how bark suppression is going to affect that.

Devil's advocate here.... What is the point of living in a rural area on 10 acres of land if your dog can't bark? You're a better man than me, because I'd be here asking how to most politefully suggest to the neighbors that they would be better off living in the city.

10 acres isn't all that big where barking dogs are concerned. The noise can really carry and get annoying quickly if there are no buffers in place. And, depending on property set up, your dogs still can be fairly close to the neighbors. I mean, us country folk expect some noise and are pretty easy going/live and let live, but we still try to avoid irritating the neighbors when possible.

Are we talking about incessant barking, or the occasional, strange noise kind of barking?