Pupply Still Barking in the Mornings

[Oak]

We've been working with our dog on his early-morning barking and he was doing much better for a while.

However...he's about 9.5 months old now and is becoming more belligerent than ever. He's trying to defy and test us at every turn! At times it is very frustrating. This has spilled over into the morning-barking department again and he now wakes us up between 5:00 and 5:30 every morning.

I know he doesn't have to go outside as we've brought him to our room before and he falls right back asleep for at least 3 more hours at times without a problem. He just gets upset that he's not in the same room as us. He sleeps in his crate in another room as our bedroom is very small and cramped already and he is still quite the chewer. He does love his crate though considering he will go in there by himself at times and sleep.

We've tried spray bottles, bottles with pennies in them, ignoring him, and more but he's just learned to be quiet as soon as he hears our feet hit the floor in the morning—we can't "catch him in the act" anymore.

We really don't want to buy or use a shock collar on him but we're considering a citronella collar. Do they work? Is there anything else we should try?

[browndog]

yes the citronella collar works. Our 10.5 month old labradoodle went through a barkey period around 6 months old and this helped tremendously. We got the remote control kind so we could control it as we didn't want every single bark punished as only at certain times it was a problem. She got sprayed probably a total of five times and then got the point.