There are a few ways you can take care of the problem. First is to train the dog to pick something up with its mouth on command. Once that is trained, you can ask for that behavior any time it barks. You have just trained a behavior that is incompatible with the undesirable behavior. This, however, is not particularly useful if you are trying to sleep.

The second is to train the dog to bark on command. It barks already; it should be a piece of cake to make it happen on command. Then, you have to make sure to only reward the dog if you ask for the behavior. That will make him bark less and less because it is more rewarding to wait for you to ask for the behavior. Make sure at first that you ask for it a lot. Once the command is securely set, you can start asking for the behavior less and less often. Then, finally, you can cease asking for it altogether. This is called extinguishing a behavior.

It can work really well, but you have to make absolutely certain that neither you nor anyone else in your house gives any reaction whatsoever to him barking without the command. In fact, you should be doing this already. Right now, when he barks, you probably yell, or pay attention to him, and you get up and run around the house, etc., etc. This is rewarding to him because he has, in effect, controlled you, and makes him perform the behavior more often. One of the best training tools (and the hardest to do) is to ignore behavior you don’t want, while rewarding only the behavior you do want.

A third method is to train a Quiet command. This is much harder, but will last longer in the long run. When the dog is barking, just stand there looking at him. The moment he closes his mouth, click and reward. Pretty soon, you can start making him close his mouth for one second, then two, then five, then thirty, and on and on up to minutes at a time. Make sure that the reward for being quiet is HUGE. It needs to be much more rewarding than barking. Eventually, you can add the command “Quiet” by clicking and rewarding, and then saying “Quiet.” Eventually, you can just say “Quiet” (in a quiet, firm voice — no yelling), and he’ll close his mouth. Reward that!

Once he knows the behavior and responds to it consistently, you should start varying when he gets a treat, and make sure it’s random. Sometimes he’ll get a treat for doing the behavior, and sometimes he won’t. Guess what? He’ll actually try harder to do the behavior right! This is priming him for when he’s going to have to be quiet all night with just one command. After a couple of weeks of that, start trying it out at night. As soon as he starts barking, give the command. He probably won’t last all the night the first few times, but if you treat him sometimes, and sometimes don’t, he’ll get better and better at it.

I hope you try training, and I hope you have fun doing it.

Sounds like this dog needs attention and obedience training? Or neutering/spaying? Or a companion animal?

Crate training might help. Try putting the dog in a crate for bedtime. Roll up a newspaper and when the dog cries, whimpers, barks, makes any sound you hit the crate with the paper and say “NO”, at the same time. Then, walk away. If the dog does it again, repeat, walk away and don’t talk to the dog or say anything else. The force of your voice compounded with noise of paper leaves a lasting impression.

It took three long nights, but my dog finally caught on to what was acceptable behavior. Eventually, I didn’t lock his crate when he went to bed, we only shut the door.

I take it, you talk to him, regularly and massage his body, to check for any irregularities? Maybe some warm milk or porridge before going to bed? It may sound silly, but little human habits can make a change and his body will tell him, when he’s had enough. So, do not worry, it is not addictive.

Remarkable problem. Good luck.

http://www.ultimatebarkcontrol.com/

Also, do you know if he is barking at noises from outside? You could try playing a sound machine set to white noise, to mask other noise. Crate training is a good idea too; when the dog is put in his crate for the night he may be more focused on his own little “den” and not every noise he hears.

Is he neutered? If not, the problem might be that he simply has the urge to find a female.

If you leave it on your dog so tight they can’t open their mouths THAT is CRUEL!!!

And muzzling the animal just to stop the barking all night is cruel as well.

I personally use a muzzle with one of my two dogs, because it is the only thing that calms my overly hyper active dog down. But it’s never left on him for long periods of time.

Muzzles will not stop barking!!!! I have talked to many trainers and the local Humane Society about barking and they recommend doggie obedience classes for training classes, or bark collars for extreme cases.

Also have you ever considered crate training your dog? Then you could leave the dog safely indoors at night and that may stop the barking!

After reading your UPDATE:
Have you tried crate training the dog? Sometimes it provides a safe feeling for the dog, and it is generally better to leave the crate covered so the dog can not see outside of it.

You could try a citronella spray that is fitted to the collar and is activated by the dog’s bark. It works on some dogs.