To get a good night’s sleep, there are some factors that you can control: drinking a warm glass of milk, tightly pulling your curtains closed or sipping on some chamomile tea. Then there are some things that you just can’t control, namely the boisterous barking of your next-door-neighbour’s dogs in the middle of the night.

According to a data analysis of Ottawa 3-1-1, the City of Ottawa’s telephone and online complaint system, dog barking noise complaints increase by 60 per cent between April and May. Calls remain high for the rest of the summer months, peaking in September, then falling steadily by the time October rolls around.

The number of complaints varied from ward to ward, but some trends were easier to spot between primarily urban versus primarily rural wards. Eastern urban wards, like Rideau-Vanier, Orleans, Somerset and Alta Vista, had the highest numbers of dog barking complaints, with calls in these wards being up to nearly 85 per cent higher than those rural wards, such as Rideau-Goulbourn and Osgoode.

“I live in the middle of nowhere, way far out in country, and when my dogs bark, they sure aren’t quiet about it!” says Ashley Ladouceur, a dog lover with three furry friends of her own. “But the reason that none of my neighbours would ever complain is because I don’t have any close neighbours in the first place.”

Ladouceur, who also volunteers at Ottawa rescue shelter Sit With Me, explains that the biggest misconception that people have about barking, is that dogs just bark to annoy or disrupt. She says that although this may be true in some cases, a dog’s real reason for barking is important. “Dogs bark to tell you how they feel or what they need, which is important for any dog owner,” she declares. “Always expecting your dog not to bark is basically saying that you don’t want them to communicate with you, which is totally unreasonable.”

There are several reasons why dogs in urban areas tend to garner more complaints. Kim Cooper is the owner of Best Friends, an Ottawa-based dog training organization. She has over 30 years of dog-training experience and explains that urban dogs have unique issues that their owners must address. “Dogs can get cramped up in smaller houses or apartments, which would cause them to bark more than dogs with more space to run around in,” she adds that “a lot of dogs, especially in apartments, aren’t getting the exercise they need.” She says that walking your dog daily can help cut down on excessive barking. She points out that “a tired dog is a more well-behaved dog.”

Dog barking noise violations fall under the City’s Animal Care and Control bylaw, which explains that the owner must control any of their dog’s “needless” barking, which they suggest owners do by meeting a dog’s daily food water, shelter and companionship needs. They do not give the definition or criteria by which they assess the term “needless.”

There are some important limits to this data to keep in mind. This is the first year that dog barking category has been included in the City’s data, so it is impossible to go through the 3-1-1 records from previous years to see if Ottawa’s dogs are getting noisier or quieter.

The City of Ottawa website urges neighbours to communicate with each other before calling the 3-1-1 number or complaining online. Kim agrees, saying that she believe that the best thing to do is talk to your neighbour directly, which gives them a chance to seek help. “If you talk to your neighbour, then maybe they’ll be more willing to give you a few days or weeks before complaining to higher authorities, like the City of Ottawa.”