We live in an era where dogs can be a big liability and a dog bite can easily cost you your home, the life of your dog and your reputation. My two big Rottweilers weighing over 90 pounds are very fond of our mailman and have even licked and greeted my landlord who one day just popped into our property out of nowhere, climbed over the fence and started painting our home!
Things could have gone really, really bad if I didnt train my dogs to accept the mailman and visitors coming to my home. While my dogs are two big love babies, their size and black-and-tan suit is the only a deterrent (shhhh . . . don’t tell anyone!); we have ADT to take care of the rest!
What You Can Do To Improve Your Dog’s Relationship With the Mailman
In addition to some of the tips in the previous section, there are some ways you can prevent your dog from barking. The goal is to improve your pup’s relationship with your daily visitors. Doing so will make your dog view the mailman as a positive person instead of someone they need to bark at.
You should start introducing your dog to your mailman as soon as possible. If you know your postal worker pretty well, take a few minutes to introduce the two personally. Some reserved physical contact on your mailman’s part can make a huge difference.
You can also place a treat in your mailbox every day so that your mailman has something they can reward your dog with each time they visit. This is a surefire way to make your pup love them.
Alternatively, you can do the rewarding yourself. Keep a short leash by the door. Whenever you hear your mailman approaching, put the leash on and tell your dog to sit down. As your mailman hands over the mail, give your pup a treat to show them that all is well.
Creating a positive connection between your dog and the mailman can make a significant difference in you and your dog’s daily life. Not only does it put a stop to excessive barking and potentially aggressive behavior, but your dog will learn important skills on how to deal with the unknown.
Socialization is a very important part of dog ownership. Oftentimes, the hatred that’s directed towards postal workers and delivery men is a result of poor socialization skills.
Introduce your dog to as many people as possible when they’re a puppy. They’ll learn to love new humans and provide welcoming affection that mailmen will appreciate.
Examples: open/close all folders Advertising
One Nike shoe commercial follows the Point of View of a dog on a leash, taking a brisk walk with its owner. The dog at one point encounters a mailwoman and makes a point of growling at her, eliciting an “Eek!” The dog chortles and remarks, “I love doing that.”
There was a series of commercials for something which had people announcing that they were leaving the job they currently had and were joining the NBA. One of these showed a mailman running from a dog while announcing his intention. We then see him actually playing basketball and going up against a player with a canine nickname. The other player barks at him and makes him drop the ball.
A series of commercials for McDonalds showed natural enemies forming friendships over McDonalds food, including a mailman and a dog.
An ad for Subaru shows a family of dogs driving a Subaru and barking furiously when a mail truck passes them on the opposite lane.
Lovable Truly was an animated mailman mascot for Post Alpha-Bits cereal. He was always seen with a dog, its teeth firmly in his rear end. Lovable Truly would become an irregular element on the Linus the Lionhearted show in 1964, where he rescued dogs from evil dogcatcher (and has-been silent movie star) Richard Harry Nearly.
Comic Books
Dennis the Menace (UK): Dennis dog, Gnasher enjoys attacking postmen (for instance, biting their bottoms) whenever they come to deliver letters. He has a collection of postal uniform trouser seats.
A comic book story based on Krypto the Superdog features an intergalactic mailman whos constantly being attacked by dogs everywhere he goes. The Dog Stars (even Brainy Barker) cant help but bark at him in spite of knowing hes a harmless character who doesnt deserve this kind of treatment.
Comic Strips
Garfield
Garfield enjoys harassing the local mailman, he even lampshades the trope by asking, “Why should dogs have all the fun?” Sometimes he just pulls harmless pranks while other times he will violently attack him or catch him in an elaborate booby trap. The mailman occasionally gets his revenge on Garfield.
In an Easy Amnesia sequence, the one thing Garfield remembers by himself is that he used to terrorize the mailman. He even implies that this must mean its the most essential part of his nature – More so than his overeating!
A paperboy who is rarely seen often attacks Garfield by throwing his papers right at him, often hitting the cat hard in the face.
Grimm from Mother Goose and Grimm loves chasing after the mailman, to the point that the post office has a wanted picture of Grimm up in the office.
Buckles from his self-titled comic strip originally had a rivalry with the Paperboy, named “Rodney” in his last appearance, who always attacks Buckles by throwing his papers at him. The Paperboy was later Put on a Bus in 2005 after an incident where Buckles wrecks his BMX bike.
Pooch Café elevates this to an almost-religion amongst its dogs, to the point where one plotline has the doggie denizens distressed to discover that their resident mailman foe has a dog — which they try to “rescue” and free from what they assume must be some kind of brainwashing. Another plotline has main character Poncho go against the code and try to rescue a mailman who has fallen unconscious in the snow by dragging him onto a train car. They are found by hobo dogs, who screech that Poncho has brought “the enemy” into their midst; Poncho bluffs that instead of helping the mailman, he had captured the mailman — and consequently is made king of the hobo dogs.
Averted by Daisy, the Bumsteads dog in Dean Youngs Blondie, who bears the mailman no ill will and is harmless. Its Dagwood, zooming out the door in a blind panic, thats the mailmans chief hazard.
Used several times in The Far Side:
In one panel, a mailman comes through a door with seven dogs hanging off him. He says to his wife, “Gimme a hand here, Edna… I got into a nest of weiner dogs over on Sixth and Maple.”
In another strip, a giant mailman is demolishing the city, Godzilla style. In the foreground, a dog is speaking to a crowd of other dogs saying, “Listen! the authorities are helpless! If the citys to be saved, Im afraid its up to us! This is our hour!”
Another Far Side strip showed a dog with a bandana and a rocket launcher standing next to a smoking hole in the sidewalk, with the caption: “They said neither rain nor snow could stop the mail, but they didnt count on… Rexbo.”
Yet another strip showed a mailman being attacked by several dogs while inside the house a dog holding a violin watched sadly because he had to take lessons and couldnt join in.
One strip has a dog on a psychiatrists couch, saying the mailman scares him.
And another strip has “Dog Hell”, where the dogs are forced to act as mailmen.
And yet another features a group of dogs dressing as mailmen to pull a Trojan Horse ambush inside a post office.
A dog sits up in bed at night nervously reading The Mailman Carried Mace by lamplight.
One strip had a couple dogs playing a cruel prank on a sleeping leashed dog involving a fake mailman puppet.
Another strip titled “Creative dog writing” had a dog named Zeek writing a book titled Call of the Calf based on the feelings that drive dogs to bite mailmen.
I sensed the mailmans fear as he opened the gate. It was like a warm stench in the air — so thick you could cut it with a knife. Suddenly, I felt myself growing dizzy — as if the fear was a powerful drug. The entire yard began reeling. And then I heard his soft, plump calves begin calling to me: “Zeeeeeeeeek…Zeeeeeeeek…bite us, Zeeeeek…biiiiiiiite uuuusss…”
Yet another has dog scientists struggling to understand “the doorknob principle”, one of them looking out the window at the mailman.
Citizen Dog: Fergus and Arlo have a (mostly) friendly rivalry with the local mailman, Larry. They even sometimes socialize in the local bar.
Played with in Olive, the Other Reindeer where Olive, the protagonist is a dog and the Big Bad is a mailman. However before the start of their conflict, Olive was actually friendly to the mailman.
This trope happens in Mad Mad Mad Monsters, the prequel to Mad Monster Party?. While delivering Baron von Frankensteins wedding invitations to his guests, Harvey the mailman gets chased by the Invisible Mans dog as well as Ron Chandley after he changes into his werewolf form.
Referenced in Up when Muntzs dogs see Russell in his scout uniform and assume hes some kind of small mailman (because apparently anyone in an uniform is a mailman to a dog).
Films — Live-Action
Garfield distracts a bunch of dogs chasing him by lying to them about the mailman. They all fall for it, thus giving the fat cat a desperately-needed head start to escape.
Referred to at the end of the first The Naked Gun movie, when a baseball park brawl ends with everyone apologizing to each other and embracing, including a mailman and a dog.
See Spot Run stars a mail carrier who hates dogs. The beginning of the film has him delivering mail to a neighborhood full of dogs ready to attack. He outsmarts them with creative ways using his gadgets…except for one.
The Shaggy Dog: Wilson Daniels is a postal carrier who is always being barked at by dogs and resents them in turn. His wife speculates that dogs dislike mail carriers because they notice how they repeatedly bring bad news to the house.
Literature
One of the trials of the postman in Going Postal is a pack of dogs, and several of the postmen have scars from dogbites. Not only that, there is mention of the other peril of dogs; their droppings. Apparently dogshit can be as frictionless as oil. Worshipful Master of the Order of Postmen: Postmen, what is the Second Oath? … Dogs! I tell you, theres no such thing as a good one! If they dont bite they all crap! Its as bad as stepping on machine oil!
Hank the Cowdog sums up the reason why dogs bark at mailmen in his own way. Hank: Why do dogs bark at the mailman? Because by George, we cowdogs have always barked at mailmen, and we always will!
Conversational Troping in the Hercule Poirot novel Dumb Witness. According to Poirot, the dog is a reasoning animal and reasons thusly: The postman regularly comes to the door. The postman is never allowed into the house. Therefore the dogs people dont like the postman and want rid of him.
Hollow Kingdom (2019): At one point, Dennis makes a beeline towards a UPS truck and ignores S.T. calling him to come back; S.T. even calls the mail truck “the sworn enemy of every domesticated dog.” This leads to Dennis death, as the truck is swarming with zombies that quickly notice the dogs arrival.
Teen Power Inc.: Zigzagged in “The Bad Dog Mystery.” Jock (the eponymous dog) got along great with the previous mailman (whod throw letters for him to catch) but constantly chases the new mailman, because the new mailman is a burglar who hurt Jocks owner.
Live-Action TV
In Season 71 Episode 1 of Im Sorry I Havent a Clue, during a round of Dogs Film Club, Tim suggested The Postman Always Tastes Nice.
Video Games
Averted by the mailman in The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess: If ever youre in wolf form whenever he has a letter to give you, you automatically switch back to human form. Then again, he might not even be scared of dogs, since one of the places in which you find him is the very bottom of the Bonus Dungeon.
A paperboy variation occurs in… well… Paperboy, where the occasional dog is one of your many obstacles in the game.
If Unleashed is installed in The Sims and a household owns a dog, they will chase a papergirl (the latter even attempts to shoo the dog after delivering her papers) causing her to run away. This is oddly averted when a mailwoman arrives where the dog doesnt give chase at all, only towards the papergirl.
Western Animation
Dog And Mailman Have The Sweetest Relationship | The Dodo