Pee when ignored and humping

[kristaj]

Hello,

We are a family of three (2 adults and a 5 year old daughter). We have had Sam for three weeks and he is 7 months old. We have noticed when one of us arrives home and does not take him out for a walk or spend idividual time with him he will go to a certain spot in the house and do a small pee. (Even if he has been out for a walk and pee 5 minutes ago) The new arrival can greet him and spend 2-3 minutes with him and then as soon as they leave the room he goes and pees- and then runs back to the new arrival looking for luv. If the new arrival really spends a longer period of time with him he is ok. It is as if he is angry that he is not getting attention from the person who just got home. evilicon

To combat this we have been getting the new arrival to take him for a walk around the block. But, there is times where we are not able to do this.

The other thing he is doing is humping my Mothers leg when she arrives. Nobody else - just mom. She treats him as we do - NILF is our motto and Mom follows this. But for some reason he really likes to hum her leg. Any suggestions on these two issues???

Thanks
Krista
Vancouver, BC

[piper's~mom]

Hi Krista

Welcome to the board. I'm afraid I don't have any advice for you... my pup arrives in a week. appicon

It sure is nice to see another Vancouver local on the board. There seem to be alot of us in the lower mainland now.

Sorry I can't be of help, but there are alot of sage frenchie parents that are sure to have some great advice.

[Cara]

Three things come to mind: 1) something medical, like a UTI, affecting the dog's bladder control, 2) submissive urination, and 3) overwhelming doggie excitement. Since the dog isn't peeing immediately upon greeting newcomers and you aren't reporting any other difficulties, I'd guess it's excitement.

So if you know the dog is healthy, and the timing and spot is predictable, could you make a rule that the dog goes out immediately when someone has come home and the dog heads for the spot? And make sure you treat the preferred spot with an enzymatic cleaner so it doesn't smell like an okay spot to him.

I strongly doubt it's "revenge pee." It's always tempting to think so, especially when you KNOW the dog has just been out, but it's probably not "no one's paying attention to me so I'll fix 'em." It's much more likely the dog gets overjoyed and at the first moment of downtime the urge strikes.

[Cara]

Sorry I have nothing to say about the humping, but I've never had luck ungluing other people's dogs from my leg. I've read tons that says it's dominance behavior, but I have little experience with it personally. I'm sure someone here will have an answer shortly.

[Borgan]

Re: humping....

Is your dog neutred? Forget about NILF, I think what we've got here is case of MILF (" Mom I'd Like to ****"). Maybe he just needs his knackers knacked.

[UFshutterbabe]

Maxwell recently learned the joy of humping. He's 7 months old and neutered. The suggestion that's been working for us is to look him in the face, lower your voice and say "Shame on you." Draw it out and make yourself sound very disapointed. Maxwell will get off the leg with an embarassed look on his face. Its too cute.
Oh, for the first few weeks that Maxwell started humping, he'd only hump his human daddy's leg. But eventually he learned that all legs feel the same. So, although its only your mom now, I'd watch out if I were you. (He's really not that bad about it anymore, I promise)

[gmacleod]

Humping is indeed a dominance behaviour - it has nothing really to do with sexual behaviour at all, with the sole exception of during mating. At all other times, it is an overt (and rather gauche) way of showing dominance over another dog. Females, who are often more dominant than males, do it just as much and often more than males do.

It is something that puppies and adolescent dogs practice a lot. So your pup attaching himself to your leg isn't necessarily a sign that he's trying to dominate you (and more than he's trying to dominate his stuffed toy), it can just be practice. You might note that humping is something that adult dogs do far less frequently than pups or adolescents - and that's quite simply because they have learnt more subtle and sophisticated ways of communicating by adulthood. Humping is a very overt, and rather rude (as in pushy) behaviour and one that other dogs don't really react well to.

But, since your 7 month old pup is an adolescent, he hasn't really found all that out yet. Keep on socialising him with adults though, and he'll learn to be a bit more sophisticated in his communications.

It is not, of course, a good idea to allow him to hump the legs of any humans. Aside from the possibility of it having dominance connotations, it's really not a good party trick in a human world and he has to learn to live with humans. Sooo - he should be promptly instructed to desist (make him sit instead) and rewarded when he complies.

[kristaj]

Thanks for the advice and knowledge! And Borgan for the funny commentary...

We have progress on the peeing thing. Essentially we ignore him when we walk through the door - he wants our attention and jumps around and makes a fuss but we walk through this and do not even look at him, speak to him or mention his name until he shows an appropriate behavior like sitting quietly or laying down. If he goes near the area he likes to pee we just move him or give him the come command. One he settles we lavish attention on him and he is pleased. No more running to pee. Also, we have made it a habit not to go to him - we always call him to us and then give him attention; this seems to reinforce that he is not top dog.