Leg Lifting
So I had my corgi, Brian, neutered when he was 6 months old. About one week prior to the surgery, I witnessed the one and only instance of him lifting his leg to pee. Usually, he would just squat, but for some reason, out in the middle of the yard he attempted to lift his leg. I didn't think much of it, other than that behavior wouldn't develop far as he would be neutered soon. After that one time, I never saw him lift his leg again...
Fast-forward 6-8 months later and then all of the sudden, he starting to randomly lift his left to pee, but not always. Sometimes, this action would occur when he was in the middle of a patch of grass, or sometimes it was up agains a bush or another plant.
He's also started stopping frequently while on walks to mark (sometimes lifting his leg, sometimes not), although sometimes he just pees once during the walk and that's it.
I'm completely baffled. I thought that if the dog was neutered early enough, then they wouldn't develop the typical male behaviors like that. He seems to have suddenly picked up this behavior (and also started a couple agressive fights, but that's another story), and I don't know where it came from. I don't have another dog, and he really only gets to pal around with other dogs maybe once or twice a week. Is this just a common occurance that I never knew about?
Fast-forward 6-8 months later and then all of the sudden, he starting to randomly lift his left to pee, but not always. Sometimes, this action would occur when he was in the middle of a patch of grass, or sometimes it was up agains a bush or another plant.
He's also started stopping frequently while on walks to mark (sometimes lifting his leg, sometimes not), although sometimes he just pees once during the walk and that's it.
I'm completely baffled. I thought that if the dog was neutered early enough, then they wouldn't develop the typical male behaviors like that. He seems to have suddenly picked up this behavior (and also started a couple agressive fights, but that's another story), and I don't know where it came from. I don't have another dog, and he really only gets to pal around with other dogs maybe once or twice a week. Is this just a common occurance that I never knew about?
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by Bev Levy on
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Nope a neutered male will lift too just they don't seem to have that uncontrollable need to pee on Everything! Even some females will lift their leg but they do it a little differently. Sparty goes out of his way to leave pee mail for every dog in the neighborhood and he has been neutered since he was 6 months. (he is 10)
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Permalink Reply by Beth on
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Jack was neutered at 6 months and is a prolific leg-lifter. As a matter of fact, it's the only way he pees. I have never seen him squat. He will also mount intact females, if given half a chance.
I had read somewhere that early neutering will minimize or significantly reduce "typical" male behaviors in about 60% of dogs. Quite a lot of neutered males still lift legs, and I've known intact males to squat.
And Bev is right that females will lift legs too. Madison will on rare occasion. It's more of a tilt and then a sort of hop away from what she peed on. She will tilt her leg if she is peeing where another dog just peed, and she's not even a dominant female. I have heard that very dominant females will do it more frequently.
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Permalink Reply by Jane Christensen on
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Wynn isn't terrible but he will occasionally lift his leg in the wrong spot. Our old dog learned how to squat as there weren't any trees to lift his leg on...or that's my theory. The females at my house never lifted their legs until we got 2 female rescues who marked everything (even their food bowls)!!! My friend has a dog that comes to my house occasionally and she is soooo embarassed because he lifts his leg alot but I don't think he does this at home! I just make sure he can't get on the carpet!
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Permalink Reply by Amanda on
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Dax was neutered when he was just under a year old. Up until about 6 months, he didn't really squat, he would kind of hunch a little bit to pee. Then he started to lift his leg...it was funny at first because he'd go up to a bush or a wall or a mailbox or something to pee on it, and then lift the wrong leg, lol. We've never had a problem with him marking inside. He's had his share of accidents, but they're just that...accidents. I've never seen him lift his leg in my house, I think if I did, I'd go so ballistic that he'd never do it again. I was worried when he started lifting his leg that I would begin to have that problem, but it just never surfaced, thankfully.
If I take him for a walk around our little section of our neighborhood, somewhere between a 35-45 minute walk, depending on just how fast I feel like walking or how much he has to sniff, he'll always stop 5-10 times and pee in the middle of the road, usually on a pothole (good old Louisiana roads), a reflector, some trash lying in the road (good old Louisiana residents' attitude), etc...you get the idea. By about the 4th or 5th time, he's just lifting his leg, nothing is actually coming out, so I know he's marking, or trying to, but I don't see any harm in it as long as he doesn't do it inside. Some people may not like your dog peeing on their mailbox, or maybe that's just that good old LA attitude again, who knows.
I once drove up to my house to find a woman standing in the middle of my yard...middle of my yard...not even by the road (no sidewalks in our good old LA neighborhoods) letting her dog poop in the middle of my front yard, and then just walked away like I wasn't even there...didn't pick it up or anything. I really should just move out of LA....
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Jack has never marked inside my house, or anyone else's. We also go to nursing homes and he's fine, but I watch him like a hawk.
PetSmart is another matter altogether...
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I've brought Dax into PetSmart/Petco and I always watch him and expect him to mark, and surprisingly, he's never done it! I think he's too busy sniffing around and trying to figure out who peed where to even think about peeing there himself. Lol.
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Permalink Reply by Stephanie on
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Bear pees sometimes in the squat and sometimes he lifts his leg. I've never really noticed him marking an object. But like Jack, he always pees in Petsmart, drives me insane, not to mention is TOTALLY embarrassing.
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Oh, I have a worse story! Jack pooped in PetSmart once, and this is the dog that only went once in the house the first day we brought him home, and has never done so since except on two occasions when he was sick and no one was here to let the poor guy out.
I looked down and said "What are you doing?!?!??!" in horror, which was worse because then he tried to, um, stop. So then he'd made a mess of himself and we took him outside to "finish" and it was about 5 degrees that day (hence the outing to PetSmart; it had been freezing for weeks and he'd not gotten to see any other dogs in ages). Well, that made matters worse as everything (gross!!) instantly froze to his fluffy bunny butt. So THEN we had to go back inside to thaw and buy a whole pack of doggie wipes and clean him up, since he was most certainly not going back in the car that way.
I was mortified. The dog looked none too happy either. Blech. It was ages before I would risk going into PetSmart with him after that.
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Oh Beth....way too funny, I had my am laugh! Sorry! I remember when Wynn went to Renaissance for the 1st time at 5 mo. and he must have thought he couldn't poop so when we left the grounds and walked through the cars the poor little boy finally stopped and pooped and pooped...under a parked car!
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Permalink Reply by Shepdog on
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Aw... poor Jack! That's awful.
Owning a pet store that allows dogs in, the thing is, we know that the dogs get sometimes overwhelmed by the scents and accidentally go. Or they get frightened because the only other place with a high concentration of scent is in the vet's office and squat nervously. Those we totally understand.
The ones I simply cannot stand are the people who bring a dog in on a Flexi lead and let the dog go twenty feet away, marking bags of dog food and anything else on the floor. They don't have any idea what their dogs are doing at all. We finally had to put every darn dog bed on the top of the shelves where it was out of the way, ugh, and I constantly check all the shelves and product after a dog has been in.
There are really two sorts of dog customers when their dogs mark or have an accident - the mortified ones (like me and you guys) and the ones who stand there and fully expect you to clean it up. It got so bad there for a while I nearly had to say, "No dogs allowed in the store." The only reason I don't is because I don't think well behaved dogs and owners should be getting the short end of the stick from the not so good ones. ;)
My unaltered boys do not lift their legs inside. Period. People are often shocked when meeting my dogs over the years, they assume they're altered. Nope - they know that it's a big, big, no-no. I also don't let them stop and mark every bush and pole when we walk. If we stop, sure, but I'm not being dragged around to mark every five steps, no way! (Totally off subject, I know.)
On subject, I have had unaltered males for a long time here and leg lifting really is individual. Riley started lifting his leg at 12 weeks or so, but he's an incredibly dominant dog. Caleb who is the bottom of the pack, just now at 8 months has started to lift his leg... well, kind of. Mostly, he forgets in mid stream and it ends up on his foot... doof. My last Shepherd did not lift his leg until he was nearly three - he was a very non-confrontational, non-dominant dog.
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Permalink Reply by Potus on
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Potus was desexed when he was around 14 weeks old. I don't think he'd lifted his leg before that but now he does it most of the time (he's 1 this month- so excited!!) He will still just pee with both feet on the ground, no squatting or anything (and his tail raises up when he pees doing this- so cute).
He scent marks too- not as bad as male un-neutured dogs I know but he still does it- peeing randomly on posts/plants. Like Amanda says Dax does, after a while nothing's coming out.
I've read somewhere that desexing doesn't always guarantee a change in a dogs behaviour. God knows Potus is just a boisterous now as he was before.
Oh, and
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