Suggestions for house marking male dog?

[Bicoastal]

I overcame this- tether

[QUOTE=meupatdoes;6522576]
Basically it just has to stay with you AT. ALL. TIMES.

I have one of these and I make him come with me whereever I go in the house. If I am showering he has to hang out in the bathroom with me. When sleeping the baby gate keeps him in the bedroom. When cooking he has to be in the kitchen. When relaxing he has to be with me in the living room.[/QUOTE]

@LauraKY;6522848

Tether him to you. Then spray every area where he’s peed with a urine enzyme cleaner.

@threedogpack;6523650

He will get 2 or 3 opportunities to empty and if he does not, he goes back in the crate. That will be a few weeks down the road, as I need to work on other things first, but trust me, he will learn to empty rather than mark as I .really. dislike dogs who don’t empty and want to do a squirt here and a squirt there.

Amen to all of this! I have two males. One from the pound. The other a toy breed notorious for being impossible to housebreak from a kennel where the dogs peed everywhere- including between my back and the couch back: I thought the dog jumped up for attention, he squirmed behind me and hiked! :eek:

I guess the easy way would be belly bands but I don’t find washing belly bands every day very easy. Tether.

Now I never go to the bathroom alone :lol:. I don’t know if that is because of the tethering and crating instituted in the first 6 months or if he would have been a velcro dog anyway. I can trust him, after two years, to leave my sight.

[Rallycairn]

[QUOTE=Bicoastal;6524245]
…I guess the easy way would be belly bands but I don’t find washing belly bands every day very easy…[/QUOTE]

Oh, you can line them with maxi pads and they don’t always have to be washed after every use – just if you get a leak. But yes, there is that whole fitting and cleaning issue for sure.

[Sonesta]

Yes, just put a maxi pad inside the belly band and easy to change out. After all, you are talking about marking (a few drops at a time), not an entire full bladder of pee.

[SonnysMom]

@meupatdoes;6522579

Does the belly band prevent the behavior entirely because they don’t want to pee into it or does it just let them do it but contain the mess?

I started using a belly band for my Eskie about 3 weeks ago. I had read that for some dogs the belly band stops them but not my dog. I use an overnight maxi pad and it just contains the mess.

[wendy]

Quote:

I firmly believe urinating to relieve a full bladder and marking are two very different behaviors

perhaps, but you don’t need to know or understand the dog’s motivation for doing a behavior in order to change the dog’s behavior. You don’t want the dog to pee in the house, so you fix the behavior of “peeing in the house” and hey presto the dog stops “marking” in the house.

I think a lot of people “excuse” peeing in the house as “marking” when it’s just an unhousebroken dog, plain and simple. Housebroken dogs do not pee in the house, for any reason.

[Nezzy]

is this dog neutered? If not, Consider neutering. But an intact dog will often “learn” this marking and after neutering will continue b/c of habit.

[lucky_dog_farm]

I have a little 4lb chihuahua that came from a rescue years ago and let me tell you that little ba$t@!d marks! I can take him out and he will pee to empty his bladder,so in that respect, he is very good. He unfortunately was neutered later in life and he lived with another unneutered dog before he came to live at my house, so he picked up the whole marking thing long before I ever got him. Given a chance he will pee on anything including the back of the couch, the cabinets,chairs, whatever. Now a days he NEVER gets any chances! He is either in my site or in his crate. I have to be extra careful if any other male dog comes into my kitchen because that sets him off for along time after the other dog leaves. Again he is never loose by himself. All my other dogs would be totally mortified if they ever did that kind of thing in the house. I have owned quite a few intact dogs when I was raising,training ,showing and I have never had a problem with marking. If this little guy wasn’t so darn cute he would have been booted along, long time ago! Did I mention he’ll poop in his crate as well? Ugh, nasty little beast. :(. He’s 12-13 now so I guess he’s here to stay.

[threedogpack]

[QUOTE=lucky dog farm;6525970]
I have a little 4lb chihuahua that came from a rescue years ago and let me tell you that little ba$t@!d marks! [/QUOTE]

I’ve heard Chis and Dachies are hard to house break and that they tend to be messy in their crates. I’ve only known one Chi, and he had these problems too.

[Bicoastal]

[QUOTE=lucky dog farm;6525970]
I have a little 4lb chihuahua that came from a rescue years ago and let me tell you that little ba$t@!d marks! I can take him out and he will pee to empty his bladder,so in that respect, he is very good. He unfortunately was neutered later in life and he lived with another unneutered dog before he came to live at my house, so he picked up the whole marking thing long before I ever got him.[/QUOTE]

Been there, done that; currently doing that. My intact stud from a show kennel was around MANY intact dogs who all marked everywhere- crates, furniture, anything standing still :lol:.

Not specifically to you, luckydogfarm, as it sounds like you do address it; many toy owners seem to give up or consider it impossible because 1) the mess isn’t as bad as a 50lb dog 2) it’s easy to lose track of a ankle biter in the house and 3) the dogs are kwoot wittle babies :mad:.

I know an OB handler with many UD titles under her belt: her toys wear belly bands. Umm, you can train your dog to Utility but can’t housebreak it? Of course she could! She doesn’t.

Maybe Timber has been reading this thread. In the past two weeks, he has peed inside twice!:eek: Not marking, but OMG emergency stop to empty bladder. On Tues, as I sat on the couch watching, he circled once around the living room before whizzing. Took me a minute to understand what I was seeing. If he is off sched*/has an emergency, I need more signals!

Back to housebreaking 101- outside to pee. No pee? Inside crate. Then outside again. Major praise and hotdogs for peeing. Hopefully it is not medical: I am on the lookout.

*My dogs go out at regular intervals throughout the day without me waiting for them to ask. I never trained a specific indicating behavior. Each has developed their own way of telling me if they have an emergency- usually whining/circling/pawing bed in middle of night.

[Banditbear]

[QUOTE=GraceLikeRain;6524042]

I firmly believe urinating to relieve a full bladder and marking are two very different behaviors and I don’t think they can always be solved in the same manner. Not that I have a solution but I know that my dog wouldn’t stop marking just because I forced him to empty his bladder.[/QUOTE]

This.
I didn’t read all the posts but my two cents are:

You can’t punish what already happened (ie. pee found in house) you just clean it up.

Take him with wherever u go in the house until he becomes trustworthy. For my dog that was 2 years - now any house he is great.

If you catch him marking grab him mid spray and take him outside- that is the only time you can correct the behavior. I usually make a NO or loud noise as I grab him and take him out.

My intact male dog will mark every stone bush tree all day long if allowed…even if he does a huge pee. He can mark with just a tiny drop! Outside as long as its a nature item (tree, bush etc) I let him because I figure it’s natural. On walks though he is only allowed to pee/mark if I let him (usually only one/two max a walk) so that I remain in his eyes as boss/alpha.

Dogs usually only mark if they feel they are boss. So enforce the nothing in life is free rule. Ie before u feed him he has to sit, before you pet him he has to lay down, before you let him out he has to sit. Basically he has to listen to you before he gets something good.