Kingdom of Pets

Posted by Heidi11
Dec 10, 2010

Hello, hoping you can help.

I have a 7 month old Moodle puppy who is pretty much toilet trained. He only occasionally has accidents in the house, and generally they are at the front or back door so it's our fault we haven't noticed he needed to go out.

Recently, he has started on occasion to wee in really strange places. He has gone upstairs to wee on the spare bed and has also done a wee on our bed.

Not really sure what to do here.

We take him outside regularly, he always goes to the door if he needs to go outside. He is a very obedient dog. Apart from this...

I want to stop this trend of urinating on the beds ASAP (as you can imagine)

Please help!!

Thanks
Heidi

Posted by KOPCaroline
Dec 12, 2010

Hey Heidi,

Combining this thread with your post about the licking, I'm really wondering if your dog has an anxiety issue? When did all this behaviour start up? Any new additions to the house?

A housetrained dog generally won't pee in random places inside unless its a psychological or medical problem. It might be worthwhile taking him to your vet and talking about whats been going on, having a check over to make sure its not a medical problem. Your vet can also tell you if the situation warrants anti-anxiety treatment.

For now, until you can get to the vet, I'd keep a closer watch on him. Maybe block his access to the bedroom when youre not in the room with him. The accidents by the door probably aren't a big deal, like you said, its hard to be there EVERY time they need to go out sometimes!

Posted by Heidi11
Dec 14, 2010

Thanks for your response(s).

Last night at 3am Lenny did another wee on the bed. He knows not to get on the bed, however I think he has worked out that when we are asleep he can get up without being told off.

In regards to anxiety, when we first got him I thought we were going to have a real problem. He would winge and cry no stop if he couldn't see us, or if my housemates were looking after him he would cry at the door until we got home. That behaviour has dramatically reduced - he still doesn't like to be outside when we are home but we don't let him in until he's quiet. Lenny is home by himself 3 days per week.

He has also escaped twice in the last 2 weeks (we have had some major storms in Melbourne, which I know he is frightened from, we're not home when the storms hit). I'm not sure if this is the reason for the odd behaviour - As I write this post I have had a call to let me know that he has again escaped!!

About 5 weeks ago, a friend came over to our place and his shoes made a horrible squeaking noise on the titles. When Lenny heard this noise he was terrified. I have never seen a dog like that before. Two or three days after this, he started urinating in odd places, on furniture and alike.
We took him to the vet who couldn't really tell us what it was other than he might have a bladder infection which could be why he was doing it. We gave him antibiotics for 10 days and the behavior reduced - but it has started again, hence my post.

Could an event like this cause the anxiety?

I will definitely take him to the vet to get him checked out.

Thanks for your help!

Posted by KOPCaroline
Dec 14, 2010

Hey Heidi,

I definitely think that, especially if your pup was anxious to start, this series of storms, escapes and scary guests could definitely push him to show this kind of behaviour. You should still see the vet about anxiety, but you can take steps to overcome at least some of these sources of anxiety as well.

When you're home, try playing a tape/CD of storms, so that he gets used to the noise. When they are playing, be sure you carry on with whatever you're doing as normal, and try not to babytalk the dog, this only reinforces the scared behaviour.

Have your friend with the scary shoes come over again First have him walk around without the shoes until your dog is friendly with him, then put the shoes back on, but dont walk around too much. Gradually get your dog used to the sound by exposing him a bit more and more.

I hope you find help at the vets, anxiety can be a real pain to try and deal with or overcome, but it is definitely possible!

Posted by Heidi11
Dec 17, 2010

Thanks again.

I took Lenny to the vet and she advised that the urinating on the bed is probably a dominance thing. Lenny has not been de-sexed yet. I have booked it in for next week.

They were reluctant to specify that it was anxiety until he was de-sexed so they could rule that out as being the problem.

The vet could provide any guidance regarding the reasons for escaping other than he was bored. We have securely blocked off the areas he could get out.

I will definitely implement the shoe suggestion.

Thanks very much for your information.

H

Urinating in strange places..