The tendency for male dogs to mark their territory is pretty well known, but these competitive Labs take it to the next level…literally.
Anyone who has owned dogs for a long enough period of time has had to deal with such things as snatched food (AKA counter surfing), destroyed or missing household items like shoes, clothes and furniture as well as muddy footprints and soiled carpets. Yet despite my many years of dog ownership, there are still elements of dog behavior that leave me mystified, if not occasionally in mild shock. In this case, it was a male dogs urine marking contest that went a little too far.
Male Dogs Urine Marking
The tendency for male dogs to hold prodigious amounts of urine and mark their territory is pretty well known by any dog owner, and some dogs are clearly better at it than others. Taking my own dog for a walk usually entails stopping approximately every 2.5 feet while he carefully and judiciously doles out minute quantities of urine on every vertical weed, tree, car tire or mailbox encountered along the way.
Each drop is precisely measured so he will be able to adequately mark his trail both coming and going. On especially long walks, or if he has somehow failed to calculate correctly, he will even false mark just in case any of his neighborhood buddies happen to be watching – one does after all have certain standards to uphold. Marking behavior is even more pronounced when he encounters another dog. Then it seems like they are committed to marking everything in sight, up to and including pant legs and each other.
“Up” for the Challenge
It started out to be a pleasant weekend with friends at their quaint and idyllic little cottage situated along the shores of Lake Huron in Northern Michigan. We had decided to bring our hunting dog, Parker, a yellow Labrador retriever, and leave him with their male Lab while we all went out boating for a few hours. Both animals knew each other and were well past puppyhood and it was therefore unlikely that they would either engage in any fights to the death or completely destroy the place while we were gone. So you can imagine how perplexed we were upon entering the cottage to find that the dogs had decided to quite literally engage in a peeing contest!
The first event was apparently conducted to see who could urinate the highest, as evidenced by the still-dripping wallpaper. Twin paths of urine, reaching to an impressive height of about 5 feet on the soaked, flocked wallpaper and a corresponding set of puddles located directly beneath it, marked the site of the first event. Casual observation suggested that both animals were apparently both well matched and equally well hydrated and this one must have ended in a draw. On a brighter note, it was also apparent that neither dog was experiencing any prostate problems and urine retention was definitely not an issue!
Reaching New Heights
The next event was a little more baffling because the only clue we had was a rather large puddle sitting square on top of the kitchen table! Although these dogs were apparently pretty skilled, there are physical limitations which should have prevented even these two highly motivated and competitive animals from urinating directly onto the top of the table. It was at that point that we all glanced up to the loft.
It suddenly became apparent to us that one or both animals, it was impossible to tell by this time as they were both acting pretty smug about the whole thing, had taken the effort to climb the stairs to the open loft and by peeing into space, shoot for a distance record. The kitchen table just happened to be in the path of the spray, as was apparently a rather disgustingly sodden napkin holder, the floor, the couch and a television set. Through their combined efforts, they had managed to liberally and quite uniformly spread dog urine throughout the entire cottage. We just stood there for a moment taking in the disaster before resigning ourselves to the task of cleaning up what had become a canine superfund site.
Mind Your Pees and Qs
Fortunately, not all canine indiscretions end with the need to call in a hazmat team and a priest – otherwise the canine species would have ceased to exist about the time that they followed us from caves into houses. It’s also likely that the only animals able to survive their early co-existence with man were those breeds that were agile enough and fast enough to successfully evade the grasp of their irate owners!
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