We have 2 dogs. A 4 year old Cocker Spaniel, and a 2 year old Chihuahua-X-Yorkie. Both males.

The issue is with the Chihuahua. Basically he likes to lick up and drink the older dogs piss. He even goes as far as licking the Spaniels penis directly to clean up any tasty drips that may remain...

The Chihuahua hasn't been castrated, though this is on the list of things to be done soon. I do not know if this could have anything to do with it...

We tell him off each and everytime, even going as far as giving him a tap on the nose. He knows that he is wrong for doing it, but he can't help himself. The Spaniel doesn't push him away, as he has endless patience for the little one, and is so dopey that he probably doesn't even notice.

The Chihuahua will ALWAYS have a good sniff and lick in the puddle in the garden after the Cocker has gone, then go himself on the exact spot.

Has anyone come across a similar thing? Is there anything we can do, or do we just have to come to terms with the fact that the dog has a fetish...?

Buffy does occationally. But I've never been bothered by it. Doesn't do them any harm AFAIK, probably some social reason for doing it - they sniff unrine to find out things about the dog that pee'd so maybe licking is the same but a bit more extreme? Or are they trying to remove the urine so they can mark their own scent?

Wilemina - where are you!!

The only thing that occurs if the ChiX is doing excessively - and if only with your Cocker - is could there be something about the Cocker's pee than is attractive? Is the Cocker in good health?

I wouldn't punish doggy, and PLEASE don't tap him on his little nose - it can cause damage and isn't a useful training technique anyway.

Perhaps call ChiX away from the wee with a tasty reward, or teach a good 'leave it' command.

The thing is that he does have a good 'OFF' response normally, but he'll be back again in a minute or two having a lick at his bits...

The drinking and licking is only with the cocker... He (the Chi) is a 'marker' when out on walks, every lampost, bush etc.

Personally I would get the cocker health checked as there must be something in the urine that attracts the chi.

I think it's quite common in some male dogs. Intact males do it because the pee of other dogs contains a lot of information. Especially if the other dog happens to be female.
I came across the following information which casts a bit more light on why they do this.

The Jacobson's organ, ("vomeronasal organ"), is located in the roof of a dogs mouth, and is an actual olfactory organ.
The vomeronasal organ is mainly used to detect pheromones, chemical messengers that carry information between individuals of the same species, hence is sometimes referred to as the "sixth sense."
Simply put, dogs lick things, including your feet, to collect samples of what they smell to be processed by the vomeronasal organ. watch a male dog lick up another dog's pee and do some kind of teeth chattering/lip smacking? He's using that organ to gather information from the urine.. he can tell if its a male or female, if the dog is more dominant or submissive.. and if its a female, he can determine where she's at in her heat cycle.

I think it is a male thing!! One of my dogs used to do the same but only with one of my friend's dogs ~ not sure why he only did it to this one other dog but we used to joke that Barney "fancied" the other dog, which was a neutered male with the smallest penis i've ever seen! Also he used to lick excessively at the other dog's penis to extent that we worried that it would make it sore. Several times I had to put Barney on a lead as it became almost obsessive behaviour. My friend's dog didn't seem to mind at all but he's a bit dopey & odd so we just put it down to the strange relationship they had.

Once Barney was castrated, this behaviour stopped so hopefully when you get your ChiX castrated the behaviour should fade.

The explanations for why he does it that the others have given are probably near the mark ~ but I don't know any more than that. To put your mind at rest, there was nothing physically wrong with my friend's dog so I don't think that you need to worry about your spaniel.

I agree that punishing your dog won't do any good at all & may do some damage to your relationship with your dog. The drive & motivation for your ChiX to do this is so high that you are never going to stop it by punishing him. Best thing is to get him castrated asap.

GENIUS! His lips/jaw always appear to tremble after his 'sampling'! Sounds like you have it spot on.

Thanks very much everyone. It appears to be all OK.

As Wilhemina says, hopefully once the castration is done the drive to do this will fade away.

Funnily, it is only my bitch that does it!! Not all that often and only to my boys. But she is the lickiest dog I have ever known.

Our Comet used to do this, now I know why.

One day he did it while in the garden and i shouted "oy, you p!ss-licker" - a rather nosey neighbour was peeping through our fence and ran off in alarm, he thought I was calling him a p!ss-licker! Well if he would peep through the fence....

full dogs are buggers for it.

our boy does it, then does the llip trembling thing, all the while drooling a wee/spit mess all over the place, i seriously hate it

prepared to live with it, but he's not giving me kisses until he's a had a long good drink from the hose!

he's not being done any more either (money, and due to the fact he's calmed back down after the bitch on heat incident)
so there's really no way he'll stop any time soon

Callipygous- what's it to you? Your dog is healthy and happy He does doggy things you find not nice - but you're not a dog, you're a person. Don't judge him.

Dogs do some pretty disgusting things, my ex's lab used to wait for his chance to raid the cats litter tray, he used to look at you with big brown eyes that seemed to say 'I know it's naughty, but I just love the stuff!"

My dog and his male friends all lick each others willies - they have no shame. They also sniff and lick each others pee (they don't actually drink it though, just a quick lick). In his circle of friends there are 4 males and 3 females, but it's only the males who lick willies and pee, we just assumed it was a male dog thing (like humping cushions and cuddly toys)

My Yorkie puppy drinks his own wee if he does it on a hard surface and my neighbours GSD dog drinks the bitches urine. My puppy eats his own and other dogs poo. I am finding it very difficult to stop him as hes just so quick. It doesnt help that they are so low to the ground as it allows them to be sneaky. He also has a very good leave it command and also drop it. These commands go out of the window when there are tasty poos around, he just seems to switch off. I asked the vet if maybe ha had some kind of deficiency and he said not with the diet he was on.

He also dives on duck poo at the park and trys to eat that as quick as he can.
I'm going to try the old pennies in a can routine to get his attention long enough to get him to respond to a command. Maybe that will work with your dog if it really is something you can't live with. Personally I wouldn't worry if its urine, the main health concerns are if hes eating poo from other dogs due to the risk of worms etc.

My old dog used to steal cat poo and horse poo from the wheelbarrow when I was cleaning them out. Any other animals poo, she would just roll in it. She used to smile if you caught her so she knew exactly what she was doing.

Please don't - it isn't getting attention - it is noise aversion - a form of punishment. "you do what I don't want and I'll scare you"

As long as you are worming regularly with a good wormer, don't worry about worms.

To stop him eating his own, try a raw diet and/or adding pineapple to his food.

This is what the vet has advised me to do as he eats so many things he shouldn't. I do not do anything to scare my puppy and have never punished him even when he has messed in the house or chewed. It holds no place in training for a happy obedient dog. There is nothing wrong with making a sudden noise to distract a dog from doing something it shouldn't whilst still giving the leave command. When he looks away from what hes doing then he will be praised enourmously. It is not a punishment at all, it is simply a distraction tecnique that is used by many trainers. It is a sound the dog is not used to hearing so it makes the dog stop and listen, thats when you give the leave it command followed by Good boy. I wouldn't be chasing him around the garden shaking the tin.

My vet also said that if the dog is ingesting large amounts of worm eggs in poo then a wormer is not always affective. Eating his own poo is one thing but eating other dogs poo when we don't know if it is carrying a disease is completely different. He has to get out of the habit because he has a severe reaction to vaccinations. He has become seriously ill and nearly died on both occasions when he was vaccinated. I have been advised not to vaccinate him again due to this.

I do not punish my dog for anything, I use positive reinforcement as a method of training and he is rewarded and praised consistantly. He is a very well behaved boy in all other aspects its just the eating things he shouldn't that is a problem. I have tried pinapple in his food, bitter apple sprayed onto poo, hot sauce. Everything. His diets been changed but its made no difference. He has raw food every day as part of his diet, I buy the frozen pure dog food and he has this mixed in with his complete food. Even if I put him off his own poo, it doesnt stop him eating others. Because he is so low to the ground he finds it and gets it before I have even seen it.

At the risk of being flamed, people often seem to forget that learning theory has two components (very summarised) : a positive outcome makes a behaviour more likely to be repeated, a negative consequence makes a behaviour less likely to be repeated.
If a behaviour has a self-reward component,as is the case with copraphagy (e.g eating poo) offering an alternative reward will not always prevent the behaviour , particularly if that dog thinks the self-reward is better that the alternative on offer i.e poo tastes better than dog treats, or, I can eat this and then get that .
Sometimes to be effective an appropriate combination (for that particular dog, at that stage of training, at that level of motivation etc) of a mild aversion e.g water or noise aversion, needs to be combined with a reward for doing something more appropraite.
Dogs do not just use positive reinforcement to train other dogs as to what belongs so whom!
As ever the cost:benefit ratio needs to also be taken into account as to whether the behaviour under consideration is dangerous to the dog, to the owner, or to others.

*Takes cover under flame retardant blanket*

Thankyou I couldn't have put it better myself. The cost to him of maintaining the habit will be huge to him if he picks up parvo or something later on when his vaccines have worn off. It worries me that he wont be covered by a vaccination but the vet said that his immunity will last for years from the ones he has had already. He said to have blood tests every year to check his immunity levels. When they drop below a certain level then to make the decision to vaccinate or not. There is a high possibility we will lose him if he reacts like that again so i'm inclined not to. He's at a much lower risk if he stops eating the poo. Why can't he bring me a stick like normal dogs

if you want to avoid problems you don't want him to bring you a stick as it can be very dangerous. Dogs can impale themselves on sticks when they're playing and if they do the injuries can be horrendous and difficult to clean due to the splinters and dirt with sticks.
Better if he's bring you a correctly sized ball that was too big to accidentally get stuck in his throat

Lol I think you have misunderstood me. I don't throw sticks for him as I too think they are dangerous as are stones. I meant it in a other peoples dogs bring them sticks and mine has to go and bring me poo kind of way He has a tiny tennis ball that we take out with us and also a mini rope tugger thats also tiny.

Things don't always come across quite as meant when posting. I did understand exactly what you meant, thought it was funny and knew you were joking, but struck me () as amusingly ironic to joke about solving one problem with a solution, that had you not been joking, could have caused a different problem

As far as I was aware, this teeth chattering is a sign of sexual arousal. I could be mistaken but my male does this lip smacking and teeth chattering when he has the scent of a female.

Also at risk of being shot down ~ I would be very careful of using any form of punishment or negative reinforcement. Yes I appreciate that dogs themselves don't use only positive reinforcement in teaching puppies what is acceptable behaviour & what is not. But the relationship between dogs is highly complex, much more than just the operant conditioning part of learning theory. There is also observational learning & attachment theory to be taken into account not to mention the biologically hard-wired behaviours & classically-conditioned behaviours.

Punishment (& this includes noise aversion, rattle cans, water pistols etc) is very hard to get right & very easy to get wrong. My favourite explanation of the difficulty in using punishment comes from Pamela Reid in "Excel-erated Learning" (an excellent book on dog training & learning theory) where she uses Karen Pryor's analogy.

"Punishment can be extremely effective method of teaching but only if certain conditions are met. Meeting these conditions is often impossible or is so challenging that it is easier to take a different approach. First & foremost punishment must not be used as a retibution. Punishment is a learning tool, not a means for revenge. That's why Ted Turner's classification of death as punishment is incorrect: dead things don't learn.

Punishment must be initially severe, must fit the crime, must be consistent, immediate & not be reliably associated with inconvenient Sds (discriminative stimuli) such as a particular person. Ideally an appropriate alternative behaviour is available. My all time favourite example of the perfect punishment comes from Karen Pryor's book "Don't Shoot the Dog". She imagines what the world would be like if every time someone parked a car illegally, the car exploded. I suspect noone would ever park illegally! This punishment completely fits the bill: it is intense, it is immediate, it happens every time, it happens remotely & it fits the crime because your car no longer exists. Contrast this with the way things usually happen. I receive a ticket that doesn't have to be paid for a week or two, the fine is not heavy, more often that not I get away with it & if I watch the parking enforement officer coming down the street I move my car & avoid a ticket".

I think this highlights beautifully why using punishment to train a dog or any animal is so difficult & so easy to get wrong. If you still don't believe me try reading "Coercion & its Fallout" by Murray Sidman ~ an excellent book on the dangers of using punishment & the emotiomal fallout if you do.

With hindsight perhaps I should have explained a bit more about my last post.

If you think that using rattle cans, water pistols etc is not punishment, you are wrong. Of course they are punishments ~ what else could they possibly be? The fact that you then praise your dog from stopping whatever it was doing, does not detract from the fact that the aversive thing you used first was a punishment. What do you think that the dog learns from your behaviour? That sometimes you are nice & sometimes you are scary.

If you think about the perils of using punishment & how difficult it is to get wrong, the rattle can approach to copraphagia could fall down very easily.

Firstly is the noise immediate? Do you ALWAYS have the rattle can to hand whenever your dog is about to eat poo? What if you are out on a walk, what if your dog is the bottom of the garden, what if you are in another room when he raids the litter tray?

Second, does the noise happen EVERY time? What if your dog eats the cat's poo when you are out, or if you are distracted at the time & don't notice?

Thirdly, if you are the person shaking the rattle can, you become the discriminative stimulus for the noise, i.e. it only happens when you are there so your dog learns only to raid the cat litter in your absence.

Fourthly, has Tass has said, is the noise sufficient punishment to stop what is a self-rewarding behaviour when the dog is so highly motivated to eat poo?

Fifthly, does a loud noise fit the crime? There is probably insufficent association between eating poo & a loud noise for the dog to make this association anyway.

The unwanted result of using punishment in this context could well result in the dog becoming wary, if not scared of you. And he may still practice copraphagia but only if you are not around.

Sorry this post is not a more constructive approach to stopping copraphagia. I've got to go out now but I'll try to come up with alternative approaches later.