Peeing on the bed and dominance....

Hmm, I don't really see it as silly -- particularly with small dogs I've seen it.  Dogs that sleep IN the bed and often it is such a power spot -- I'm up 'high' and this is where my people sleep and 'do' other things.  It's such a focal point for scent. 

You have a bigger dog and it may not be as obvious -- but a small dog will often "climb" to make a point and the bed tends to be the alpha spot for humans and the dog is often allowed on there without repercussions (not at my house).

However -- there's also a HUGE difference between marking and a dog with a UTI who loses control during sleep or who loses control during a stressful encounter. 

But if a dog wants to 'mark' and is allowed free-reign in the house, the bed is the alpha pack-center, so getting up ON the bed is definitely a "this is MINE" kinda place.

People can get really anthropomorphic about it tho -- "he's doing this to get back at me" -- no, he's simply saying "this and all on it are mine -- I was here LAST."

Nah, I don't think so. It's just another one of those things that arose out of....well, wherever. Urination on the bed might stem from different origins:
1) Marking the bed as some sort of territory (dog believes it's his) - still not dominance, and when marking on the bed, it's not usually ON the bed, but on the perimeter of it.
2) Out of stress - the more common reasons. Whether it stems from SA, or insecurities, or fear, often times this is a reason for bed urination.

If a dog suddenly began urinating on the bed, I'd wonder if there were any changes in the household - new baby, person moved in, person moved out, death in family, etc. Or if there is company over. If the dog has separation distress or separation anxiety. I'd inquire about a possible medical situation. I wouldn't be likely to consider it dominance though - dominance is about controlling resources in one specific situation, to give a very basic definition, and it changes from situation to situation. Peeing on a bed isn't about "controlling" anything. If the dog was trying to control the bed, it would be more along the lines of resource guarding.

I once had an intact male lift his leg on a spot of blood on top of my bed from a bitch in heat. He had never done it before, and never did it again, but there was something about that time that caused him to instinctively mark that spot. Not dominance. Annoying, and I screeched at him (not in an attempt to punish, but rather as a surprised automatic reaction like "What the heck are you DOING!". I think it might have come across to him as a P+ though, and he definitely was very careful around me for the rest of the day due to my outburst. *G*)

My mother also got peed on once, in bed, by our Shih Tzu mix when she was a pup. She was so tiny with a tiny bladder, she just couldn't hold it and decided the blanket was the only place she could pee, as she couldn't hold it (mom says she didn't give any signs of needing to go....I wasn't there...lol....can't comment). Not marking, just a natural need that needed to be taken care of at that moment.

 A dog who needs to pee goes looking for an absorbent surface that isn't part of his usual "living area". Often rugs or beds in rarely used rooms like the basement or guest bedroom are chosen; and sometimes, dogs who aren't often allowed on the bed decide that it's a perfect "not part of my usual living area" potty area. Most of the stories you hear about dogs peeing on beds "out of spite", something stressful and different is going on in the dog's life, and seems likely the dog's potty routine has been messed up. So he's just emptying his bladder in what, to a dog, seems the logical place.

mudpuppy

 A dog who needs to pee goes looking for an absorbent surface that isn't part of his usual "living area". Often rugs or beds in rarely used rooms like the basement or guest bedroom are chosen; and sometimes, dogs who aren't often allowed on the bed decide that it's a perfect "not part of my usual living area" potty area. Most of the stories you hear about dogs peeing on beds "out of spite", something stressful and different is going on in the dog's life, and seems likely the dog's potty routine has been messed up. So he's just emptying his bladder in what, to a dog, seems the logical place.

This is how I understood it as well, that it's simply a smooshy place to pee (like grass or leaves).  I'm talking more about normal business, not marking behavior.  I've heard so many times from friends that their dog is being "dominant" or "spiteful" when in reality the dog was never totally potty trained to begin with, has an untreated UTI or medical problem, or has other behavioral problems that are not being properly addressed. 

The other day, Kenya POOPED all over our bed.  She'd eaten too many canned sardines (my bad).  She doesn't tell me when she needs to go out, so if she has to go before our scheduled times, I don't really know.  I figured she REALLY had to go, so she went to the farthest place from us that still smelled like her - the bed.  I don't see how that could be dominant or spiteful, she just really had to go and no one took her out.  I wasn't mad because I should have remembered that she'd eaten too many fish and would have to go sooner.

Dominant and spiteful aren't in any way the same thing. I don't believe dogs do things for spite. But I do believe they do things to show dominance. And peeing on the bed CAN be a dominant behavior, but it is not, in and of itself necessarily a show of dominance. There are many reasons a dog might do this, one of which would be to mark or claim the bed as "theirs".

If they just wanted an absorbent area to pee,  there are many around the house, especially if there's carpet somewhere. But a prime sleeping place is one of the benefits of being "top dog".

I think the act has to be taken in context with other behaviors to determine the cause. But it's certainly not silly to think it might be a dominance related issue. More info is needed.

People get so het up about their dog and their bed. Pretty soon people will be saying if your dog looks at your bed, he's being dominant.

Beds are absorbent and up off the ground so a dog who's learned that peeing on the floor is not good may not really quite get why peeing on the bed is also not good. In Marlowe's house training progression, our bed was the last thing he learned to stop peeing on (I was *thisclose* to putting rubber sheets on it). He wasn't marking, he was full-on peeing because he just didn't realize that the bed counted as a place not to pee. It seemed like such an excellent location to him. He never sleeps on it, it's so absorbent and squishy, it's not the floor. What's not to love? With the layout of our old house you had to go through the bedroom to get to our main living room area so if the door to the bedroom from there didn't get shut all the way, he could sneak down and relieve himself in the days before he finally learned to give some sort of indication of needing to go.

In addition to stress and medical problems, I also think people are way too quick to declare their dog "housetrained". I think a lot of so-called house trained dogs aren't really 100% trained yet, and people start looking for other reasons for why their dog is still eliminating in the house beyond just a lack of housetraining. Given the number of people who come here distraught that their 18 week old puppy isn't fully housetrained yet, I think most people have really unrealistic expectations for the timeline.
 

People get so het up about their dog and their bed. Pretty soon people will be saying if your dog looks at your bed, he's being dominant.

ROFL, I guess the Aussies are planning a coup.   

Dominant and spiteful aren't in any way the same thing. I don't believe dogs do things for spite. But I do believe they do things to show dominance. And peeing on the bed CAN be a dominant behavior, but it is not, in and of itself necessarily a show of dominance. There are many reasons a dog might do this, one of which would be to mark or claim the bed as "theirs".

one of the most ingrained instinctive behaviors of dogs is you don't pee where you sleep. That's why crates can help you house-break your dog.  A dog who really wanted to sleep on the bed would be almost certain to never pee on it.

Some dogs mark territory, sure- the boundary of their territory, not the prized sleeping spot.

Dogs most certainly DO sometimes mark their territory, including their bed if they feel someone is trying to encroach upon it. Dogs don't mark in their crate because you don't crawl in there every night. 

A very interesting read on Canine territorial Marking and urination: 

Canine Territorial Marking 

By Myrna Milani, BS, DVM. Originally written for DogWatch, a newsletter for the general public from the Cornell University College of Veterinary Medicine.

Q. My dog urinates in numerous locations in my house, which I've been told is territorial marking. The only place she's never gone is in my bed. On the other hand, my cousin's dog only urinates in his bed and he was told that's territorial marking, too. How can these two opposite behaviors mean the same thing?

A. To understand the variations that may occur in marking behavior, we first need to understand territorial behavior itself. Recall that establishing and protecting the territory serves as the primary animal priority. The wild dog pack's territorial nature leads its members to claim an area large enough to support them and any offspring, but not one so large that it requires excessive energy to adequately defend it. Within that space, the animals also protect certain prime locations - such as choice feeding sites and dens - more diligently than areas at the periphery.

However, because the ultimate goal remains to find food and water and reproduce, it makes sense to leave a token marker - such as scent-laden urine that communicates the resident's willingness to protect this space if necessary - rather than actually physically challenging every suspicious interloper who approaches that space.

Awww, ya gotta love Myrna.

I'm talking about peeing and pooping, not territory marking.  Neither of my dogs ever marks.  Coke is a boy and has never lifted his leg and Kenya....she has never even peed once on any walk, neither has Coke now that I think of it.  Anytime they pee, they squat and pee for a good 10 seconds!  However, we HAVE had accidents in the house.  I've just attributed it to the dog being sick (2 times) or the dog not having a way to tell me she needs to go out (1 time - Kenya).  The accidents happened on my bed, in a crate, and on the floor in the living room (right where the dogs spend most of their time).  I think Kenya went on the bed because whenever she goes outside, she goes WAY to the edge of the yard and will only go in long grass or a leaf pile, so the bed, being on the "outer" edge of the indoors and being the squishy surface that did smell like her (she does sleep on there), that's what she chose.

The dominance/marking things usually makes me snicker because while I know it's true, most of the times that's not the case.  My friend thinks her dog does this, but I think he's an older dog who was never totally reliably house trained in the first place.  "Dominance" is her way of making excuses.  Her cat peed in our old house and again, people said he was being "dominant" and marking, but it turned out he had an untreated UTI.  It just leaves me wondering why people so quickly cry "dominance" when there are other more obvious causes, especially for some dogs/cats who have never marked or shown any other dominant behaviors. 

I think there is the potential to be something to this in some circumstances. I say this only because I had a rabbit going through puberty who deliberately and repeatedly peed on my bed and in Kit's cage. I'd let her out of her cage and she'd be on the bed or in Kit's cage almost instantly. She was litter-trained and was impeccably clean in her cage, going so far as to only ever wee in one corner of her litter tray. She knew where the toilet was, but she also knew where in the room smelt most strongly of Kit and where in the room smelt most like me. She disdained the dog's bed, though. She sneered at dogs and tried to pretend they didn't exist.

Dogs aren't rabbits. They have some things in common as they are both social and territorial, but they think very differently. However, as I've had one social animal peeing on my bed as a display of dominance, I wouldn't rule it out completely. My current rabbit was desexed when I got her, and she's never done it on my bed or in Kit's cage. Kit hasn't, but he's not a social or territorial creature, although he is intact.

I think it's worth remembering that your bed smells very strongly of you. You do spend the most time there than anywhere else, really. I don't really pay much attention to most talk of dominance in dogs and I don't know if this would happen with dogs, but I keep an open mind about this one because of my experience with the bunny. I've heard bunny people tell of rabbits that have maliciously peed on their pillows when they have deeply offended their rabbits. Any other time and they're reliable outside the cage, but offend them and suddenly you have a wet, smelly pillow. The pattern is very strong. I think they just latch onto something they know makes you angry with them. My rabbit was very aware of what I didn't want her to do, and quite capable of using that behaviour to punish me. Thankfully, dogs don't think that way as a rule! I'd say at least 99% of the time it's not deliberate and has nothing to do with dominance, but I wouldn't say it never has anything to do with dominance or spite. It's possible. With the right kind of temperament.

Liesje, you didn't say you were talking about your dogs. I thought you were asking a general question. I would ask if this has all happened since Coke arrived on the scene. Because if Kenya peed and pooped on your bed after Coke arrived and got on your bed, she could very well be saying, "This is mine, bud" in the best way she knows how. That's not to say she's being "dominant". In fact, definitely not. She just wants to do her best to claim what's hers.

Liesje

The dominance/marking things usually makes me snicker because while I know it's true, most of the times that's not the case. 

Marking isn't even an act of dominance, necessarily. They aren't the same thing. And it just depends. If the dog has one "accident" on the bed, you're right, it's probably not marking. But if he does it time after time or under other certain circumstances and a UTI is ruled out, it may very well be marking. Or it may be a show of dominance.

Liesje

It just leaves me wondering why people so quickly cry "dominance" when there are other more obvious causes

I guess I don't hear people crying dominance. That's just one of the possibilities. The first thing I hear people say is to have them vet checked for a UTI.

There's a lot of good information in the paper I linked. It's just that it can very well be about marking OR dominance OR an unresolved UTI OR something else. It all depends on the circumstances.

The suggestion that a dog who regularly pees on the bed is expressing dominance is like the suggestion that a dog who itches a lot has allergies. It could be allergies, dry skin, fleas, a skin condition, nerves or something else. But suggesting it's dominance is a viable diagnosis. It might be wrong, but it's not out of the question at all.

FourIsCompany

Liesje, you didn't say you were talking about your dogs. I thought you were asking a general question. I would ask if this has all happened since Coke arrived on the scene. Because if Kenya peed and pooped on your bed after Coke arrived and got on your bed, she could very well be saying, "This is mine, bud" in the best way she knows how. That's not to say she's being "dominant". In fact, definitely not. She just wants to do her best to claim what's hers.

I am, I'm looking for more info, preferably from a more scientific perspective.  I know it's *always* a *possibility*, but I'm looking for a little bit more than that.  I hear it a lot from friends and so far in their cases, I have not believe it to be true.  However, I don't have anything to throw at them that explains the difference between a habit (or not being totally house trained) and something else.  I'm sure there are dozens of possibilities, I'm just wondering why so many people go with "dominance" as the most likely one.  Not people on here - I think all of us here know enough about dogs not to do that - but the JQP out there.  My brother, my friends....people who have always had dogs (or cats for that matter), but don't necessarily take the time to dig deeper.  I don't get where they are getting the idea that the most likely cause is the dog being dominant.  With altered cats, you always assume any accidents outside the box are a UTI unless proven otherwise, but I see so many friends and acquaintances brush off dog accidents as "dominance", maybe so they can avoid a trip to the vet?  Or place the blame on the dog and not a lack of complete potty training? 

Neither of my dogs have ever peed in the house, save for a piddle drop or two from Kenya if I've been gone all day and she's super excited/really has to go when I get back.  They've never peed anywhere but their two pee spots in our yard (they won't pee on a walk or outside the vet's office).  They have had other accidents in the crate/living room/bed when they were sick.