The cliche understanding is that dogs mark their territory with pee. At times I’ve been on walks with family and friends with half a dozen dogs. There have been occasions where they form a line just to pee in the same spot.
So how does the ownership work? Is it like a co-op? Last one to pee wins?
It’s not really ownership, per se. It’s really more like planting a flag to say “I was here”. They’re leaving their scent behind to let other outsider dogs know that they are around the area, like a calling card. Sometimes the pheromones in the urine can let other dogs know if they are in estrus, so it has a useful social/mating component to it.
I have always thought of it as how graffiti taggers work. They are always tagging over each other’s work. The last one to paint gets the most exposure but you can still see remnants of more recent taggers the lay under the topmost. Eventually the oldest stuff just gets covered completely. They don’t necessarily pick their canvas because there is other work they try to cover up, they pick their canvas for the location and exposure.
My grandparents had a dog that when we brought our dog, would follow our dog around to all the spots ours peed on after the car ride, sometimes peeing before and after on a spot with our dog peeing there in between.
So it’s more like a dog guest book, got it. Does anyone know why they pee where they pee? My dog picks a particular spot in the bushes at my parent’s house and he does it without fail every time.
And my male dog pees on the same spot as my female dog. What up with that?
If I’m not mistaken, it’s just to say where the dog has been.
As far as pee ownership goes, if you can get to the pee first, it’s yours. You should probably ask the owner first if it’s not a stray.
