dog constantly licking his paws and peeing on himself :(
Posted by amymylove on Sep 16, 2009 · Member since Apr 2009 · 5266 posts
my dog Mason constantly licks at himself and scratches... yes he has flea medication, i bathe him... the one thing i noticed though is since adopting him he's only seen how my dog Bella (a girl) pee's so Mason (a boy) pee's like a girl and squirts all over his front paws! Is this why? How can I get Mason to pee like a boy? Why is he constantly biting at his paws and scratching himself? I don't get it!
Well, when my family had a male dog....he peed sitting down for the first few years, then he decided to try w/ leg up, and he continued to 'switch off' between the two. For him, we just considered he was lazy.
Have you examined him for ringworm? How often do you wash him? And, what products do you use (if you do it too often/with too harsh of cleanser, it could simply be dry skin)? What flea product are you using (one or two of the products are water soluble)? What do his paws look like, could there be something in them? Could he be allergic to something he's walking in?
Something Dad would do occasionally would be to rub chilly paste on the paws....After a few times, that's normally discouraged everyone of them!!
Good luck!
i think i need to take him to the vet...
i use front line or advantage plus for fleas
i have not examined him for ringworm
i wash him maybe every three weeks, right now i'm using groomax deep deoderazing (he smells and has smelled since we got him like a year ago) but I just recently took him to petco to get groomed (someone i know)
i haven't seen anything on his paws except redness after he bites them... but i'm wondering if maybe there's some kind of fungus/mites bothering him
he's mostly inside... i walk him around my condo complex mostly on cement and grass
I fostered a puppy that had a lot of itchiness. It turned out that he was allergic to grains and chicken. He is now in his forever home and they feed him a sweet potato and fish dog food, and his rashes and itchiness are all gone. Not that you would be interested in a dog food with meat, but you might be able to play with some recipes omitting commen allergens to see if there are any improvements. You need a good, open minded vet that will help you explore these ideas, otherwise you will just be given expensive prescriptions for cortisol creams and shots that do nothing but make the problem worse in the long run. Your dog sounds like he will be just fine once he is settled and feeling safe and secure.
..also..if it is fungus or mites, a vet will be able to indentify that anyway.
I vote allergies. My dog has bad wheat allergies, he gets really itchy and sometimes has like little seizure type things. The shampoo could be bothering its skin, the old one we had did that to my dog also.
The peeing issue. My doggie is like, 15, he still doesnt always pee like a guy dog. haha. He didnt even realize the whole lifting his leg thing until like, a few years ago. I wouldnt worry about that, its gross if they pee on themselves (my dog used to ALL the time) but eventually they learn.
when i first got mason i fed him food with meat in it... now he eats vegan dog food so would it still be the dog food? I fed him Iams for toy breeds before and natural balance now
Did he have the problem before you changed his diet? Look at the difference in ingredients besides meat if it was different. Corn, soy, and wheat are common dog allergies.
My dog Jonah has always peed like a girl. I think its laziness. He sees my other dog Harry pee like a boy.....
And both of them lick their paws constantly. They also lick the carpet constantly. I guess I never thought it was that weird. Gross, but not abnormal. If it is, I'm in big trouble.
yeah, I'd be less concerned about the peeing part. my in-laws have a now four year old labradoodle male who only learnt to lift his leg to pee a few months ago when they got a new puppy. Some dogs are just like that.
I forgot to add to this.
My dog had this time period of about 3 years, after he learned the leg lifting deal, where he would go up to something to pee, and then lift the wrong leg. I always thought it was funny. (he still does it sometimes.)
Did he have the problem before you changed his diet? Look at the difference in ingredients besides meat if it was different. Corn, soy, and wheat are common dog allergies.
yes he had the problem before i changed his diet... i will have to check out the ingredients in Iams
You can try switching your flea meds to Advantage Multi or Revolution (different brand), which also protects against mites.
If you go to the vet, they'll most likely do a skin scraping to diagnose mites or ringworm. Not a huge procedure.
Sometimes dogs get into the habit of licking their paws (previous injury/bug bite/whatever), and continually lick them, making the situation worse. It's sort of like mosquito bites - the more you scratch the more it itches. This can actually get so bad with dogs that they wind up with an interdigital cyst.