You may have heard the term “pee mail,” but I like to think of pee as dogs’ social media, a “dogbook,” if you will. Dogs can “tag” where they have been, “like” another dog’s pee, and learn vast amounts of personal, or I guess “dogal” information about their canine neighbors.
With a quick sniff of fresh or dried urine, your pup can tell another dog’s gender, if they are spayed or neutered, their age, health status, stress level and diet.
You may be wondering, how are dogs able to sniff out this vast amount of information? It turns out, dogs are good chemists, in addition to being good smellers.
A dog’s urine contains dissolved hormonal chemicals, known as pheromones, that provide the clues. Dogs use their 300 million olfactory receptors (compared to a human’s 6 million) to detect the information. In addition, their vomeronasal organ (an organ located above the roof of the mouth that people do not have) helps trap the scents they pick up.
Pee is not only used for identifying another dog’s profile, but also for establishing dominance. The higher up the urine is on a vertical surface, the larger and therefore more dominant the dog, it would seem.
The scent of dried urine on vertical surfaces also carries further. That’s why trees and fire hydrants are such popular “watering” spots.
It turns out dogs — just like humans — can often try to exaggerate their social status. You may have seen some smaller male dogs almost tipping over on their sides from trying to lift their leg super high to get their pee as far up a tree trunk as possible.
So, what happens after your dog reads another dog’s message? Well, in many cases, they post their own update. Meaning, they pee on top of or next to the other dog’s pee.
High-ranking male dogs will over mark, meaning they will pee on top of another dog’s pee. Female dogs, on the other hand, may pee next to another dog’s pee but not on top of it.
Research suggests females are…
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