Sniffing Where The Sun Don't Shine

[Guest mariah]

Oh, boy. I was just curious to know others' opinions on this. Don't laugh. I've never really cared or thought about this in the past, because it's just what dogs do. And not only that, but to them, it's considered a polite greeting! So why would you want to discourage it? However, Gussie is an avowed crotch-sniffer. With everyone she meets. Sometimes they do that thing where they stick out her hand to her (I know), and she'll give them a look like "What?" and then stick her face right in their nether regions. Some people get weird about it! Do you guys typically discourage this behavior in your dogs or just suffer through the awkwardness when someone wants to make it weird?

[Guest thecoyotesgrin]

Most of my dogs were too small to do anything to peoples nethers.... but my lab was and he did it religiously. People who took it weird were told "he shook your hand. welcome home."

[Guest mariah]

Most of my dogs were too small to do anything to peoples nethers.... but my lab was and he did it religiously. People who took it weird were told "he shook your hand. welcome home."

 

Whenever my parents' sam mix does it to visitors, my mother tersely informs them, "He's. Just. Gathering. Information."

[Guest thecoyotesgrin]

i'd just tell them theyre lucky hes not mouthy like some dogs....

 

or "look, what could he possibly say? i mean, hes a dog, he doesnt talk much..."

[Feisty49]

I discourage it. ::shrug:: Yah, it's what dogs do, but they also want to pull on the leash, cruise the counter tops and get in the garbage.

[Guest sheila]

If someone appeared uncomfortable with it I suppose I would take my dog by the collar and make them stop. I admit it sort of skeeves me out when a dog does it to me and I will swat at the dogs muzzle and make them back off.

[GeorgeofNE]

I don't permit it--although George is not a crotch sniffer.

[Sambuca]

I think it's inappropriate. It's equivalent to jumping on someone to me. I don't just allow people to do that to me.

I don't allow people to pet my dog when hes uncomfortable, why would I let the dog do something that makes the person uncomfortable.

[Guest mariah]

I neglected to mention, I call her away when she does it. But it doesn't prevent her from doing it in the first place, obviously. I just don't see how it's something that can be trained out of them, you know, by teaching them an incompatible behavior. Asking her to sit or lie down to greet people would merely postpone the sniffing, say if we had people over to the apartment or she was meeting someone in the office.

[sarabz]

I've never had to correct a dog for doing it - until I realized that Bella's nose is almost always at exactly the right height and I haven't had such a tall dog before I typically keep her on a short enough leash when she's that close to people so that she can't do it. I do discourage her when she starts, although it can be a little hard in a crowded elevator

[Guest MyCody]

I told this story when it happened about 6 or 7 years ago, hope you don't mind a repeat. My son was president of our local Little League and on opening day they always had a blessing as part of the ceremonies and a local priest would do the honors. We had a new, young man who decided to come informally dressed in khakis which was fine. Cody, our very big white guy was standing with us near the gate to enter the field and Father came by, stopped right next to Cody who did what he did to everyone, sniffed his crotch, I pullded him back of course but then Father reached the pitchers mound, turned to face the crowd and had a very noticeable wet crotch. Don't know if Cody heard about that when he crossed the Rainbow Bridge almost three years ago but someone would approach him at every game, pat him on the head and chuckle over it.

 

Yes, it's their thing and they don't care who's crotch it is.

Edited March 16, 2012 by MyCody

[christinepi]

I know my response won't help anyone. But I just wanted to mention that Tracker does this every now and then from behind to me (and only to me), and if at all, only in the morning before his first walk. That's always rather "shocking", because it's unexpected and I don't see it coming, but it cracks me up. Those needle noses are made for it. He rarely does frontal crotch surfing to strangers, so it's not really an issue in our house. Might a firm "ah ah" not help?

Edited March 16, 2012 by christinepi

[Guest sheila]

I know my response won't help anyone. But I just wanted to mention that Tracker does this every now and then from behind to me (and only to me), and if at all, only in the morning before his first walk. That's always rather "shocking", because it's unexpected and I don't see it coming, but it cracks me up. Those needle noses are made for it. He rarely does frontal crotch surfing to strangers, so it's not really an issue in our house. Might a firm "ah ah" not help?

 

Yeah.....it's the reason I block my dogs out when I do yard work. Every time I bend over to do ANYTHING there is a nose on my butt! Fricking Fracking Dawgs........

[jetcitywoman]

I'm lucky that mine are pretty "polite" about it. When they sniff someone it's usually very brief and not - ahem - probing. When I'm on my time of the month, they sniff me slightly longer. When I first got them I wondered what in heck they thought about that - sometimes mommy smells like blood ohmygod is she injured?! They seem used to it now, though, like "oh, she's bleeding again. Hey what's over there?" They're just as nice with strangers, so I rarely have to pull them away from people.

 

However, if you want to know what nervous is... DH and I sometimes host naturist dinner parties and when we scheduled the first one after getting Capri we weren't sure how it would go. Turns out she was (and still is and so is Ajax) Perfect Angels! I don't know how they know, but they just don't poke their noses into people's naked bottoms. (We still do watch them very closely, of course.)

[Batmom]

Not allowed here. As someone else above noted, dogs have all manner of normal behavior that we discourage in polite company .

[Guest mariah]

It wasn't clear from my initial post, but I guess what I'm wondering is should I be expected to actively train her not to do this? As opposed to just redirecting her when she does? And how would I go about doing that, if she mainly does this with people she's meeting for the first time? I don't know why, but I'm just having a very hard time envisioning how that would work.

[Guest FastDogsOwnMe]

Never thought about it... but I don't have much company over, and at the park, my dogs don't care about people. They want to play or patrol the fence line for things to pee on.

[Guest lfreem2]

Most of my dogs were too small to do anything to peoples nethers.... but my lab was and he did it religiously. People who took it weird were told "he shook your hand. welcome home."

 

Whenever my parents' sam mix does it to visitors, my mother tersely informs them, "He's. Just. Gathering. Information."

 

That is HYSTERICAL!

[christinepi]

It wasn't clear from my initial post, but I guess what I'm wondering is should I be expected to actively train her not to do this? As opposed to just redirecting her when she does? And how would I go about doing that, if she mainly does this with people she's meeting for the first time? I don't know why, but I'm just having a very hard time envisioning how that would work.

 

The only thing I can think of is teaching her to keep her attention so much on you when asked, that as soon as you even just THINK about telling her "no" when she's just THINKING about sticking her nose where it shouldn't go, she'll back off. And then it would probably help to work with (prepared) visitors over and over (sort of like with jumping up).

[Gryffenne]

I know my response won't help anyone. But I just wanted to mention that Tracker does this every now and then from behind to me (and only to me), and if at all, only in the morning before his first walk. That's always rather "shocking", because it's unexpected and I don't see it coming, but it cracks me up. Those needle noses are made for it. He rarely does frontal crotch surfing to strangers, so it's not really an issue in our house. Might a firm "ah ah" not help?

 

Yeah.....it's the reason I block my dogs out when I do yard work. Every time I bend over to do ANYTHING there is a nose on my butt! Fricking Fracking Dawgs........

Sammi doesn't wanna sniff nether regions, but she has goosed me, and my roommate, numerous times. My roommate has now adopted my style of if I have to stop in a doorway, I turn my body since one of the "hairy hemorrhoids" (or as Sammi has been dubbed, The Assteroid) is usually following at close range.

[Sighthounds4me]

I don't allow it. When my dogs meet new people and begin to sniff crotches, I pop the lead, say "No Sniff!" and redirect them.

[Guest poofmagk]

I know my response won't help anyone. But I just wanted to mention that Tracker does this every now and then from behind to me (and only to me), and if at all, only in the morning before his first walk. That's always rather "shocking", because it's unexpected and I don't see it coming, but it cracks me up. Those needle noses are made for it. He rarely does frontal crotch surfing to strangers, so it's not really an issue in our house. Might a firm "ah ah" not help?

 

Yeah.....it's the reason I block my dogs out when I do yard work. Every time I bend over to do ANYTHING there is a nose on my butt! Fricking Fracking Dawgs........

Sammi doesn't wanna sniff nether regions, but she has goosed me, and my roommate, numerous times. My roommate has now adopted my style of if I have to stop in a doorway, I turn my body since one of the "hairy hemorrhoids" (or as Sammi has been dubbed, The Assteroid) is usually following at close range.

 

Oliver is all about "goosing" those he loves, I can't help but laugh at his persistence, that is if I'm not in my work clothes.

[Guest Wasserbuffel]

I usually tell Jayne to leave it and pull her back. She's not a dedicated sniffer though. She does sneak up and goose us on occasion. DH calls it her Nosepedo.

 

There is one hound at playgroup who, while he isn't a sniffer, does have a crotch fetish. He comes from behind to park himself between someone's legs for petting ease. It's startling but funny. At first it feels like a hound trying to rub their muzzle off on your butt, then suddenly there is a whole dog standing under you.