Female domination?

[Amber and the zoo]

Emmy's 3rd birthday party was last weekend and it ended up being giant "dog" party too. We had a lab, a german shepherd, a mastiff, a bischon, a german shorthair, and of course...Ellie. Ellie will play with ever single one of these dogs regardless of size (thankfully they have all been socialized in this behavior). She, in fact, can take down my sisters mastiff who is 10x her size (and still only 8 or 9 months) although when the mastiff, Koya, gets tired of this she just puts her foot down...literally on top of Ellie so she can't move. Anyway, on to the question: I noticed that when playing with my sisters Bichon(Angel), Angel would try and hump her. My brother in law said this was to show dominance etc. Later on that evening ELLIE started doing it! She has only done it a few times since we came home, but I wasn't sure how I should curb this behavior. When my male german shepherd tried this, we just stepped on his toes...it didn't take him long to figure out he didn't want to do that anymore (and moved on to the poor poor cat...lol)...Anyways, any suggestions? Should I just ignore this? I don't want to let her know she is the ruler of the house!!!

Amber

[mrskti]

Just tell her to knock it off, correct her with the leash a couple of times. She's trying to be the alpa is all. My girls do it on occassion, i tell them to knock it off, and they do.

[Eliz222]

My two do this on occasion too. The first time Scout did it was when we first brought Finch home. I finally called the breeder because I didn't know what the heck Scout was doing and why. She said not to bother them, and that Scout was just showing Finch that she was the BOSS....of course Finch was only 8 weeks old...lol! This behavior has not been frequent or bothersome, so I just let them do it and they stop within a min or so.

[meandzax]

Oh my gosh, Amy!! You make me laugh!! And poor kitty. My cats have been victims as well. I think the behavior is normal. And sternly telling Ellie to stop is likely to work. I have learned that Cairns seem to get their feelings hurt pretty easily. At least Maisy does. She takes it so personal when scolded. Pouts too. Can't hardly get mad at her because when I scold her for a shredding incident, she smiles at me. She literally bears all of her teeth and curls one corner of her lip. Then I laugh at her and we move on. Silly girl. To know a Cairn is to really, really love a Cairn. I am still a bit concerned about kitty. LOL.

[meandzax]

I forgot to mention that it could be worse. My mom had a Shnauzer mixed breed (likely the result of a very irresponsible, horrible breeder) that would "get busy" with my step fathers leg every single time the telephone rang. It was hysterical. I used to call and hang up just to be naughty.

[Barney's Mom]

I wouldn't worry about her doing it to other dogs, but definitely put a stop to it with you or other people because it is a show of dominance. Barney did this to me last week and I threw him off me, growled a very loud NO and ignored him. He was not a happy puppy.

Kind of funny, we were at the dog park and a Westie came in the small dog run with us. They proceeded to back and forth hump each other for about 20 minutes, then it was like they had decided who was boss and went off to play! They got the issue settled and moved on!