Hi

We're from Derbyshire and we are Mum & Dad (I'm Mum), 2 girls (3 and 6), 2 cats (an oldie and a kitty) and 2 dogs.

My boys are the main reason for being here.

We have Oggi, a lab x collie who is 4 in June and Tamba, a dane x lab who was 3 in Feb. We were one, big happy family until last year when we decided to put a lawn on part of the garden and keep it secure and clean for the children to play on. It was previously all paved and horrid in summer but the dogs had free use of it. Now, the dogs still have the free use of 3/4 of the garden but Oggi has decided that he won't wee on pavers anymore and will hold hs wee for as ong as he can, even on long walks. This means he will now urinate overnight in the house and sometimes soil. Oggi has even been on 1 1/2 hours walks and not done a wee, even when left to roam around a grassy area.

There have been no major changes in our lifestyle, the vet has found no physical problems but this is really challenging our relationship with Oggi. He is great with our children, with Tamba and with the cats, walks beautifully to heel off his lead, is very toy-orientated so is obedient to a fault when out on walks (which we all do as a family on a weekend) and we can't understand why this is happening.

I feel that this is some sort of either pack-leader issue as he has only just started cocking his leg (he was neutered at an early age as was Tamba) or attention seeking but we are at a loss as to how to find out waht he needs and how to make it better for all of us. Our local dog-training school (where we used to do agility) have rather old-fashioned methods of training, including keeping the dogs hungry to respond better to treat training, using choke chains and water pistols which we weren't happy with.

Any suggestions?? I would be very grateful....

Thanks