This is one for the dog experts, but I'll happily welcome wild speculation.

Our puppy, Jessie, is just coming up to 11 months old and is having her first season. Our vet advised us to not get her spayed until after this, so we're just living through the pain of not being able to walk her off the lead.

Our other dog, Woody, was neutered when we adopted him, so he's fine around her, except...

(it gets a little gross from here, so you might want to not bother if you don't know much about dogs)

...while she's in heat Jessie cleans herself, but Woody has a go as well. It's not all the time, but sometimes she'll just be lying or standing around and he'll stick his head in her crotch and start cleaning off blood.

I can *sort* of understand, obviously there's all kind of hormonal stuff going on, what's really, really strange is that after every time Woody does this his teeth chatter, almost as if he were freezing cold. It only last 20 or 30 seconds, but for that time he stands there with his bottom jaw chattering up and down, obviously involuntarily.

What the heck is that about? Has anybody ever seen anything like this before? We've never had a dog in season before, so we really don't know if this sort of crap is normal.

Any thoughts?

Can't help with your freaky pets, but we once had a female fox terrier that used to mount a neutered male cat and give him a good virtual seeing to. Thank god dogs can't use strap-ons. (If you know different, you win the battle of who's been to the worse website)

My dog does the same when he encounters a bitch on heat. I think it's just excitement. He does still own meat and two veg though.

We once had a Breton Spaniel who used to masturbate. He was French though.

Does Woody get a woody while this is all going on?

Yes seen it before. Its a bit like the wine tasting method!

Grossssssssssssssssssss !

Dogs are gross aren't they [much as I love 'em]. I remember my mates lurcher cross who used to spin round after "laying some cable" and gobble it straight back down again.

I nearly chucked.

On a completely unrelated note, our cats both "chatter" when they see birds or if you make "shineys" go up and down the wall. I guess the dog chatter is no double natural too.

My dog does this, especially after he has licked his what-not. Sort of like Joe says; wine tasting method. Get in more 02 I suppose?

Saying this, dogs are weird; come on, they sniff and lick each others s h i t e and love it

And I thought Andrew was going to want to know how much his head weighed...

Yes, the 'chattering' is normal

I've only ever owned one male dog and he wasn't bothered, he just wanted to get in there

All the other dogs I've ever owned/do own, are females and even after licking themselves their teeth 'chatter'.

There was a thread on Hoovers once, So this is cool, Although I have no pets & cant help!