The 'Everything' Discussion Forum

Our dog Praga loves to chase her tail. She can do this for hours on end. Circle, circle, circle, circle, chomp, yelp! She dosen't seem to realize her tail is attached until after she bites it. This is really pretty cute, but is it normal? She is a shitzu mix. She does not have fleas.

We used to have a border collie who would chase her tail. She bit herself a few times too. But it only happened when other people were around. She liked the attention. So I think it's fairly normal.

Tail chasing can be either for fun, if it is brief and uncommon. If you dog chases its tail frequently and it is hard to interrupt the behavior, it is a symptom of canine obsessive-compulsive disorder developing. Some dogs with this constantly lick their legs, some chase shadows, some compulsively chase their tails., etc.

Although this behavior is fun to watch at first, do not encourage it under any circumstance! I hate to be alarmist over what many people consider normal, but the research and my own experience says otherwise.
For example, this dog has ocd in spades and needs medication and physical activity and someone to interrupt, not encourage the behavior. It makes me sick to watch it and know the owners are making the dog worse.