Diarrhea from lack of treats?
On Saturday we went to the vet for our annual checkup and I discovered that Wendel tipped the scales at 96lbs  . So needless to say, that day we went on a diet. This means his dog food (taste of the wild) a cup and a half in the am and the same in the pm.Wendel always is ready to eat... even after he eats! He is a chronic counter/garbage hound, so I have been diligent with keeping items away from him. I came home at lunch today, when I opened the door Asterisk was in a submissive pose and the smell hit me like a ton of bricks. Asterisk is always submissive when Wendel has accidents, gets in the garbage, in general, she feels bad when she knows something happened that shouldn't. I put Wendel in the back, cleaned the basement and front room as best I could in ten minutes and then scrubbed Wendel's rear. We always seem to fight with loose stool, but this seems like absolute water. The only change was removing the treats. The only other thing I can think of is that when I bought our food from the feed store, I had to get a bag of Taste of the Wild's duck instead of bison because they were out... Does anyone have ideas of what I can do to battle this? I was thinking of putting him on a sensitive formula Taste of the Wild, to help with this on and again, off again diarrhea. |
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| I personally don't think "taking away" extras would cause anything. If anything, I think it's beneficial!! The change in flavor/variety that you got ALWAYS gives my dogs diarrhea. ...so that would be the cause of it ...if it were my dogs!! Poor thing, hope this goes away fast!!! |
| It crossed my mind that it may be the switch from bison to duck too. Unfortunately, there wasn't much time to transition them. My feed store that ALWAYS has bags of my dog food sold 12 bags an hour before I went there to one family! Geez, they must have a LOT of dogs! Wendel will be excited to get hamburger and rice tonight (there goes our diet for a few days  ) |
| As far as the gas goes- I have a REALLY stinky farter too- We discovered these treats that have a little bit of charcoal an mint in them: http://www.darford.com/products.php?pl=1&pr=6 They're made for bad breath, but the vet recommended them for gas too- I guess they help neutralize the gut so less gas is produced. You give them separate from meals, because charcoal can block the absorption of nutrients. They really help!! Tonka has to have one every night before bed or we get gasses out have have to change rooms in the middle of the night. |
| A magic, beano-type dog treat?! Sign me up! How many do you give? If it will help with his gas, but we can still be on our diet, I'll definitely get them! |
I searched their site - no retailers in all of MN!  But there are in WI, so I may need to incorporate this into our trip across WI in August....gotta love road trip shopping....  Also - I haven't read the TOW dog food labels in awhile, but 3 cups sounds like quite a bit for that food. Especially if you are trying to have Wendel lose weight.  |
| Can you order from the site? Looks like there are no local retailers here either... I wonder if a charcoal biscuit would work the same? Anybody have any idea? |
| We normally do around two cups of dog food for each of the girls - a cup in the morning and one at night. And they split a banana as a bedtime snack. We cut back on Riley's food a bit, for a slow steady weight loss, but added green beans as a filler. Green beans are very low calorie. Bailey pouted until we added a few to her food too. The girls are very sensitive to changes in their diet - we had to slowly add in the green beans to prevent problems. We pick up a bag of dog food about a week before we think they will need it, just to be safe. |
* Capt. Obvious Danger wrote: A magic, beano-type dog treat?! Sign me up! How many do you give? Tonka started with just 1/2 a biscuit to see if that was enough, it seems to be for the day time, but at night he gets a whole one. (He's 130lbs) I think smaller dogs get less, like maybe just 1/2 so they don't get too much charcoal. * Capt. Obvious Danger wrote: I wonder if a charcoal biscuit would work the same? Anybody have any idea? I think the active ingredient is the charcoal, "activated charcoal??" if I remember correctly... * Capt. Obvious Danger wrote: Can you order from the site? Looks like there are no local retailers here either... I'm not sure, but I get mine from a local independent pet store called furever pets. ( http://www.fureverpets.com ) I would imagine someplace like that would let your order over the phone and ship them to you. |
I'm plunking my money on change of food not lack of treats.  Tiggy only gets 2 cups of food a day plus a few treat biscuits. Let us know how you go with the charcoal biscuits, I might get some for my dalmo. |
| I'd say it was probably the change too, however, we've had two incidents with "natural" foods, and I don't know if that would apply to your type, so I'm just throwing it out there. Two different "natural" (i.e. easily identifiable ingredients listed, and advertised as preservative free) have actually spoiled on us in the time that it took to finish a large bag. Both times the dogs (two different ones) were so sick they required medical intervention (metronidazol for both, one also ended up so dehydrated he needed i v fluids). My husband and I have both gotten really sick (medically diagnosed as food poisoning with fever, body aches, vomiting, etc, not just your typical "I ate something bad and my tummy's upset") from foods that are "natural and preservative free" (one was honey and the other jam) and I've just come to believe that, unless you personally make it yourself, preservative free is NOT all it's cracked up to be. We continue to buy a good quality dog food, but I avoid anything that claims to be completely without preservatives, as I think it's a ticking time bomb. I know the "organic" movement will take a hit out on me for that comment, but I'm just putting it out there. So while in your case it probably was the change of ingredient, I'd also take a good look at the food inside the bag. It may have been close to its expiry time (whether it's marked that way or not) and may well be spoiled...or it may have gotten moist and be spoiled from that. Just a thought... |
You know... I never thought of that, Tracie. I'll have to check the bag when I get home. I guess I should pay more attention to see if there are any preserving agents in the brand, I guess it never occurred to me to check that.  |
* Capt. Obvious Danger wrote: You know... I never thought of that, Tracie. I'll have to check the bag when I get home. I guess I should pay more attention to see if there are any preserving agents in the brand, I guess it never occurred to me to check that. Um, if his daughter isn't having any problems I think you can assume the food is probably fine in and of itself, but too much protein/too rich for him? I mean, if I had a dog who constantly had gas I'd be considering maybe I needed to be feeding something else anyway. Don't get me wrong - I've fed it and love it. But not all food works equally well for all dogs. So perhaps something to consider? And, yeah, lardbutt probably doesn't need 1 1/2 cups x twice a day. How about 1 cup x 2 times a day and then throw about a cup of unsalted green beans in there to make him less likely to try to raid the garbage if that's possible?  If his output was that liquid I'd probably have him on rice and hamburger till that settled. Throw in a dab of yogurt? Also a good time to consider if you may want to transition him onto something less fancy in the food department? Frankly, some of the cheaper foods have more fiber bulk and that may just work better for him, though I don't know what I'd try him on. Alternately just feeding him less of the TOW might help. My sense is that gas/loose stools can be a sign of caloric overload (I base this on when my dogs break into the food and throw down several pounds each, so maybe that's not a fair comparison ). And, in any event, HE'LL probably try to tell you that the whole caloric overload theory is a load of bunk and that you are STARVING him to death Kristine |
Mad Dog wrote: And, in any event, HE'LL probably try to tell you that the whole caloric overload theory is a load of bunk and that you are STARVING him to death Kristine Isn't THAT the truth!! Wendel is so DIFFERENT than Asterisk. She will only eat when she's hungry. Some days, she'll wait all day and only eats right before bed time. Wendel is ALWAYS hungry. I don't think he's ever been disinterested in food. I have a feeling, even if we peel some pounds off of him, he's always going to be a bit of a chunk. One problem is... if I give him green beans, Asterisk will pitch a fit because he got something she didn't (even if she doesn't like it). I'll try the green beans, hopefully that will help the weight loss and his constant food craving. It also doesn't help that he is a rather lazy boy. When we went to the dog park, he ran for two minutes then made his rounds to meet every person in the park. Once that was done, he plopped down in the shade of the tree and was ready for a nap. |
| Also roll over the two bags and compare ingredients beyond the bison vs duck of course. You may find some other product differences you want to put on your anti-gas campaign once this current problem is overcome. For our gas bag #1 it was anything soy related. For gas bag #2 it was corn product. It's been awhile since we've been blessed with a stink butt.......except when Jack tries something new......cucumbers didn't agree with him the other day. If rice and GB doesn't work, rice or beef might be a problem. Try barley for the grain and turkey for the meat. Remember we trimmed Glacier from 150+ down to 88 thru the green bean diet. (thyroid meds took off the last 10 lbs) Canned, no salt added. She'd get 1/2 can and 3/4 cup kibble 2x a day. Of course she thought she was starving......a carrot stick was her treat. She survived nicely. Today she gets her regular kibble and real dog treats and maintains her weight......we have the 5 lbs limit.......add 5 lbs and she gets cut back for awhile. |
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