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Hello,
We have a 5 month old boxer puppy and his poos are very SOFT. Anyone have any suggestions for helping this? We feed him Simply Nourish dry food and usually Nutrish wet food, but also sometimes those refrigerated foods. I had been mixing in cottage cheese or egg or chicken too. I am wondering if possibly it was the dairy? I stopped that over the weekend so we'll see. I also used to give him cheese cubes. Or maybe I am giving him too much PB - he usually gets a PB snack every night while we eat dinner (PB slathered on a Kong). I'm stopping with the PB for now as well til we figure this out. Hoping for some thoughts!!!
I would cut out the Wet Food. I found PB & Cheese make hard stools not soft. Too Much of a good thing can be just that. Don't stop PB & using the chees as a training treat is great. Everything in Moderation is the key
Pumpkin .. works to harden soft and soften hard. Good stuff. Get a can of pure pumpkin puree (not pie filling) and add a bit to his food.
And as suggested, cheese can be the culprit. My dog loved it but he got loose if I gave him too much. Experiment to see how much yours can tolerate. Many dogs are lactose intolerant.
Thank you! I hate to take away his wet food but I will try to sub some for pumpkin. I guess I wasn't really thinking of cottage cheese as "cheese" (though rationally of course I know it is) so we will continue cutting that and try the pumpkin! I had been giving him large scoops of cottage cheese day and evening on top of his dry food!
It could also be something your puppy picked up while you weren't looking. It happens a lot especially for pups.
In the meantime, no cheese or canned food. Dry kibble mixed with Fiber such as veggies and sweet potato works better than pumpkin, at least for me. No treats until the poop gets better. If the poop gets worse, the vet can prescribe this really good antiflammatory/anti bacterial/ anti guardia med that works almost immediately.
Just a spoonful of pumpkin, no scoops. There are lots of things that are good for your puppy that you can enhance his food with, green beans, sweet potatoes or some chicken.
I doubt if you need to add anything. Just take one thing at a time away until the problem is fixed. I too would start with the canned food.
My dog eats only a dry food he loves, with very small amounts of leftover meat sometimes. The other day we gave him a nice meaty bone and it really messed up his stool. Like someone said, too much of a good thing. He loves frozen plain yogurt, but this does not affect his digestion negatively at all.
In my opinion, we humans show love through fixing "gourmet" doggie meals, but it is not necessarily the best thing for them. I think a balanced, high quality dog food is.
To start I would cut back to only kibble until the poo is firm. 3 days or so, up to a week. If the poo is still not firm you might want to go to the vet with a stool sample (in case it is giardia, or parasites). Then, if that is clear you might want to start with a new food. The reason for that is it might be the kibble, or some ingredient in the kibble.
If you remove one thing at a time, or replace this, or that you may be wasting time.
The theory of eliminating starts at the basic point. If poo is good on "just" kibble, I would add back everything one at a time. Give 3 days between introducing each item.
You also might have better luck added a tablespoon (or less) of plain full fat yogurt instead of cottage cheese (helps with good gut bacteria), that is approximately the amount of pumpkin to add as well.
I would slowly reintroduce the canned too (it may depend on those ingredients as well).
I agree 100% with adding meat, or a few other healthy items, but only after you know what works for your dog. I feed raw, so I believe in feeding not just kibble
One of my dogs has a hard time with anything extra introduced, sometimes just more than 6 treats could give him the runs. So, i have always slowly added things, and I am always careful not to give too much of one "new" thing at a time. He is 5 now, and we don't have issues anymore (though I am aware it could still happen). However, if you don't pay attention, it can get worse, with further sensitivities.
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