Expert: Jana Connell RVT, CVT - 12/14/2009

Question
Hey I have an 8 month old German Shepherd mix puppy. Female, 50+ pounds, spayed, up to date on all shots. She eats purina large breed puppy food (2 cups twice a day). She is outside (on a tie out) during the day and crated inside at night. She's gets a 20-40 min walk a day and 30-60 min play at the park off leash daily (no other dogs, it's just a big fenced in area on the far side of our property, we use it as our own personal dog park).

Sunday morning she wasn't as excited about eating as normal, and it was about 10 seconds before she finally started eating (she's usually eats as soon as it hits the ground. Her stools were normal enough, maybe a tad looser. That night it was about the same 10-20 seconds before she ate, stools were looser than normal. And this morning I had to add some beef broth to her food before she decided to eat it. She ate it all. Stools were more diarrhea with a few solid bits (sorry don't mean to be so graphic).

I love her to death but as it's the Christmas season we of course are a bit tight on money. If it continues to get worse we'll take her in, but as you can imagine we'd like to avoid it.

So my question I guess is what do you think we should do? The weather has changed a bit dramatically here, but she doesn't seem to care. She's still just as active as before. No blood in the stools, no other signs of anything really.

Someone said to withhold her food for 24 hours and then put her on a bland rice/chicken diet for a a few days? All her toys are accounted for and she's not one for swallowing non-food objects anyway. Her back molars (or whatever they are called) are coming in now I believe (she's chewing her toys on the back teeth a lot now). This morning she was also eatig grass which she doesn't normally do. She doesn't free feed either, she has scheduled meals. She still eats her treats and peanut butter like normal (she's clicker trained, so treats are something she loves, but even then she used to eat her dinner like crazy too).

So basically since I'm rambling I'll recap. Loose stools, still eating but not really wanting to, still active and no other signs. Oh and a worried puppy parent, haha. :)
any ideas, help, or info would be greatly loved!  

Answer
Well the problem is most likely in the garbage she is eating. By that I mean the Purina Large breed food.

Here's the deal. Purina, Iams, Nutro, etc, don't use a fixed formulation when they make their food. They use an 'open' formulation. What that means, is that every time there is something on sale cheap on the docks, they buy it.

So consequently, every batch of food they make is different- not consistent. Thus when you feed this food from bag to bag, you are essentially introducing a new food each time, which upsets a dogs stomach and digestive system and causes diarrhea.

That is the simple answer. The cure for that I will get to in a moment.

The more complicated answer is that she could be developing one of many issues, such as:

Protein-losing enterophathy, malabsorbtion disease,Lymphoplasmacytic enteritis, colitis, Crohn's disease, lack of digestive enzymes or is just having a case of digestive upsets from inflammation of the intestines from any of the above.

Since she is healthy in every other way, let's concentrate on the food issue.

Fasting her for 24 hours with limited water is a good idea, and it can be followed by a boiled chicken/white rice combo for a couple of days.

Then if you want to find out if it's the food feed her again with the Purina.
Otherwise, put her on a diet that is formulated on a fixed formula and doesn't change from batch to batch.

The only food on the market now that is that way is Hill's brand Science Diet. Hill's are the first food company that came out with a large breed line after doing a multi-year study on the effects of diet, calcium and phosphorus on the growth and joints of large breed puppies in the early 90s. They put their 50 years of veterinary research behind the food and created the first large breed puppy growth and then later their adult large breed line.

This food has optimal nutrition for a healthy, strong puppy with a shiny coat and strong bones. You will not believe the difference in your dog after feeding it for three weeks.

I put my daughter's cat back on the Sensitive Skin formula after she had been on the senior for about two years and her coat is so soft again that I can't stop petting her.

So I would do the fast, and in the mean time get her a bag of Large Breed Puppy Growth by Science Diet. You will feed less in the long run as this food requires less to meet the dogs energy needs.

Give it a try and if she doesn't benefit from it it's backed by a 100% money back guarantee.  Please let me know how she does.