Question:
We adopted a (then) 6-month-old Bernese mountain dog while serving with the U.S. Air Force in Germany. Within months of his arrival in our family, he began eating our golden retriever's feces and has continued doing so for the past four years. We have tried everything we can think of to stop this behavior:
- Picking up the feces to prevent him from getting it, hoping he would forget this behavior.
- Giving our retriever pills that would make her feces unpalatable to the Bernese.
- Using an electric collar to send electrical signals to the Bernese when he went to eat the feces.
- Sprinkling the feces with hot cayenne pepper.
None of these methods seem to have any effect. The Bernese is a dominant male who was neutered at eight months, yet he continues to practice the habit, much to the disgust of our family and friends. Do you have any explanation as to why he does this and can we stop it?
K. & B.P., Woodbridge, Va Feb 27, 2011
Answer:
Dogs engage in coprophagia for a host of reasons, from cleaning up (as a parent dog would do attending to pups) to trying to compensate for a nutritional deficiency. I would suspect the latter, and if you are feeding your dog one of the big-brand, TV-advertised dog foods, that may be the root of the problem.
Check my website, TwoBitDog.com/DrFox, for the brands I recommend that are not highly processed junk foods that consist mainly of carbohydrates, cheap soy protein and poor-quality, heat-denatured animal protein. Or try my homemade dog-food recipe.
Giving your dog probiotics (kefir and plain live yogurt or probiotics tablets) and supplements such as brewer's yeast and a daily pet multivitamin/multimineral may also help.
Many dogs suffer malnutrition when fed dry, junk dog foods and will eat feces to attempt to correct their dietary deficiencies. Having the dog checked for internal parasites is also advisable.
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