Hi,
Im writting on here because I am open to anything right now. I have a 4 month old Husky puppywho cannot go to the bathroom solid. Since we got him he has been soft and often has Diarrhea. I have brought him to the vet 4 times and he is perfectly happy and healty except for this. He has all of his shots, has had 4 clear fecil tests done, i have tried changing his food in case he had food allergies and even tried the vets Gastro for sensitive stomachs. Nothing has worked.
Right now I am trying plain white rice with his food to help absorb but it is not doing anything. He is currently on Nutrience Puppy.
Like i said he is healthy in ever other way, happy, energetic and very playfull just like he should be.I just feel very bad that he has this problem... im not sure if maybe he just has a very sensitive stomach or not. But i know with these bathroom issues he is not absorbing all of the nutrients that a growing puppy needs.

Please help... I am open to any suggestions at this point.

Thank you in advance

Originally Posted by Dryden12

Hi,
Im writting on here because I am open to anything right now. I have a 4 month old Husky puppywho cannot go to the bathroom solid. Since we got him he has been soft and often has Diarrhea. I have brought him to the vet 4 times and he is perfectly happy and healty except for this. He has all of his shots, has had 4 clear fecil tests done, i have tried changing his food in case he had food allergies and even tried the vets Gastro for sensitive stomachs. Nothing has worked.
Right now I am trying plain white rice with his food to help absorb but it is not doing anything. He is currently on Nutrience Puppy.
Like i said he is healthy in ever other way, happy, energetic and very playfull just like he should be.I just feel very bad that he has this problem... im not sure if maybe he just has a very sensitive stomach or not. But i know with these bathroom issues he is not absorbing all of the nutrients that a growing puppy needs.

Please help... I am open to any suggestions at this point.

Thank you in advance

Has your vet done any bloodwork on this dog or just fecal exams? I would be asking my vet about testing for SIBO (small intestinal bacteria overgrowth) or other malabsorption problems. Has the dog ever been placed on an antibiotic such as tylosin or flagyl?

First I would get this dog on a premium grain free diet...there are many on the market nowadays. I had a Chinese Crested with IBS and the only food I could feed him was Natural Balance Sweet Potato/Fish formula. BUt as I said, there are a lot of really good grain free choices now (there wasn't back then).

I would also start adding some good fiber to his diet, pure pumpkin is great and dogs love it - just a tablespoon or so as too much causes the reverse effect of what you are trying to accomplish. All my dogs get a teaspoon of pure pumpkin daily. I would also consider adding a good probiotic given daily (Jarrow's makes a great one). Go slow with the probiotic, and build up to the daily allotted dosage. You can also buy a product at your local health food store called apple pectin (in a pill formula) which is a fermentable fiber. I would also be supplementing this dog with a good quality multi-B vitamin (again, pick one up at a local health food store - you'll pay more but there's not all the added junk fillers to cause further digestive upset).

Hope this helps some

[reeskujo]

The first thing you need to do is have the vet do some blood work an also a fecal exam....Huskies are known to have this problem.

I feed my Husky a holistic food which with the exception of brown rice has no grain or preservatives and she does great on it...

Is he gaining weight properly?....Is he dehydrated?You can check for dehydration by pulling up on the skin between the shoulder blades...It should go right back into place....If it doesn't or it takes a while to do so your puppy may be dehydrated...

Please get your pup to vet A.S.A.P...If you have taken him did the vet do any blood work or a fecal?...How much does your puppy weigh?

Thank you both for your reply. He is at the vet and we were informed (even though he was there two weeks ago) that the vet has seen a bacteria latley in puppies that is new. He has treated two puppies with very similar symptons as our Dryden, and both have recovered fine. My only issue is they were vomitting, sad, inactive and not gaining weight. We're our guy is the perfect helthy puppy other then this, he is growing proportionatly, he is 30.5 pound, 4 months old and is a tall boy. (he is not chunky, just long)

So tonight is going to be a very long night for us, he is having blood work done, X-rays, fecal and the vet is giving him anti-biotics. Whatever it is it is not contagious as I have two other dogs who are perfectly healthy.

I will update with the reults, and if they are clear I may come back to the changing the food once more.

Thank you again.

Originally Posted by reeskujo

T

I feed my Husky a holistic food which with the exception of brown rice has no grain or preservatives and she does great on it...

Holistic means pertaining to Holism. Holism is the philosophy that the whole is greater than the sum of its parts. How can a food be Holistic?

[reeskujo]

Originally Posted by vetgroomer

Holistic means pertaining to Holism. Holism is the philosophy that the whole is greater than the sum of its parts. How can a food be Holistic?

A dog food is considered holistic when it uses only human grade food,no preservatives ans no grains.

White rice is not exactly the best thing-- brown rice is best, if you want to feed rice. (Brown rice is better for humans, too, over white). I'm glad to hear the vet is looking for more clues, though. Hoping for a good prognosis!

[lil mutt]

any update to your dog's health?

We have Dryden home with us, and he is doing well. The vet checked everything and thankfully it was not the break out of bacteria the vet thought. Although Dryden has been dewormed and had prevention, the vet said he found one round worm egg in his fecile sample... no worms or other eggs. He said he may have been from the dog park. So Dryden is on a very strong de-wormer.

Also we found that from his X-Ray he has a lot of gas in his tummy... as to why we're not sure as he has never been givien human food, or anything then his dog food. The vet put him back on Gastro and today we got a solid .. odd how owners can get so excited over poop lol.

Until he is done his medication we're keeping him away from the dog park. Other then this the vet said he is perfectly healthy... he's gaining weight, active and happy.

Next mission is to find other foods along with the Gastro that will keep gas from building up in his tummy. I read an elevated dish may help, so I bought one... and im looking into foods.

Thank you everyone

That's great news-- glad to hear everything's going to be okay. : )

Originally Posted by reeskujo

A dog food is considered holistic when it uses only human grade food,no preservatives ans no grains.

By whom? Practicing Holists? Or people who are trying to convince you to buy the food?

That's an inappropriate use of the term "holistic". Even in healing/medicine, holistic refers to treating the patient as a whole system; body, mind, emotional and spiritual. A holistic healer would use the term "psychosomatic", meaning treating psyche (mind, spirit, and emotions) as well as soma (physical body) to describe how one cares for an animal holistically.

For some strange reason, there are people who feel it's OK to attach the term holistic to many things that are not. Your food may be high quality, human grade, and completely natural. But unless you're sitting down with Phydough and discussing his feelings while he eats, it's not holistic.

There's a lot more to things holistic than people realize. And people who study Holism, and embrace the concept, don't particularly care for how some people, who are not Holists, use the term.

Did you know there can be holistic attorneys, holistic office managers, holistic business owners? Even holistic politicians. Societies can be holistic, ecologies can be holistic, but, being a Holist, I don't see how food can be holistic.

[CorkyMax]

I also give my dogs pumpkin. In fact I even grew some in my garden just for them---but mainly for the seeds---which I put on a paper towel on a cookie sheet to dry out w/no heat---then grind them (coffee grinder) and store in an empty vitamin bottle,etc--some in refrigerator,rest in freezer---suppose to be good to help get rid of worms--takes awhile and not sure how much at the moment to give at at a time--may be a lot of V.A in this. Also give my dogs plain yogurt w/live active cultures w/acidophius and bifidus every day-about 2 to 3 tbsp. every morning. It gets mixed in w/their cottage cheese or oatmeal--whatever I am feeding at the time. My dogs weigh 25-30 lbs. I also prefer the fat free yogurt. I also don't give many grains like I used to--try to keep it at just oatmeal (I feed mostly raw food) At one time (6-7 yrs. ago) I found out (when I was cooking the meat) one of my dogs got too much fat and ended up w/pancreatitis which can be life threatening very quickly. If I can recall he had to be "rehydrated"--is that the word?--anyway intravenously given and the vet told me to give him very small amounts of cooked rinsed ground beef and rice--like only a couple Tbsps at a meal for acouple days and gradually increase amount---Wish I could remember better but it's been a few yrs!

[reeskujo]

Originally Posted by vetgroomer

By whom? Practicing Holists? Or people who are trying to convince you to buy the food?

That's an inappropriate use of the term "holistic". Even in healing/medicine, holistic refers to treating the patient as a whole system; body, mind, emotional and spiritual. A holistic healer would use the term "psychosomatic", meaning treating psyche (mind, spirit, and emotions) as well as soma (physical body) to describe how one cares for an animal holistically.

For some strange reason, there are people who feel it's OK to attach the term holistic to many things that are not. Your food may be high quality, human grade, and completely natural. But unless you're sitting down with Phydough and discussing his feelings while he eats, it's not holistic.

There's a lot more to things holistic than people realize. And people who study Holism, and embrace the concept, don't particularly care for how some people, who are not Holists, use the term.

Did you know there can be holistic attorneys, holistic office managers, holistic business owners? Even holistic politicians. Societies can be holistic, ecologies can be holistic, but, being a Holist, I don't see how food can be holistic.

Thanks for the info....That does make sense.