Food and its effects on poo

Lovely title I know.

So Juno has been on Natural Balance for a while now (maybe since March or April?), and she's certainly doing better on it than she was on Innova. But she still has mushy poop. It seems like every day she has at least one pile of slop. And then sometimes her poop is completely normal. It's not related to the amount she's being fed or the treats she's eating... yesterday and today she ate the same amount of food, she got no treats, and both days she had shapeless, mushy poop.

The only conclusion I can draw is that there is still something about this food that isn't sitting right with her. It's the duck & potato formula which is also grain free. The ONLY time she has had completely normal poop was when she was eating Eukanuba for a few days, and when we were given a prescription diet. I don't want to feed her either of those, but I want to know WHAT about them works for her. I thought about playing around with the fiber content but the Eukanuba was 5% and the SD was less than 2% so that's obviously not it.

I want to try switching foods but I don't even know where to begin. Grains are not the issue. Duck is not the issue because that was in the SD food as well. I don't know what other factors to try changing. Thoughts?

Try feeding a little less and see what happens.

Would that affect her weight? She's borderline TOO thin, she can't really afford to lose any weight. I'd actually prefer it if she gained a pound or two. So although I know that overfeeding can be the culprit... I'm definitely wary of decreasing how much she eats!

You can try adding a probiotic.

So just decrease the meal size and add a meal. My suspicion is that she's simply eating too much in a single sitting. Dogs have VERY short digestive tracts so I'm guessing she has to empty her bowel before water reabsorb finishes which is causing the mushy turds. Decreasing the meal size and giving that time will help with her body weight as well.

Maybe it's the potato? I don't know what formulas you fed of the sukanuba and SD but I looked at the regular asult Euk and sensitive stomach SD and neither have potato, both NB and Innova do. Try a food without potato or sweet potato and see how that works.

Nature's Variety Instinct uses tapioca instead of potato as a binding agent... so if anything you could try that and eliminate the potato as a trial run.

I'd second the idea of decreasing the amount she eats at one sitting and increasing the number of feedings per day. You might even see her weight pick up like you want.

Also, fiber may indeed be a problem. She may need a touch MORE fiber to bind the stool. Give her a little pumpkin or sweet potato with her meals and see if it doesn't firm up.

I'm not sure that potato is necessarily better than rice for all dogs, despite our (I include myself here!) obsession with grain free.

I agree that a probiotic and/or smaller, more frequent meals could help. Has she recently had a fecal exam? Are you interested in trying raw or homemade? That way you could avoid all carbs for a while.

I tend to be of the opinion that pumpkin or sweet potato can mask an underlying issue, and identifying the issue first is a good idea. That said, I did have my IBD dog on canned pumpkin for a number of months when I was trying to figure out how to manage his symptoms.

You could decrease the amount of kibble and add rice.

This would also be a great idea to try.

Interesting catch on the potato--see that's why I come to you guys.

She's had 3 fecals done since December... the most recent one was when we switched to Natural Balance, so early spring. Everything comes back normal. I'd love to try raw but I think it would take quite a lot of research before I'd feel confident that I was doing it right. And I think my mother would have a heart attack.

Her portions are already split into 3 meals... but I can try throwing a 4th one in there. I did pick up a probiotic today too so we'll see how that goes. If all it does is decrease her gas, I'll call it a success.

This is your boxer then? I wouldn't worry about her running on the thin side. They do tend to do that until 2-3 years old when they get their muscle mass. If you're doing three meals I would go ahead and decrease the amount. A 1 year old dog should be able to survive on two meals.

I swear, I haven't met a Boxer with firm poops! And a lot of them come into our work. Many have straight up diarrhea every day of their lives. I've heard that it's because they take in so much air due to their flat faces, but my coworker swears that her Boxer has perfect poops on Nature's Variety Instinct, and they just have sensitive tummies. Natural Balance potato and duck is made of primarily potato... it may be grain free, but that's a whole lot of starch!

Whatever you do, DON'T go back to Pukeanuba or Science Die. Those foods are not made to be nutritional or species appropriate, but to make it only seem like the issues are gone. The reason the digestive formulas work so well to firm up poops is because they are packed with nutritionless binders and fillers to make it look good - that does not mean what's going on inside is good at all!

I would highly recommend feeding her pre-made raw, like Primal or Nature's Variety, for the ease of it. It tends to be boney so you'll get nice, firm poops on it!

My old coworker used to breed boxers and raw was the best thing that ever happened to her dogs. Almost all the "boxer specific" issues that they were having like sensitive stomachs went away with the raw food.

I'd like to introduce you to Gavroche He used to have a sensitive stomach when he was younger, but that was when I was screwing around with things like Science Diet, Authority and Purina ONE Since I switched him to Taste of the Wild, he's had PERFECT poops, except for the day after his birthday cake.

Id also introduce you to Remo. She's got her problems, but runny stool, or loose stool isn't one of them, no matter what she's fed. She's on Holistic Select now (I think) and shes got a grass allergy like her mother, but never had runny poop unless she's been into something she shouldn't. (Which is often for a young boxer, lol)

LOL definitely not! The Eukanuba was just for a weekend when she wouldn't eat her own food, but she couldn't keep her face out of my brother's dogs' food. And the vet gave us the science diet for free to see if a diet change would work, so I just went with it. And even though her poop was finally firm for once.... it was MASSIVE! :lol-sign: She's always been on higher quality food and I never would have considered her poop "small".... until I saw what she produced on Science Diet... OMG would not want to clean that up everyday!

I do think it's pretty common with boxers though. A guy I was talking to at the dog park had to put his boxer on Natural Balance because he was having digestive issues as well, and it seems like almost everyone on the boxer forum I'm on has difficulty finding a food that works, and they still have to add things like yogurt and probiotics.

I think I'm going to switch her food anyway just because I've never been satisfied with the ingredients in NB--for exactly the reason ihartgonzo stated, it is practically nothing but potato. If it was helping her I'd keep her on it but we're obviously still having an issue somewhere!

Do you think home cooked would be an option for your household? Do you have the time and would your mom be comfortable with that? You'd just have to supplement with an appropriate amount of calcium.

I'll be honest, though, Bailey (who had more severe digestive problems than Juno) didn't improve until switched him to fully raw. I think the bones really helped. Now he's on Primal and has no problems at all (he actually does much better on premade than he did on my supermarket "Frankenstein" raw diet). That said, it's not cheap for us, and it wouldn't be for Juno, either. (Oh, and he's an adult and eats 4x/day -- not a big deal.)

What about canned food? For example, the Wellness Core fish cans? Canned doesn't need as much starch as kibble.

Or dehydrated raw? Again, expensive for a dog Juno's size, but maybe an option? Similarly, ZiwiPeak "kibble" has great ingredients, but it's also expensive.

I dogsit for 2 Boxers and they have the same digestive problems! They were also eating Natural Balance for a long time, and I noticed a few weeks ago they're food is now a Hills prescription diet. So the owners must have had their vet talk them into switching.

My friend's dog had the same problem and now that he's on Taste of the Wild Pacific Stream, the poops are perfect.