# Food and soft stool connections



## gitane59

Our 7-1/2 month old spoo Bella is eating Blue Buffalo large breed puppy kibble and continues to have very soft stool. We have ruled out/eliminated worms as a causal with 2 de-worming treatments in the past 30 days. Yes she did have round worms 5/6 weeks ago. The soft stool is not diarrhea, it is just too soft to pickup up and dispose of with any ability.
We are beginning to suspect that her system is just not liking the Blue Buffalo. She is gaining weight just fine, almost 37lbs now. Could their be too much protein or nutrients in the Puppy food for her system?
Has anyone had a similar experience with young Spoo's
Our 4yr old Shih-Poo eats the adult Blue Buffalo just fine.


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## WonderPup

Just my humble opinion but I would probably put her on a regular puppy food or adult food. When I was doing the nutrition part of the training for my trainers training (that's a mouthful lol) I was taught that large breed foods were more of a marketing thing and have read several times that it is better to put the puppy on adult food to keep it from growing to quickly than to use puppy food. I'm sure others will disagree *shrugs* that's the thing with food though, there are many good ways to feed dogs as there are dog owners 

I put my spoo Saleen on adult food at around 6 months I think. Hard to remember exactly now but I am pretty sure it was 6 or 7 months. She also had very soft poo on Blue and Taste of the Wild. I do believe we were feeding lamb and rice at the time and switched to chicken (dang... maybe it was the other way around... don't remember exactly sorry) and it helped. The adult food seemed to help as well. All that said, it is possible that Blue is just not the food for you. I have seen dogs that do fantastically on it and dogs that don't. Just like every other food on the market what works for some doesn't work for another. 

When I didn't go back to work after having a baby last year we started feeding Diamond Naturals chicken and rice. It's a slightly lower grade food than Blue Buffalo I guess but it is corn, wheat, and soy free which is what I needed and it was cheaper which was the reason for the switch to begin with. Everyone has really firm poo now. We've also used Chicken Soup for the Dog lover's soul and several of the Solid Gold foods, with great success. Over the years I've fed other foods as well but those were the ones we've liked with our current dogs. We tried taste of the wild (the fish formula, whatever it's called) and our dog's smelled fishy while eating it and Saleen still had gas and soft poo so we switched back after only one bag.


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## faerie

i put temperance on adult food at about 3 months.


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## jazzi480

Jazzi and Ella both had issues on Blue, they are doing well on TOTW, we rotate between lamb and the fish. We put them on adult food at about 6 months of age. Their vet is an advocate of adult food for large breed dogs.


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## PoodlePowerBC

jazzi480 said:


> Jazzi and Ella both had issues on Blue, they are doing well on TOTW, we rotate between lamb and the fish. We put them on adult food at about 6 months of age. Their vet is an advocate of adult food for large breed dogs.


Ditto here ... I switched to TOTW adult from Origen Large Breed Puppy at 3 months and added pumpkin for a week ... all OK now, he is just over 4 months old. BTW, Pumpkin is magic!


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## 2719

I would switch to medium breed.


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## *tina*

I think Blue Buffalo changed their formula a few months back, both of my dogs were having poo issues on it after eating it for over a year with no issues. We switched to Merrick brand food after that, my poodle hasn't had issues with it, but our other dog is still having periodic poo issues.


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## pudlemom

I also had the same problem with Buffalo Blue,I am currently feeding Chicken soup for the dog lovers soul and they are doing fantastic on it. I switched my puppies for puppy to adult food at 6 month.


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## georgiapeach

I wish mine could eat the Chicken Soup food, but it gives them eye boogers - it's so affordable. TOTW Pacific Stream seems to be the only thing they do well on. At least it's not horribly expensive, either, especially compared to some of the other good foods.


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## star

I had the same thing happen to Lola. I put her on Natural Balance but after a month had to do a switch. The vet said it was too rich (too many ingredients) for her system to digest. She had major cow patties and accidents in the house. I have her on Wellness puppy now and she is doing good. If I give her treats I have to keep it minimal because her stool will get loose again.


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## LuvPoo

Hi There -

We went through a lot of food changes with our (now) 9 month Spoo. Blue Buffalo, Wellness, Merrick, **** Van Patten - same thing - loose stools. We finally got him settled on Taste of the Wild grain free kibble and he's been doing great on it. (It does have some carbs in it, but in the form of potato, sweet potato, etc.) We could only draw the conclusion that he did not tolerate grains well, even rice. We use TOTW canned and Wellness grain free canned food & he's fine with both added in. All of the above foods are good foods, I just think different dogs have different tolerances.

Best of luck. I know how frustrating it can be. If nothing works for you, I would encourage having your dog tested for Addisons or liver issues. We lost our previous Spoo at 3.5 years to liver disease. He had constant loose stool that we could never resolve, but a number of other problems too.


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## gitane59

Well we tried Nutro Natural Choice after the Blue Buffalo left her with very soft stools and she was no better on Nutro so we have switched to Pedigree Vitality and her stools have firm right up in 2 days. She was raised as a pup on Pedigree Puppy until we started reading about food quality and thought we should feed her a better quality food.
Seems her system can't handle the high protein quality products in the high end foods.


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