Hi all,

I've been in need for some extra help so I finally decided to post on forums. This forum was referred to me by mheath0429 so thanks again for that! I did read a few threads on similar cases before posting but I feel my situation may need it's own thread. My 5 month old Siberian Husky "Bambi" has had consistent diarrhea since the day I got her. I got her on April 6th and I'm positive she had this problem even before I had her. I took her to the vet and had her stool tested. She ended up testing positive for Giardia however the test had a very light reaction so it wasn't severe. The vet prescribed 250mg metronidazole and Align probiotic pills once a day. He also suggested buying hypoallergenic foods with limited ingredients.

She has been on this medication consistently everyday. She passed her second stool test clean yet I haven't seen any improvement yet. There is some variation to her stools as they are sometimes pure liquid or will have a bit more shape. The vet has told me to be patient as this can take months and to occasionally try a different meat/vege combo from Natural Balance. I've tried grain free bison, salmon, chicken, duck, venison and turkey.

So far only the Bison has displayed the best results and I always fall back to it when another food fails however even with the Bison the stools are still mostly a mud pie. I've even tried online suggestions such as canned pumpkin(not the filling kind), yogurt and the chicken/rice bland meal. None of it seems to be working. Should I just continue on like this and be patient or is there something else I should be doing?

I'd appreciate ANY advice on my issue. Let me know if you need any additional information from me. Thank you so much.

Howdy and Welcome Sorry to hear about the tummy issues with your pup.

Bumping for our nutritionist while at the same time grabbing a bit more Info for them.

So you've been feeding Natural Balance L.I.D. (varying proteins) for a bit over 2 months?


You say Bison has been your best result...

How long have you stayed on Bison?

What is the longest you've stuck with one Protein?


Lastly Treats and Snack....

Are you feeding anything else they might need to know about?
What ingredients in the treats?
Table scraps?

~Chris~

As far as the food goes, I did notice that Natural Balance is a vegetable protein based food. Have you tried anything that is meat based protein? This would probably help the situation.

bump!

Have you tried a totally bland diet with a neutral source of protein such as eggs or cottage cheese?

Since you've tried a few foods on her in kibble, and chicken/rice bland diet, maybe we should try a bland diet of a veggie and neutral protein: hard boiled eggs and either no salt canned green beans, carrots or defrosted green peas.

Try giving her 3 hard boiled eggs and one cup of one of the veggies I listed, 3x a day. Yep - that's a lot of eggs and veggies, but the eggs will give her protein and vitamins, while the veggies will also give her vitamins, but fiber to keep her moving. Most of the dogs that have had diarreha issues will improve a lot within 24 hours. If you give carrots, I chop them up and blanch them for a few minutes to just soften them up a tad. They will come out almost the same as it goes in, so you'll see carrot in her poop if you give her carrots.

Cut out all other food and snacks.

If she does improve within 24-36 hours, keep her on this bland diet for about 3-4 days to let her digestive tract 'reset'.

After 3-4 days on this diet, try a grain free kibble that you have not tried already, or maybe even try a dehydrated or freeze dried or raw food. You will want to SLOWLY add some of this new food to her bland diet. I'd go 80% bland to 20% new food. If she keeps improving, you want to keep her on this mix for another 3 to 4 days before you decrease the bland diet and add another 20% of the new food. If she takes a step back, take away the new food and go back to bland for a couple of days to reset.

This is the part that will take time to figure out what food she will do well on. Most pups that start out with diarreha typically do well transitioning to dehydrate/freeze dried foods such as The Honest Kitchen or Grandma Lucys, or raw (premade or not).

So let's eliminate all ingredients except eggs and 1 veggie source.

Let's start there and keep us posted on her progress.

On a side note, too much pumpkin can have the opposite effect, so if you were giving her too much, it would cause her to go soft.

Wow, I wish I knew about this place sooner. I appreciate all the amazing feed back. Bambi has been trying the different protein sources for about 1-2 weeks each. When I first got her she was on a chicken and brown rice diet. Now she has been on the Bison/sweet potato for about 3 weeks and her treats are also a bison/sweet potato mix for consistency.

I was really interested in this hard boiled egg and carrot bland diet you've mentioned in another thread. Bambi tried her first meal of 3 hard boiled eggs and 2 chopped medium sized carrots just a few hours ago and boy did she love it. I am going to keep her on this diet for the next couple days as you suggested. I am really excited to see her upcoming stools (never thought I'd say that). I did peel the shell from the eggs. Let me know if I should be keeping the shell on.

I felt so alone and lost with this problem before deciding to post. Once again, I appreciate all your responses very much!

Yes, peel the shell off the eggs.

If Bambi has a sensitive tummy, you'll want to take at least 3 weeks to completely transition her from one food/diet to another.

If she starts to firm up with eggs and carrots, it could be some intolerance to an ingredient(s) in the kibble you're giving her, or it could be the 'cooking' process. To give you an example: my female, Ginger, did really well on fish protein, grain free kibble, however, she did not do well on Taste of the Wild Pacific Stream which is a grain free salmon protein kibble. So Orijen 6 Fish and Natures Variety Instinct Salmon are 2 kibbles I rotate in. Something else that Ginger does not tolerate: chicken or turkey in kibble form, however, freeze dried, dehydrated or raw chicken she has no issues. And another thing I learned with Ginger is that I cannot add anymore than 25% of a new kibble/brand, even though it's grain free and it's fish protein base, to start. Otherwise, she will go soft for a few days.

These are things you will eventually work through and learn as you go through the process.

In all the pups that I know that started out with diarreha that has been ongoing for several weeks, I will typically hear they end up doing really well on dehydrated/freeze dried foods like The Honest Kitchen and Grandma Lucys. Since you've tried a few dry foods on her, maybe you can check to see how available THK or GL is available to you and/or if the stores nearby that carry them have samples or if they will let you return the unused portion if Bambi doesn't like it or do well on it when you get to that point.

anyway - I'm getting ahead a little bit....

Keep us posted!

Yeah, I definitely agree with being more patient. I am just concerned because she is underweight most likely due to all these low fat kibbles and bland diets. I'm afraid this problem will stunt her growth and she will suffer from malnutrition. I don't know the details though, I am just being paranoid. All this advice is really great. I have yet to see her first stool after the egg/carrot meal which is odd because she normally goes potty 5-8 times a day.

I will keep her on the diet you suggested and I am going to try this Grandma Lucy's Lamb diet if things start to get better. She has never had lamb so that will work. The THK Perfect Form supplement looks very useful as well and would be a strong combination with the probiotics she is already taking.

I'm just happy you are feeling less alone. This is a great group of people. We get our occasional troll, but the majority of people here are devout husky lovers and you are going to learn a lot from them. Welcome

saL916 wrote:

I will keep her on the diet you suggested and I am going to try this Grandma Lucy's Lamb diet if things start to get better. She has never had lamb so that will work. The THK Perfect Form supplement looks very useful as well and would be a strong combination with the probiotics she is already taking.

Yes, Perfect Form is a staple in Val's home for Faith as Faith has a very sensitive tummy!

However, I would try the eggs and carrots first and see how she does. I'd rather try to find out what she really has intolerances to first before adding in Perfect Form that would help her firm up but then you wouldn't know what intolerances Bambi has.

Is Bambi still on Metronidazole? My old vet prescribed it for my sibe a long time ago when we had a diarrhea issue and it only made matters worse. If she's parasite free and still on it, I'd cut that out. Another gal on a different husky forum had the same experience as I did with Metronidazole making things worse for her sensitive sibe also. Take that FWIW.

I can definitely appreciate what you're going through, I've got two sensitive dogs and the trial & error game is not fun at all. With my sensitive sibe I discovered what he can & can't have via trial and error and we avoid those things he can't tolerate. With my sensitive chi, Faith, she has irritable bowel so she cannot live without Perfect Form.

Typically I like Natural Balance LID diets for the purpose of an elimination diet, but it sounds like it's not working for you. My suggestion after you've got formed BM's on the bland diet would be either The Honest Kitchen or Grandma Lucy's as Claudia also suggested. They're not as processed and tend to have fewer ingredients than kibble which can help tremendously with an elimination diet. Back when I used to feed kibble I would keep The Honest Kitchen in the pantry specifically for treating the occasional bout of diarrhea because a single meal of THK worked wonders for clearing it up in my sibe.

Honestly I would even start a bland diet with one ingredient rather than two, but to each his own. I prefer either chicken (raw or boiled) or egg (scrambled or hard boiled) to start, but that's just me. The less to upset the tummy the better, which is why I wouldn't particularly include carrots in a bland diet right off the bat.

I'm interested to hear how her BM's look when they finally come.

Given that she has(had?) giardia, how well are you cleaning up her area(s)? Giardia has a nasty reinfection rate and that might be why you're having trouble getting rid of it.

In addition of the other suggestions here, you might try pumpkin puree to add more fiber to her diet. I've found a single spoonful seems to set my pup right for months. Just make sure it's pure pumpkin, not extract or sugary.

Perfect form did not help Balon at all, but like most supplements or medicine it won't help every dog. Good luck if you do try it they have sample sizes.

Hi all,

Bambi's stools looked about the same today however I did notice a bit more shape. I believe it's too early to expect any drastic changes. I will continue to monitor her BM's throughout the day. If things don't improve in the next few days then I will remove the carrots from her diet and we will go from there. I can't wait to get this over with so I can start feeding her more nutritional diets everyone else here uses!

Yes, Bambi did test positive for Gardia in April. She tested clean just 3 weeks ago however. The vet suggested that she stay on the Metronidazole until it is finished. She has about 8 pills left. I'm starting to think I should go ahead and stop giving her the pills. We are strict about cleaning her stools right away especially because it is smelly diarrhea.

Let me know what you guys think. Thanks again!

I think I'm with Val and stop the Metonidazole. If her BMs had more shape to it now, maybe with out the meds she'll improve even more.

Dalton had terrible diarrhea for about the first 2 months we had him. We were feeding him blue buffalo, and as I think a lot of others have said, the high protine was too much for him. It could just be food allergies as well, we had to change food a few times before we found one that he could handle (right now he is eating Taste of the wild). I hope that the egg veggie mix works out for you! I am glad she's seeming to respond to it. I am sure it's been said, but we had to take tons of extra time when introducing a new food with Dalton, about a month in a half until he was really used to it. Good luck!

How's Bambi doing?

Hi all,

Okay Bambi is officially passing hard stools. This is the first time I've seen actual log shaped stool and I am strangely excited about it. cmanding, you nailed it! The egg and carrot diet worked like a charm. I did notice most of the stool is made up of carrots so it seems like she digests very little of it. I believe removing the Metronidazole from her daily supplements definitely helped too so thank you for that suggestion Val. The whole family is so relieved about it. I appreciate everyone help on this.

I will now begin the process of testing new foods. I will go out and buy "Love" from THK since Bison and Cattle aren't too far off. I will test a small amount and see how she reacts to it.

Thank you all so much!!!

Woohoo! I believe we all get excited to see normal stools when dealing with sensitive dogs. Lol. Good luck with THK, I swear by that stuff for sensitive dogs. However my sibe can't tolerate beef in anything but raw form, so he can't have Love or Verve without getting soft stool. He does great on all the other formulas though. Fingers crossed for you! And please keep us updated.

Yay for formed stools! I think anyone who's gone through soft stools for extended periods of time cheer and dance and get excited when our pups start to pass formed stools again!

Yes, when feeding carrots, they will come out the way they went in.

If you need coupons for THK, I can send you some - just PM me your address.

I am going to hijack this thread.

Raven has the poopies for two days now. I recently switched her from TOTW HP puppy to the adult version without much of a transition because I figured that it wouldn't be much different. She woke us up last night to go out which she never does and she has already gone three times this morning. Its pure liquid at this point. Other than the poopies she is still acting normal: eating, playing, drinking.

We are supposed to be going to a 4th party this evening put I don't want to leave her locked in her crate if she has to go that just seems cruel.

Any advice would be great.

What food was Raven on previous to TOTW HP?
If she was doing well on the previous food prior to TOTW HP, did you try going back to that?
How long did you take to transition her from the previous to TOTW HP?

Sorry every one else uses abbreviations lol

She was on Taste of the Wild High Prairie Puppy and now she is on Taste of the Wild High Prairie Adult dog food. No I haven't switched her back she no longer needs a puppy formula.

Do you think its the food? I didn't think the formulas would be that different. Transition was a few days

Just a quick suggestion...

I had a nightmare with my pup and his stools, pretty much tried everything and he still had runny stools, and i mean runny for over a month!

What worked for us was to buy some puppy food, a 10KG bag that cost me £10, yes, dirt cheap and low quality :/ The quality of this kibble was so poor that it had hairs sticking out the kibble, something that I hadn't experienced with any of the other premium foods I was feeding him.

My point is, its the fact that this food was so poor, that his stomach settled, I think that when they're still developing, some of our pups have really fragile stomachs, and the high quality food is just too rich.

I finished that first £10 and moved him onto an adult kibble that cost me £10 for 15KG (LOL). The transformation was no issue, i introduced the new kibble in a couple of days and a week later reintroduced the Orijen that I still had 2 bags of, I introduced it slowly and he's doing great and has been feeding on just Orijen (LP) for over 2 months now with perfect stools.

Has your husky been spayed/neutered? Before my husky was neutered he would have liquid stools. But now they are hard stools.