Hunger / diarrhea issues

[Josh Adams]

Our almost 5 month-year-old puppy is always hungry. I realize this may be normal puppy behavior but his constant hunger has increased recently. We feed him Fromm Large Breed Puppy food on a strict schedule three times per day - 7AM, 11AM, and 4PM. We feed him the amount the bag suggests which is 3 1/4 cups per day. Sometimes we increase slightly if he has a very active day. We provide treats during the day when we're training (inside the house and on walks). Nonetheless, he begs for food between meals. I swear if we put a bag of food in front of him it still wouldn't be enough. Also, he eats a lot of grass and dirt in the yard and on walks. Our vet says this is all normal, but it doesn't sit right with us. Any suggestions?

The second issue is diarrhea. I posted about this issue a while back. We tried switching from Life's Abundance to Zingnature. We did so gradually mixed with a bland diet. That didn't go well so we started over and switched to Fromm LBP. His stools we're okay and he loved the food so we stuck with it. He still has diarrhea issues. About half his daily stool is formed, but the rest is soft, sometimes very soft (usually in the afternoon). We tried removing treats one day and it sort of helped but he still got soft stool once per day. We added treats back in because he was enrolled in puppy school and we couldn't go without treats during training. I ordered Proviable DC which arrived today. We'll start it tomorrow. I hope this helps. Would love advice if I am missing anything. I'll add that we had a stool sample done a while back and it came back fine.

Here are the treats we use for training:

- Cloud Star Chewy Tricky Trainers Liver
- Trader Joe's Beef Liver Begging Treats
- Trader Joe's Joes Chicken & Sweet Potato Flavored Dog Treats
- Vet One Neat Treats
- Occasional pieces of hotdog for high reward training
- NF Greek yogurt

[Karen, Jasper and Jackdoodle]

I wouldn't switch the kibble again at this point, I think it would complicate matters. Down the road, I'd consider an LID formula if the digestive issues continue. But give the Proviable a little more time to have an effect. 

[Stacy]

I like the cloudstar rogue treats. They are just meat and some preservatives. Pure bites are great, but at training class they're really too big to just pop a bite in their mouth and keep going. And when I try to break them up it kind of works but I also end up with a pocket full of chicken crumbs. I don't have that problem with the rogue treats. 

[Karen, Jasper and Jackdoodle]

I break up the treats at home way in advance of class, lol. :) 
The Cloudstar treats are okay, but they are much higher in fat than Purebites, and high fat percentages can contribute to loose stool and diarrhea. Chicken Purebites contains absolutely nothing besides chicken, and has a 3% fat content. Cloudstar Rogue chicken treats have 18% fat. That's a BIG difference. The calorie content is 2-3x higher too. And if I can give my dog plain chicken, I'd just as soon not give him salt, vinegar, and citric acid along with it. :) 

[Stacy]

Okay, dumb question. If the cloudstar treats (autocorrect keeps wanting to make that cloister - that's not right at all!) only contain chicken, how is it possible for them to have so much more fat? What are they sneaking in there? 

Now that miss picky pants is no longer so picky and no longer so thin I'm going to have to start thinking about how many thousands of calories of treats I'm feeding her. Happily she will eat whatever at class now. No more hot dogs. Poor puppy!

[Karen, Jasper and Jackdoodle]

Well, there's chicken and there's chicken, lol. Dark meat chicken contains more than twice the fat of white meat chicken for the same size portion- a 3.5 oz portion of white meat chicken contains 4.5 grams total fat compared to 9.7 grams of fat in an equal protion of dark meat chicken. Calorie content in the 3.5 oz of white meat is 173 compared to 205 for the same amount of dark meat. And the protein content is higher in the white meat, too, as you would expect with there being less fat: 31 gms of protein in the white meat compared to 27 in the dark. The Cloudstar treats ingredient info says only "chicken", so we can assume some if not all of it is dark meat, whereas the Pure Bites ingredients state that it is only chicken breast, which is of course white meat. :) 

[Stacy]

I feel like I should have known this, but I did not. So thanks! Nutrition is hard. For dogs and people too. I think if I just ate whole, fresh food I would probably do better. But all of that processed junk just tastes so good.

[Karen, Jasper and Jackdoodle]

The thing is that when you study nutrition and you know what is or isn't in food, you tend to make choices based on that instead of on how it tastes. (Or at least, I do, lol). Not that taste isn't important, but you are mindful first of "I need some lean protein (or potassium or whatever)" and then you make a choice of something that contains what you need and also appeals to you tastewise. :) 

[Josh Adams]

Hi Karen, I took a look at the PureBites Pure Dried Chicken and PureBites Dried Turkey analysis - both are over 74% protein and 8% fat which is a lot higher than the Cloud Star Chewy Tricky Trainers Liver and the Trader Joe's Beef Liver Begging Treats. The CS Treats are only 10% protein / 4% fat and the TJ’s treats are 57% protein / 5% fat. I think we’re better off with these treats than the PureBites? That’s a lot of protein and fat.

An update on his stool: we just returned home from the holiday weekend. We withheld all treats while we were away to see if it approved his stool. His afternoon stool got a little better, but unfortunately, it's still soft (probably a 4 / 5 on the stool scale). Today was day 7 of the Proviable. Tomorrow we're going to switch him to two meals per day. I hope this helps him. I've heard adding a little parsley will also help?

[Karen, Jasper and Jackdoodle]

Protein is what you want, always. There are only 3 macronutrients, protein, fat and carbohydrates. Plain chicken, turkey, beef, fish, etc is always only going to contain protein and fat, no carbs, which are sugar. So there is something not correct about the nutritional info on the TJ treats, because if they are plain liver, how can they contain only 50% protein? 50+5 (fat)+9 for fiber and moisture equals 64. What's making up the other 36% of the whole? 
I just looked again at the link you provided and the chicken Purebites contains only 3% fat. The turkey does have 8%, which is still a low fat content, but you are better off with the chicken, which is still lower than the Trader Joe or Cloud Star treats. 
The Cloud Star tricky trainers contain carbohydrates like maple syrup, tapioca, and barley flour. Carbohydrates in dog food and treats are basically fillers, starches which provide little to no nutritional value. And some of those fillers can contribute to digestive issues. You really are better off with plain chicken from a digestive standpoint.
I have never heard that giving parsley can help firm up stool and I can't imagine how it could. Dogs (and people, too) can't digest raw plant material due to the cellulose that makes up the cell walls of plants. If you want to experiemnt with herbs, you'd be better off with slippery elm. 
Give the Proviable another 7-10 days. If there is still no improvement, I'd consider changing to an LID food and/or trying VSL#3 human probiotics.

[Josh Adams]

Thank you. Maybe the CloudStar and TJ treats should be removed from the forum's recommended brand list - or are they on the list because the ingredients are sourced and not because they provide good nutritional value?

We'll give the Proviable another week, but I hesitate to change his food again. He did well on Life's Abundance LBPF which is very similar to Fromm LBPF in terms of ingredients and guaranteed analysis. If you remember, we tried Zignature LID before Fromm, but he had soft stool. It was the Lamb formula, probably should have tried Turkey. What other LID brands or formulas would you recommend if we were to switch foods again?

[Karen, Jasper and Jackdoodle]

There's nothing wrong with Cloud Star or Trader Joe's treats for dogs with no digestive problems. Almost ALL dog foods and most treats contain some carbohydrates, and they still provide good nutritional value. It's dogs with digestive issues or other health issues that do better with plainer, simpler, low carb treats and foods.
The best LID I have found for dogs with digestive issues is Wellness Simple Solutions, either the turkey or the salmon formula. It has the fewest ingredients and the best nutritional profile of any LID food I have found. It has worked well for many people here. I like it best for adult dogs, but it works for puppies too.

[Jolene, Sassparilla & Josie]

My sister also uses the LID Wellness for their newfie who has tummies issues with great success.  With my two Zignatures has done well, Sassy no longer is randomly vomiting liquid bile and I'm not sure if it's related or not but since we switched Josie hasn't had anal gland issues (almost 2 yrs) and that was something we battled monthly for the past 4-5 years!  Josie enthusiastically eats the food now so not sure if that is the difference, before she was a grazer taking a few kibbles at a time across the room behind a chair to eat, now she inhales her food and tries to steal Sassy's!  Food can make all the difference.