Eating his poop

[Jody Neeley]

Albus has a nasty habit of eating his own poop immediately after he goes. Luckily I usually catch it in time with bag in hand before he can gobble up this decadent dessert :). I talked to the vet and she said he was on a good dog food and that hopefully things would change. The biggest concern I have is that he might be going in his crate and eating it before I know. We are working on crate training and he spends about one hour three to four times a day in it. He is only pooping three times a day now at eleven weeks of age. He used to go more often. I know dogs usually don't go in their crate, but could this be a possibility? Also, any ideas to help deter him from poop eating would be wonderful. Hard to praise him for going while trying to quickly push him aside before he eats it! Thanks :)

[Gayle & Hunter]

Hi Jody, here is a good article I thought might help.... http://www.petmd.com/dog/puppycenter/health/evr_dg_why_do_puppies_e...
Hope this helps or at least gives you an insight as too why. Good luck, I sure it will work out.

[Jody Neeley]

Thank you do much! That article was very helpful and also gives me hope that we will figure it out.

[Lori, Daphne, Lucy & Pippa]

What food is he eating? What the vet considers good may actually not have enough nutrients in it.

[Deb's Yarrow and Schatzi]

Here's another great article.
https://www.aspca.org/pet-care/virtual-pet-behaviorist/dog-behavior...
It's not abnormal, just undesirable. Extremely! Dogs of all ages do it. Even some of the most posh Manhattan poodles do it. My dogs will pass by 9 frozen poops on the trail, but the 10th one is somehow irresistible! I'm guilty of freaking out, loosing my cool, yelling "LEAVE IT, LEAVE IT!" to no avail. But other dog walkers confess to me that their dogs do it too... Even if their food costs $100 for 20 pounds of super nutrition.
Since Albus is eating his own poop, there is a natural product by NaturVet called Coprophagia Deterrent. It's the only natural product I know of. There are others but they contain MSG which is probably as bad for dogs as it is for humans. When Yarrow was a little pup she wanted to 'clean up' after our older dog. I put the afore mentioned product into his food and it wasn't long before Yarrow decided his poop was yucky.

[Rosemary (Ro) and Enzo]

^^^^. Great info. This is very common and your best bet is to try and deter while he is a puppy before it becomes habit. The food he is eating has nothing to do with the act itself. As Deb said, there are a number of products on the market that can be fed that make the poop undesirable to eat.( Hard to believe I even typed that!). I had a pup from one of my litters who had Coprophagia...She eventually grew out of it, but not before Grosso g a lot of people out.

[Jody Neeley]

Hope he will outgrow it! Thank you :)

[Nancy, Ned, Clancy, and Charlie]

Great article, Deb.

[Deb's Yarrow and Schatzi]

It's the most thorough source of information on the topic nobody really wants to talk about. Yarrow stopped this behavior when she was about 6 months old, but her sister who we adopted at 10 months is a chronic poo eater. I keep the yard immaculate but off leash Shiloh finds poopsicles. Yarrow looks at her, looks at me, looks back at her, then back at me... she seems to be saying, "mum, stop her!"
I know I need to work on the Leave It command with her using treats in the kitchen.

[Jody Neeley]

Thank you so much for the article and your reply. I will have to look into that product. Thanks!

[Laura and Angus]

I was thinking that, maybe, since you're working on potty training you could get a two-for and praise him for going potty and then have him sit for a treat to give you time to pick up the poo? We use the 'sit' commands for all kinds of things because Angus has really mastered it. I also just read somewhere that a puppy sometimes will not always respond to the 'come' command, but will often 'sit' on command, so it's a good one to start practicing early and often. In regards to the crate question - if the crate is small enough - meaning only large enough for Albus to stand up and turn around, I think it's unlikely he's pottying in there. Also if you're crating Albus while you're at home, then you would smell a poo. Puppy poo is pretty potent from what we've noticed... Good luck! 

[Jody Neeley]

Great idea, thank you! Going to give it a shot.