Coprophagia
When the weather gets colder increased numbers of coprophagia or stool eating cases occur. From the human standpoint this is a very disgusting habit, but from the dog's point of view it is a very normal behavior in some circumstances. Bitches will eat the feces and urine of their puppies during the first few weeks of their life. This keeps the whelping box clean. Many adult wild dog species must consume dropping during trying times in their environment to survive. Modern commercial diets are loaded with nutrition that will not be 100% digested on first passage. Cat feces is especially true of this. Puppies too will often eat their own feces. It's considered normal exploration behavior on the part of the puppy, similar to a human infant's first attempt at "finger painting". Most puppies will stop eating feces after they reach one year of age but some never kick the habit.
Gastrointestinal medical problems should be ruled out as a cause for this problem. A maldigestion or malabsorption syndrome may result in nutrients in the food to pass through the dog's intestinal tract virtually unchanged. Since a dog with this type of problem is chronically hungry, the stool may serve as a "between meal snack."
Dogs that eat feces often have problems with periodontal disease caused by the stool adhering to their teeth. Stool eating rarely causes any other medical problems except when the feces eaten is from other animals that have parasites.
The reasons why healthy dogs eat their own feces are unknown but some guesses can be made. The dog may be imitating the owner's behavior of picking up the feces. Stool eating may be an attention getting behavior especially if it gets the owner to play in a game of "keep away". Dogs that are fed once daily may be hungry and find that feces fills them up between meals. The mouth feel of the feces serves as a major component of palatability for the dog. Frozen stool or dry firm stool produced from feeding high fiber dog foods is usually more tempting for the dog to pick up. Soft stool is usually avoided by the coprophagic dog.
Coprophagia can be handled several ways. The easiest thing to do, which most owners refuse to do, is to walk the dog on a leash so that the dog can be immediately taken away from his feces. After the dog has been put back into the house the stool should be picked up and disposed of. Allowing the dog to see the stool being removed may lead to a game of keep away. This becomes a vice of many dogs that are bored, usually those that are isolated in the backyard and provided with few toys and little owner interaction. Leash walks and play time with the owner on a regular schedule will help alleviate some of the environmental stress that resulted in this redirected behavior problem.
I have found that punishment is rarely successful. Many sources recommend adding meat tenderizer to the food to change the taste of the stool when it is passed. A commercial enzyme powder called FORBID has been marketed to be fed to dogs to make the stool foul tasting. Meat tenderizer and FORBID are rarely effective at stopping this behavior. Sprinkling hot pepper on the stool has also been recommended. This must be applied to every bowel movement or the dog will just learn to eat the " untreated" feces. In fact this type of intermittent reward system (i.e. the periodic ingestion of untreated stool) may make the behavior even harder to stop. I have been told that adding Certs to the dog's diet makes the stool taste terrible. This seldom works but it may improve their breath!
A diet change is often the only thing that helps these dogs. The diet of coprophagic dogs should gradually be changed to a canned dog food diet. Vegetable oil should be slowly added to their diet until they are ingesting about one tablespoon for every ten pounds of body weight. The dog should not receive any treats or table scraps and should be fed on a regular twice a day schedule. Sometimes just a month or two of this high fat, high protein, low carbohydrate diet will change the dog's behavior.
Other tricks of the trade with diet modifications include the adding of cooked or fresh vegetables to the regular food. Its doubtful that a deficiency is being treated, rather a change in the routine and texture of the diet is more likely the reason it works. Some have claimed that an addition of powdered bone meal on the regular diet will discourage the habit too.
CASE STUDY BY ANIMAL BEHAVIORIST, DR.
BONNIE BEAVER
The primary problem (from the owner's point of view) was coprophagy. The cause of this aesthetically unpleasing behavior in nonlactating adult dogs is unclear. Because coprophagy was observed only when the dog was unattended at defecation, attention-solicitation was excluded as a proximal motive. Because coprophagy was the owner's greatest concern and because the treatment regimen for this behavior is straightforward and would not interfere with treatment of the other problems, this condition was addressed first. The recommended treatment included 3 components: decreasing the attractive qualities of the feces, preventing the expression of coprophagous behavior, and rewarding appropriate postelimination behavior. Because time and location of defecation are controlled by time of feeding, exercise, and olfactory cues, these factors can be used to advantage in treating elimination problems. The owner was instructed to feed the dog two or three times daily, so that the time of defecation could be more accurately predicted on the basis of the gastrocolic reflex. A high-quality diet was recommended, in the hope of decreasing total fecal output. Changing the diet can also decrease the attractiveness of the feces by changing fecal taste or texture. The owner was informed about commercial products designed to impart an unpleasant taste to the feces. On the basis of anecdotal evidence, grinding breath mints into the dog's food was also recommended to alter the taste of the feces. The owner was instructed to accompany the dog into the yard at all times to prevent it from consuming its feces and to reward appropriate post elimination behavior. A simple program of counter conditioning was recommended. While outdoors, the owner was to remain close to the dog (within 2 to 4 feet). Immediately after the dog defecated, the owner was to call the dog to her and reward it with a valued food treat. Having the dog defecate while on the leash would have been preferred, however, because it would have given the owner more control. The owner then would remove the feces.