Question:
Hey...

I have a 115lb german shepherd male. he is not overweight, eats (science diet senior) once a day and gets lots of table scraps in between. he has always been very healthy.

about a month ago i woke up in the middle of the night because his stomach was growling (sounds like liquid squirting back and forth). i thought he didnt eat enough so i gave him some more food, he wouldnt touch it. whenever his stomach makes those noises he wont touch food, even his favorite snacks. eventually after an hour of begging him and coercing him to eat something he takes a few bites. after the few bites, hell continue to eat normally and sounds would go away within 10 mins of eating. this would happen for about 3 weeks, twice a week id say.

for the last 2 days i have started feeding him more often but the sounds happen sporadically regardless of when hes eaten. same thing as before though....he wont eat, but after coercing him to take a few bites, hell start eating on his own. as for other signs...no vomitting, no diarhea, pretty normal activity level (hes always been lazy....lies around all day with a 2 hr walk at night), etc etc etc

what could this be?? im getting pretty worried bc nothing like this has ever happened before.

thanks a lot for the help!

Answer:
I'm not a vet, and given his age it might be a good idea to get a check up, just to rule out anything serious.
That said, one of my dogs, who has had many GI problems, has had a similar thing happen in the past. Exactly like you described, his stomach would be gurgling and seemed a bit uncomfortable and he would refuse to eat. The longer he refused food, the worse his stomach would get, making further refuse food.
As far as I can tell, it's basically just a gassy stomach ach, which I think is caused by a combo of food which doesn't agree with the dog, eating in larger, less frequent portions and the GI system being out of whack.

What finally dealt with the problem was a combo of things. First, I would get him off the Science Diet. Look for a high quality kibble ( Nature’s Variety, Solid Gold, Timberwolf, Merrick are ones that come to mind), it'll help you with this and your dog's over all health. I don't know how often you're feeding him, but splitting the food into smaller portions, and feeding right before bed can help. Also, adding a tablespoon of plain, unsweetened yogurt to his meals will help to maintain GI health as will getting a probiotic and digestive enzyme supplement ( here is one example: http://www.eaglepack.com/pages/ep_ho..._solution.html )

I hope this helps you.....

Answer:
At age 10, your boy is a senior, and likely has special needs. Anytime an older dog goes off his feed like this, you need to really look into having him checked over thoroughly by a vet. Only a vet can determine if this is a food sensitivity or something far worse, please make an appointment and keep us posted on how he fares.

Answer:
I agree with Pitgrrl. The doggy's belly is very unhappy. It could be an intolerance to something in the science diet (I also agree with her on the food change), in which case, you might not see diarrhea and vomiting yet, but it could be building up.

With Boo, what would happen is he would get some chicken and be fine and then a week or two later, he'd develop "bacterial overgrowth", start vomiting and never stop. He needed antibiotics and an anti-vomiting injection into his belly. I would definitely try changing the food.

Here are a couple of good brands to look at, in case you need somewhere to start:
Canidae
DVP Natural Balance
Solid Gold (Wolf King)
Timberwolf Organics

More digestible ingredients mean you feed less, which creates less gas.

Answer:
First off,have him checked by a vet.Then have his food switched.Science Diet is not a good food.Check the ingredients...The first 4-5 ingredients should not contain corn.And also,please stop with all the table scraps.It's not needed...

Also,IMHO feeding him once a day is not enough.

I've raised GSD's,my current is also 10 years old and still pretty active.I don't have him on senior.And I have never fed any of my dogs Senior food.He's on a Holistic dry.He gets fed 3x a day.And this is with the canned.His dry is left out to nibble on(he's not a Hoover)..He does get raw veggies,which he loves.And he is a happy healthy dog..


Also be very careful.GSD's are also prone to Bloat.And they do have tummy issues.

Answer:
hey guys...

thanks a lot for all the responses!

i agree with you that science diet isnt the best thing to feed him and ive decided to switch foods....but what bothers me is that hes been on the same food for many years and these stomach problems just recently started

yesterday we decided to put him on chicken soup and other things like that for a few weeks just to help his stomach out.

also, ive been doing some reading online and found something about "yeast/bacterial infections" in dogs. some of the symptoms include gas, food sensitivity, itching fur (which he also started recently....no sign of fleas either), redness of the skin (under his armpits and between his thighs its been red and irritated for a few weeks now....i put cream on him and its really gotten the itching and scabs down, but its still red)....anybody know if this could be it? is it common in german shepherds?

thanks a lot....

Answer:
You may find that the skin problems are an external symptom of his systemic problems related to food. This was true with two GSD's I know, belonging to a friend; they had both digestive and skin problems, which only cleared up when they were fed a homemade diet. But start with better commercial food and see how it goes.
Older animals can develop sensitivities to food that they previously tolerated. In a way, this is a good thing. It alerts you to the fact that his system needs more of something, or is getting too much of a so-so thing (in some cases, corn and other grains, or the various fillers mainstream petfood companies use to improve their bottom line, but not necessarily the dog's health).

Answer:
I agree. Switch his food to one of the holistic brands and you'll see a great improvement. Make sure to do the switch gradually. Check out the dog food forum here for recommendations. Also, you may want to consider adding some plain no fat yogurt to his food that contains probiotics.

Answer: