Diet tips?

[soniakanavle]

Hi! I have a 1 year old Czechoslovakian Wolfdog. He is the love of my life (even though he is crazy!) He has some problems though... It seems like no matter what I feed him he always has diarrhea... I feed him one meal per day (at night) of about 3 cups of dry dog food (Royal canin German Shepherd 24) and 1 can of Natural Balence beef wet food. He gets plenty of water and I don't over do his treats or feed him anything weird so I don't know whats causing it. He also just started getting hot spots and I heard those can be diet related also. I would love any info/feedback and any suggestions that anybody can give me! I want him to start feeling better ASAP! Thank alot! -Sonia and Flint

[Mirkawolf]

Hi Sonia,

I think you should first of all visit veterinarian with your dog. Probably the best way would be to go see veterinarian - dermatologist. He´d examine the hot-spots of the dog and he might suggest the right diet.
It is possible that your dog is allergical to some part of the dry food you are giving him. Some dogs are allergic to barley, some to corn, some to soya. Usually these dogs are then given hypo-allergenous dry food, that contains rice and lamb. I do not remember all the brands that do this food, but for example Canadian Nutram or Eukanuba, probably also Royal Canin or Purina Proplan should provide hypo-allergenous food.

It is not recommended to mix dry food and meat (can food) together, even not in one day. Usually it makes more troubles than good to the dog. If you have to mix it, then give the dog in one meal 80% of the dry food and add into that 20% of the wet food. Also, one year old CSV should eat only twice a day, or even just once.

You might also try to stop giving dry food and feed the dog normal home prepared diet (such as meat + rice + vegetables) for about a week or two and you will see, if the conditions change. Generally wolfdogs are doing better with natural food.
Or, try to change the brand of the dry food (slowly) and it also might help. I have two wolfdogs, one eats only meat (with rice etc.), the other one eats dry food (because we don´t have freezer large enough for all that meat!). I am giving her Purina Proplan Large Breed - chicken and rice and she is really looking fine and has no troubles.

But if I was you, I´d first go to the vet and see what´s up.

[Mirkawolf]

Originally Posted by Mirkawolf1

Also, one year old CSV should eat only twice a day, or even just once.

Sorry, I misread your post. Of course you feed the dog just once a day, at night. Silly me.

[michaelundinaeichhorn]

If you want to test if your dog reacts on parts of it´s food you shouldn´t use commercial food, especially none with rice. A lot of dogs react on house-dust mites and those dogs react on food-dust mites too (I hope that´s theire name in English, it´s the name in German) food-dust mites are in everything containing starch that stands around for some time. And some dogs don´t tolerate some preservatives.
For the test you should feed a kind of meat that the dog hasn´t had before (like sheep or horse) and cooked potatoes for about 6 weeks. If the dog improves you try other kinds of food one part every week. If you know what your dog doesn´t tolerate you can look for a commercial food that doesn´t contain it.
Before that you should visit a vet and take a faeces sample of three days (it is very important not to take only one!). It is very likely that it is caused by parasites or microorganism. There are parasites that are quite common like Giardia and Coccidia that are not killed by normal wormtreatments. Long lasting Parasites can affect the skin too.

Ina