The Quahog
Forums Enthusiast
Here is our take on coprophagy, forgive me if I have said this here before.
No, it is not a dietary deficiency. That is a good guess- rabbits eat their stool to recycle nutrition, and their is a depraved appetite called pica seen in cows and people, amongst others, from severe deficiencies, but that is not the case except perhaps in a severely malnourished puppy. It is simply a 'bad habit.'
However, I firmly believe that most puppies do not eat poop because they are 'dirty', but because they are 'clean'. What dog is the world champion coprophagist? You would think beagle, lab, some other hound, whatever , right? Nope, far and away it is the Shih Tzu. Extremely common in the breed. Then the little foo-foo jumps up and licks Mommy in the face. I beleive they do it because it offends them to have poop lying around, just as we are offended if we go to someone's house and see dog poop by the front door. So minerals, supplements, Adolph's meat Tenderiser etc dont work. (The theory behind the meat tenderizer is they are not digesting their food -malabsorption, similar to the EPI of GSDs - so nutients come out in the stool. As that isnt the reason this doesnt work.)
The pills are vegetable dyes which have little taste when eaten but, when digested, become noxious to the dog. Pineapple works the same way. A good idea, they work in perhaps half the pups, but rmember they must be eaten by the 'pooper' to work. hence no, eating pineapple will not prevent coproghagy of rabbit stool.
No, it is not a dietary deficiency. That is a good guess- rabbits eat their stool to recycle nutrition, and their is a depraved appetite called pica seen in cows and people, amongst others, from severe deficiencies, but that is not the case except perhaps in a severely malnourished puppy. It is simply a 'bad habit.'
However, I firmly believe that most puppies do not eat poop because they are 'dirty', but because they are 'clean'. What dog is the world champion coprophagist? You would think beagle, lab, some other hound, whatever , right? Nope, far and away it is the Shih Tzu. Extremely common in the breed. Then the little foo-foo jumps up and licks Mommy in the face. I beleive they do it because it offends them to have poop lying around, just as we are offended if we go to someone's house and see dog poop by the front door. So minerals, supplements, Adolph's meat Tenderiser etc dont work. (The theory behind the meat tenderizer is they are not digesting their food -malabsorption, similar to the EPI of GSDs - so nutients come out in the stool. As that isnt the reason this doesnt work.)
The pills are vegetable dyes which have little taste when eaten but, when digested, become noxious to the dog. Pineapple works the same way. A good idea, they work in perhaps half the pups, but rmember they must be eaten by the 'pooper' to work. hence no, eating pineapple will not prevent coproghagy of rabbit stool.
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