We had Blue on Kirkland puppy food and his poo was soft verging on runny. Now we slowly switched over to Kirkland chicken, rice, and vegetable (26% protein min) and its even runnier and he's waking us up at night to go out (thankfully he isnt going on the floor!)

So what component is most likely to be messing with him and what else should we try?

It could be anything... or it could just be that you aren't giving him enough time to adjust to the new food, or you are introducing a new food too fast and not transitioning him slowly with the older food.

There seems to be an increase in the number of dogs that are intolerant of wheat, even if it's not in the form of runny stools, it could be seen as skin issues or ear infections.

Two other proteins that seem to cause the most problems are chicken and beef, however lamb is also a pretty big one too.

Your best bet is to put him on something that he's never ever been on before... transition it SLOWLY and give it at least 6 weeks (because that is how long it can take to get anything causing problems out of his system). Once he has good stools, you could try to reintroduce a different protein and see if he has a reaction. Google Food Elimination Diet.

Mine gets very runny stools with food that has wheat. Yep, you just need to do the food elimination, I make sure there is also no corn in the dog food.

One of these days I'm going to the raw diet, it just sounds so overwhelming to me right now.

Jade has issues with grain and also anything with lamb for the protein. Food elimination is the way to go. Has he ever been on another brand?

Yeah the raw diet sounds like way too much work for me right now too.

jadesmom wrote:


No, he has only been on Kirkland but we switched him from puppy to adult a few weeks ago. Since he has never had a normal poo I am guessing its not a good fit for him, and I need to switch brands.

If chicken, beef, and lamb could all cause problems maybe I could try salmon or something? There is no wheat in his food, just rice and barley.

Yeah I think it might be time to switch up brands, just make sure you transition slowly. Salmon usually works well for dogs that have intolerance issues. Jade does great with salmon. Bison, venison, and duck are also good with her. Every dog is different, you just have to find what works for yours.

We tried different things with Ocha and nothing seemed to work. Her stools were always runny and got bounds of diarrhea as well every so often. We tried Wellness large breed puppy, Blue Buffalo large breed puppies, and Acana lamb limited grain (1 protein + 1 grain [oats]). We transitioned to all of those very slowly but the results were always the same. We switched to commercial raw and by the second day her stools were completely solid and small. We have given her the chicken, turkey, venison, and beef options of her raw food and they all work fine. Eventually we will try making her own raw food but for now we are spending the money (~ $3/lb) on commercial food until we research enough and are willing to spend the time.I think you can even find Bravo raw at pet stores for about $2.5/lb. We have given her stuff that contains the main protein + bones + organs + veggies.

You can try those to see if it fixes the problem and that will give you an idea or motivation to do your own raw in the future.

Ocha wrote:


Ugh. I have a kid who starts engineering school in 2 years, dont think I can justify that expense unless nothing else will work. Plus, ick. I hope I can find a dry food because the germaphobe in me does not want raw meat being constantly in use in the house. So I guess I would say my motivation level for the raw diet is low.

Last night I brought home a bag of salmon/sweet potato grain free dog food ($1/pound) and will slowly be switching him over to that. I gave him some last night and he didnt wake us up last night so fingers crossed!

Well he has been on the sweet potato/salmon (mixed 1/2 and 1/2 with his old stuff)for 4 days now and already he has normal poop. So I dont know what component of the other food was disagreeing with him but I am definitely happy with the salmon stuff.

Scout has been having a similar issue. He has been on Iams large breed puppy since we got him at 10weeks. He is now 17 weeks and has been having a soft stool issue for a while now (luckily no diarrhea yet!). He is constantly licking his rear-end, and even if he is on the other side of the room we can still smell the metallic smell when he does this! Last week he had his anal glands drained (they were FULL) and he was OK for a few days, but now he's back to his usual. I have even been adding a tablespoon of pumpkin pie filler to his evening meal for the last week with no change in his stool. I'm thinking of converting him to TOTW. I had his sister on it (a lab/weim mix) for awhile and she seemed to like it. I'm assuming the licking the booty/smelly-ness is related to the runny stool..

Any suggestions/feedback would be great

My Stormy at 5 1/2 months old has had the same problem too. I switched to half raw diet and Taste Of The Wild Salmon and now he is doing some what better. He scratches his self all the time though, no fleas or hives just don't know.

Stormy has that issue too, constently empting his glands every few days and really smelly. Hope the taste of the wild salmon one helps.

All I know is Blue has been on Kirkland (Costco) grain free Salmon/sweet potato since about August 21 and he is totally normal now. Much easier to clean up the backyard now and no more gas (well a lot less anyway!) I suspect Weims don't deal well with grain.

I will be giving salmon a try. Thanks!