Hello! I have a year and a half year old rescued wheaten terrier. I need food suggestions please. He’s been randomly vomiting yellow bile. We’ve tried Natures Balance, Blue Freedom, Nutrish, and ProPlan Salmon. The Pro Plan is our latest and he hasn’t gotten sick yet. Any insight? Please and thank you!!
Hello Nicky and your Wheaten - thank you for having rescued him. Do you know what he was fed on before? Sometimes randomly vomiting bile can just be a change of food brands and/or contents. What does your vet say, although sometimes vets that sell dog food can be a bit biased. I am sorry that I cannot advise you as I am a raw feeder but hopefully someone more experienced than I will be along shortly who can. In the meantime may we have a picture [or pictures] of your lovely boy?
Thank you so much for your reply! I added pumpkin and he seems to be doing a bit better I’ll upload a pic of my little man as soon as I figure out how
He is adorable Nicky what is his name? Such a beautiful face, just asking to be loved. As I said, I am a raw feeder and before then when I did feed kibble, there were not the varieties that you have probably tried. All I can think of is that frequent changing of brands and/or contents can sometimes cause some problems with digestion, as possibly something [which has to be processed by the liver and then passed into the gall bladder] has maybe been irritating your gorgeous boy's stomach. Please give him ear twiddles and tummy rubs with love from little Tikva and from me. Juli x
How many meals do you give him in a day? Sometimes yellow bile can just mean that he has an empty stomach. This can be prevented by splitting his daily ration to create an extra mealtime. Otherwise, he could be making himself sick by eating grass.
Good thought Carole, although at his age two meals a day should be enough. But all dogs are different and some some do not like having empty stomachs, so although Tikva has only two meals she does have a small tooth cleaning chewy when she is up, her breakfast at ~10am, and then only a tiny few treats if I have to leave her to go to the store, which is only a couple of times in the week, nothing until her supper at ~8pm. But as she does not go into her crate for the night at anywhere near midnight, she always has a little bikki when she goes into it. She does not eat grass but one of her supplements has all the good greens to help her digest her food, although with a kibble-fed dog that would not be necessary. I am just a fussy raw feeder!
When you say he is "bad" about eating grass, do you mean he wants to eat it frequently? Because if grass has been sprayed against weeds, that could cause some problems through the liver and into the gall bladder, causing these gall bile upchucks. Or maybe he has a tummy ache and that by eating grass and then vomiting bile it helps relieve it?
I am trying to do a multi quote to answer more things at a time, but seem to have boogered up somehow. Just put it down to old woman's failing memory. OK, from what I understand, freshly cut grass should not have been sprayed before being mowed, and usually dogs prefer to eat grass they have gnawed themselves, not had freshly cut for them. But there definitely is something in fresh greens of all types which can help digestion, both for humans and for dogs [and cats]. Which is probably why "green smoothies" became so popular. Some of the mixed greens I give Tikva are now in tablet form [gimmee gimmee gimmee] whereas previously she had as dehydrated powder. Do they help her? Do the green smoothies I make for myself, even though I probably get through a minimum of 10 a day fruit and vegetables, do the green smoothies help me? I do not know.
Most dogs that being up bile do it in the morning because their stomachs have been empty overnight. A snack at bedtime is the best way to stop this. Grass eating can either be a desire to get something into the stomach, or a means of getting something out of the stomach (indigestion). My two are dedicated grazers though - especially new growth grass - they just seem to enjoy a little fresh greenstuff.
But grazers against freshly cut grass is not the same. I am not sure why [but could find out] the difference between chombling on fresh cut and and fresh grazed I know you are a nutcase raw feeder - well most of you do. No way am I am "you gotta eats this or that" - I am not a vegetarian or vegan [the latter would probably be the end of me] but I have learned that what suits me, also suits Tikva - and I really think that it helped Pereg, as such a diet was thought to be better for her condition. And like Pereg, and Tikva after the bottle feeding and weaning, seemed to have a stomach that such feeding seemed to suit her, I have stuck to is. It is highly unlikely I will ever have the treasure of another four-legged companion, so I think the way I food I give cannot be too bad now.
We have to be careful with Merry when we cut the (sort of) lawns, or she will gobble up those heavy, finely chopped, clumps of grass that fall out of the Flymo. She hasn't had any ill effects, but I do worry about the danger of bloat. She also relishes a piece of horse poo - I ration her to just one piece - and would eat rabbit currants like Coco-pops, if she was off the lead. There probably is a risk, but, as a breed, Beagles have a long history of eating disgusting items in stableyards. Ugh!
Carole, what with you and Gareth, you both 'ave me almost 'avin anaccident! Pereg was very fond of what came out of Lexi's rear end, to the extent of standing behind it waiting... ...and as Tikva cannot get near horse poo [why does Breedia seem to always get onto the subject of poo?] and as far as I know there are no rabbits here... ...the only things she seems to chomble are tissues - if she raids my pockets while I not noticing.
I think it was the rather eccentric Juliette de Bairacli Levy that used to tell us that this was one way that dogs could boost their dietary enzymes. Roll on 50 years, and researchers are talking about faecal transplants - both upper and lower. What goes around, comes around. However, there are risks. Some horse wormers can be toxic to dogs, and two years ago, a training friend lost a promising gundog puppy, which failed to recover from an e-coli infection. She is convinced that this was contracted from horse manure.
