Have you ever walked your dog on a blissfully beautiful Sunday morning, when the birds are chirping, the dew is still wet on the grass, and the weekend quiet is in full force?  You might be breathing in slowly and thoroughly enjoying your outing, when you are suddenly realizing that your dog has seized walking and is intently sniffing.  Before you can move your canine friend along, your doggy suddenly gobbles up the item of interest and you realize to your horror that your dog has eaten another’s dog’s feces.  Yuck!  A variation of this theme occurs when you come into the bathroom, only to see your dog’s head in the cat’s litter box, and he is snacking away at litter covered cat feces. What is it about poop – why can dogs not resist that taste sometimes?

If veterinarians had a dollar for each time this question was asked, they could probably retire in style to the Bahamas within a few short years of opening their practices.  As a matter of fact, this problem appears to be so common, that actually quite a few different reasons have been identified.
• First and foremost, of course, is a dog’s highly developed sense of smell. Adding to this a dog’s natural predisposition to be scavengers – always on the hunt for a tasty morsel – it makes sense to contemplate that another dog’s partially digested food may be attractive.  If the neighborhood pooch has eaten a peanut treat but some of the peanuts are left undigested and have been passed through the dog’s intestines into his stool, your dog will be smelling the peanuts, and from smelling these peanuts to gobbling up that piece of dog feces is only a very short trip.  The same goes for a dog’s own feces, if he smells some undigested food in them.
• Some scientists believe that eating their poop is a puppy’s way of coping with the stress of potty training. They feel guilty for leaving it, and want to make the “evidence” of their accidents disappear.
• Dogs that just had a litter of puppies will eat their little pups’ poop to keep the area clean and free of pests.
• Dogs who have strong control issues, such as territorialism, will frequently try to eat the poop they find while walking around the neighborhood in the same way as they will urinate over the pee of other dogs to eradicate those dogs’ claims on the territory.

Knowing why a dog is picking up poop is one thing, figuring out what to do about it is something different altogether.  Here are some suggestions on what might help.
• Purchase some papaya extract from your health food store and mix it with your dog’s food. Its enzymatic action will help your dog to digest his food more completely, thus taking away the temptation of undigested food.
• As an alternative, another supplement that may be obtained through your vet is called “Forbid” and while it is tasteless and odorless when ingested by your dog, it will make his feces stink to high heaven – even to his nose.  Of course, this will only deter him from heating his own poop; this will not work if he also goes after the neighborhood dogs’.
• Clean up after your dog immediately after he eliminates.
• Move your kitty’s litter box into a location your dog does not have access to, or put it into a closet and install a cat door in the closet door to keep the dog out while allowing the cat access.
• Some schools of thought believe that eating poop is more a behavior issue than a physiological one, and thus they suggest training the dog to abstain from eating poop by making it unappealing.  While to you this should not take any effort at all, to a dog it will actually take some substances that he will hate to make it not worth eating anymore. Some suggest liquid hot sauce that should be liberally poured over the feces. The dog will detest the taste, and will hopefully cease to go after his feces – or other dog’s droppings – when he is looking for a snack.
• Do not forget to have your doggie toothbrush and doggie toothpaste ready for some serious oral hygiene when you get back home!