Dog eating habits

Question
My 2 yr old Basset has started eating grass.  He will be fine for the most of the week and then one or two days (not necessarily in a row) he will not eat.  But he wants to go outside and just eat and eat and eat grass.  He runs around and plays and seems fine the other 5-6 days a week and even on the days he wont eat he still is in good spirits and seems okay (except of course not eating his food and wanting the grass).  This has been going on now for about 4 months.

Answer
This is usually a sign that the dog is having digestive upsets. Dogs instinctively eat grass to settle their stomach or to make themselves vomit up something bad. Most people think they just like to eat grass for fun but most of the time their stomach hurts.

Start with diet. What is he eating that is upsetting him. Treats, people food, etc  can cause this. Leave out the treats and human food and see how he does. If he still feels bad weekly then it could be his dog food. Most diets are not formulated in a way that is consistent and that will cause upsets in dogs.

One thing most consumers are not aware of is that pet food manufacturers do not have to have the same ingredients in their food to make up their nutritional content. They buy whatever is cheap on the docks that day. As a result of this when you buy a bag of food one week it might be totally different in content then the food you bought the bag before. This amounts to you switching foods on him without a gradual mix. This results in upset stomachs, diarrhea, and can lead to pancreatitis.

Hill's Science Diet is the last food on the market with fixed formulation. This means the ingredients stay the same batch after batch, assuring that the food you buy is the same high quality bag after bag. That means that the dog doesn't get a 'new' food each time resulting in no digestive upsets.

So give it a chance by removing all the treats etc first then go for the diet if there is still an issue going on.

I hope this helps Tammi. Please let me know how he does.