Ewww, I was just doing some research on why dogs eat rotten stuff and came across an article on why dogs eat poop. Here's a link to the article if you have the stomach: http://www.pet-comfort-products.com/why-dogs-eat-poop.html
The actual definition of this is "Coprophagia," and dogs do it on purpose and it can become a habit. Gross!
Our dog used to eat kitty roca. I wondered why I didn't have to clean the kitty litter box so often. Since we no longer have the cat, I think the dog is cured. Maybe she needs to go to a dog psychiatrist just to be sure. According to the article there are many abnormal canine eating issues. I know for sure our dog has food issues. She was abandoned as a pup and spent several months on her own before she was adopted by my hubby. Nobody gets between her and her food dish. No free feeding from the self-serve bin at our house. She gets her morning meal, her evening meal plus a Scooby snack.
She's not allowed to eat people food, but pretty much everyone besides hubby and I sneak her human food. Occasionally we'll slip her a morsel or two, which 'magically' falls from the sky. Since she's not allowed to beg, she doesn't know how to catch food that's tossed to her. It's entertaining to see unknowing humans toss her food and watching it bounce off her head. Of course, then we have to give them the lecture on how we don't feed our dog people food, but nobody really cares.
Another odd thing dogs eat is grass. I always thought it was because they were sick to their stomachs and needed to purge. All the dogs I'd seen ingesting grass pretty much ralphed shortly after. Not so says my youngest. She took an animal behavior class and says they do it because they like it. According to my google search, we're both right. If dogs eat it fast enough it will make them regurgitate right away. It also says many of them just plain like it.
I think I'm about done with this topic now. I mean the next logical step would be to talk about body parts dogs lick and I'm not going there. I suspect the real reason dogs eat rotten stuff is because they can.
The actual definition of this is "Coprophagia," and dogs do it on purpose and it can become a habit. Gross!
Our dog used to eat kitty roca. I wondered why I didn't have to clean the kitty litter box so often. Since we no longer have the cat, I think the dog is cured. Maybe she needs to go to a dog psychiatrist just to be sure. According to the article there are many abnormal canine eating issues. I know for sure our dog has food issues. She was abandoned as a pup and spent several months on her own before she was adopted by my hubby. Nobody gets between her and her food dish. No free feeding from the self-serve bin at our house. She gets her morning meal, her evening meal plus a Scooby snack.
She's not allowed to eat people food, but pretty much everyone besides hubby and I sneak her human food. Occasionally we'll slip her a morsel or two, which 'magically' falls from the sky. Since she's not allowed to beg, she doesn't know how to catch food that's tossed to her. It's entertaining to see unknowing humans toss her food and watching it bounce off her head. Of course, then we have to give them the lecture on how we don't feed our dog people food, but nobody really cares.
Another odd thing dogs eat is grass. I always thought it was because they were sick to their stomachs and needed to purge. All the dogs I'd seen ingesting grass pretty much ralphed shortly after. Not so says my youngest. She took an animal behavior class and says they do it because they like it. According to my google search, we're both right. If dogs eat it fast enough it will make them regurgitate right away. It also says many of them just plain like it.
I think I'm about done with this topic now. I mean the next logical step would be to talk about body parts dogs lick and I'm not going there. I suspect the real reason dogs eat rotten stuff is because they can.
