# Diarrhea and Blue Buffalo puppy food?



## mayapaya (Sep 28, 2011)

Our pup Maya had loose stools on the Blue Buffalo puppy formula, and I contemplated switching myself, but then I read in several threds that the recommended amount on the bag may be much more than she needs. I discussed with the vet and dropped her to a little over two cups from the 3 cups a day she was getting, (she's almost 7 months old) and she's doing fine on it now. Search the threds for Blue Buffalo and you'll find some who had similar issues, with some suggestions on new foods. Good luck!


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## canine_mommy (Dec 27, 2010)

Puppies can get diarrhea when you transition from one food to the other, so mixing it little by little can help. 

That said, my vet recently told me that a lot of his patients are complaining about digestive issues with Blue Buffalo. I have to switch Austin to adult food and BB was one of the options, but on vet's recommendation, I've decided not to go with it.


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## tippykayak (Oct 27, 2008)

Is it happening in a cycle? Do you get some good days and then back to bad?


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## Florabora22 (Nov 30, 2008)

Flora did terribly on Blue Buffalo. She'd get diarrhea so bad that it was like water. Brown, smelly water...


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## Rainheart (Nov 28, 2010)

I have seen a lot of issues with Blue Buffalo, that it might be too rich for puppies. My vet also said that some of the formulas have had excess calcium and had been recalled. I've never tried BB myself, but I personally would not use this food.


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## iansgran (May 29, 2010)

Some of the high protein foods are too rich for little puppy tummies. You might go back to the one the breeder sent home. You can add a spoon of pumpkin (plain not the pie mix) to the food to help firm up the stool. Or it can be a recurrence of the giaridia.


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## cmz1210 (Jan 13, 2012)

Faith, did you end up switching your dog food and if so, to what? Sounds like I'm in the same predicament....giardia, but our pup's stools are still loose after finishing her metronidazole. She is on Blue Buffalo Large Breed Puppy.


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## rhondas (Sep 10, 2010)

@cmz1210

It is not uncommon to need more than one round of Metronizadole to get rid of giardia.
Did your vet recheck using a snap test?


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## darbysdad (Dec 23, 2011)

Faith82 said:


> Our puppy has had diarrhea issues since the day we brought him home. He did have issues with giardia for almost a month and a half so we assumed that is what was giving him the loose bowels. Since then he has tested negative for giardia but the diarrhea continues. He's been on different probiotics and medications almost continuously. We started him with Purina LBP when we first brought him home because that is what the breeder had him on. We slowly transitioned him to Blue Buffalo. We are thinking that the blue buffalo is what is giving him the diarrhea now. Has anyone else had this issue with this food and if so what did you switch your puppy to that works and is a high quality food?


Darby has been on Blue Buffalo with no problems at all.


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## cmz1210 (Jan 13, 2012)

@rhondas

Thanks. I will keep that in mind. On the last day of her metronidazole, I started her on rice and chicken. Her stools are normal and firm now, but I am going to do another fecal test (maybe more?) this week. With the rice and chicken I have been giving her Forta Flora. I will try to reintroduce the Blue Buffalo gradually. Perhaps the antibiotic for the giardia wiped out the good bacteria in her GI, so getting her balanced again was the issue and not the food. Trial and error I guess!


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## Deber (Aug 23, 2011)

We had to do two rounds of metronidazole and it took about a week to refirm stools after treatment. Giardia can be stubborn. Best thing we did was we started all our dogs on probotics, Dogzymes, for just the reason you stated and because of threads on the forum. Feel this has helped a lot.


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## dmsl (Jun 7, 2009)

I wouldn't start her back on bb, I'd switch to another brand. Ours did horribly on bb and I went straight back to what the breeder had used (I figured since the loose stools were so bad, it couldn't get worse!) and we have stuck with Eukanuba Naturally Wild - either the salmon or vennison. You can search this forum, many use it and tons use purina pro plan.

good luck!!!


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## Faith82 (Aug 25, 2011)

cmz1210 said:


> Faith, did you end up switching your dog food and if so, to what? Sounds like I'm in the same predicament....giardia, but our pup's stools are still loose after finishing her metronidazole. She is on Blue Buffalo Large Breed Puppy.



Yes, we did switch his food first to Fromm LBP but his stools were still loose, again no giardia. Then we decided to switch to Purina Sensitive Skin and Stomach since we have heard a lot of good things about this food. He still had loose stools!!!! ( we transitioned him very slowly to both these foods). FINALLY we decided to go to a different vet and have a fecal smear and culture which is different than a regular fecal test. He tested positive for Clostridium (an overgrowth of bacteria in his intestines). Most dogs have this but his levels were too high. He's now on Tylosin powder, an antibiotic, and a mulit-vitamin every day. He is doing better. We are not sure if it was the food or the clostridium or a combination of both that was giving him the diarrhea. We would eventually like to switch him back to a higher quality food. We've heard good things about Nutro. Hope this helps!


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## Faith82 (Aug 25, 2011)

cmz1210 said:


> @rhondas
> 
> Thanks. I will keep that in mind. On the last day of her metronidazole, I started her on rice and chicken. Her stools are normal and firm now, but I am going to do another fecal test (maybe more?) this week. With the rice and chicken I have been giving her Forta Flora. I will try to reintroduce the Blue Buffalo gradually. Perhaps the antibiotic for the giardia wiped out the good bacteria in her GI, so getting her balanced again was the issue and not the food. Trial and error I guess!



Might want to ask for a fecal smear AND a culture. It's expensive but we finally got a diagnosis for our pup (Clostridium). I wish we would have done it sooner, would've saved us money in the long run!


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## rhondas (Sep 10, 2010)

@cmz1210

Once you know definitively that her giardia has cleared up you might want to consider changing foods.
My now 15 week old was being fed Solid Gold Lamb & Rice by the breeder and she also added pumpkin & rice to at least get form - sorry about being explicit. She had sent out stool samples for the entire litter (11) to UofI to rule out everything. I also had fecals done when he came home. 

She wanted all the puppies on an adult or ALS food by 4 months and was ok with me changing to what I wanted to feed. Well, after I transitioned to Acana Grain Free (and Wysong's Pet Inoculant Probiotic which was highly recommended by the integrative vet as the best one for puppies) his stool is normal. 

So it can ultimately just be the food but rule out everything else first.


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