There is a problem many pet owners can relate to and that is dog and cat diarrhea. Runny stools are a very common problem with pet owners. Stomach and digestive disorders are usually a result of something they ate from the garbage, changes in the food they are given, viruses, overeating and certain diseases like cancer and parasites in their intentional tract.

Above all make sure your pet has a healthy diet and don’t give them people food especially chocolate or milk. They must have plenty of water and exercise to keep the bowels healthy.

Dog and cat diarrhea that lasts for more than two days can cause dehydration or they may have an obstruction which could be very dangerous. So if your pet has fever, pain, vomiting, and blood in the runny stools, doesn’t eat and has weight loss, seek treatment right away.

Over processed food and pasteurized milk can cause runny stools and is detrimental to the health of our animals. Treating your pet for runny stools could be as simple changing their diet. Try introducing raw, unprocessed food in small amounts while limiting canned foods.

Diarrhea or runny stools is a symptom of something happening within the intestinal tract to cause dog and cat diarrhea and there are many home remedies to help correct an irregular digestive system. Homeopathic supplements available can be used to prevent and treat by soothing mucus membranes in the intestines and will help aid in absorption of nutrients.

So make sure your pet has plenty of roughage for firm stools. Don’t feed them people food; make sure they have plenty of water and a well balanced diet so their immune system is able to fight off any disturbance.

By: Rebecca Shelly

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There are various parasites that can affect your iguana. Some of them live internally, while others inhabit the outside of the body. Some of the most common parasites include mites, worms, and protozoans. This article will discuss everything you need to know.

Worms

Worms are internal parasites that inhabit the gastrointestinal tract. There are various types such as hookworms, tapeworms, and pinworms. If your iguana is infected with worms, he will show a variety of symptoms such as smelly stools, lethargy, and weight loss. You may also be able to see the worms in his feces.

The veterinarian will have the determine the type of worms that are causing problems. After this, he can prescribe the proper medication. Multiple treatments may be necessary to totally get rid of the infection. You will also need to disinfect your iggie’s enclosure before he returns to it. Eggs can be shed in the feces, so you will also need to clean up his stool promptly whenever he defecates.

Mites

Mites are probably the most troublesome of all iguana parasites. They attack to your lizard and start sucking his blood. They usually inhabit the armpits, vent, and eyelids. They’re very small, but you may be able to notice tiny specks moving around on his skin.

Mite are notoriously difficult to get rid of permanently. First, you need to treat your iguana. The enclosure will then need to be treated. They can easily hide away and be difficult to get to in the enclosure.

Protozoans

Protozoans are single-celled organisms that inhabit the gastrointestinal tract. These parasites cause signs such as very smelly stool and diarrhea. Since there are various types of protozoans that can infect your iguana, the veterinarian will have to determine exactly which one is causing problems. After this, medication will be prescribed to treat the problem.

By: D Swain

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Do you experience chronic excessive gas? If so then today I’ll explain for you the most common reasons that people suffer from this condition and what you can start doing today to begin to get relief from an excess of smelly intestinal gas. Best of all, not only will your gas go away but also a majority of other health problems that you might be suffering from.

What Causes Excessive Smelly Intestinal Gas?

The main culprit in all this is quite often the fungal yeast known as Candida Albicans which exists in over 90% of the population. Not everyone with this yeast has health problems of course, but those that do are often a result of experiencing a yeast overgrowth somewhere in their body. When this yeast overgrows the beneficial bacteria in your digestive tract will often be reduced in numbers as their #1 task is to keep other micro-organisms such as yeast in check.

When candida runs rampant it causes fermentation in the digestive tract, this is where all the gas is coming from. When left to continue overgrowing the amount of symptoms experienced by a person will continue to grow as well, symptoms commonly experienced range anywhere from digestive problems to mental/emotional problems such as depression or a lack of concentration also known as brain fog to even asthma, allergies and respiratory problems in general.

How do you Control & Eliminate the Overgrowth and the Gas?

The best solution is to simply stop eating garbage processed food because candida loves to feed off of it especially the processed fats and sugars. You need to start starving it off and the best way is through whole foods that are low in sugar. Besides the diet a program of supplements is needed to control and vanquish the excess yeast from your body. Then lastly are the various cleansing procedures you can follow to fully clean out your body and begin to feel the way you’re supposed to feel, healthy!

By: Jessica D Dale

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How and what you feed your Pit Bull has a big effect on their health and over-all behavior. There are so many commercially available dog foods to choose from that making the right decision can be somewhat impossible. But let’s tackle the problem nonetheless.

For a change, look beyond the labels and advertisements and look into what exactly your dog food contains. What follows is a partial list to help you find out if your dog is getting what he needs in the right amounts.

If your pet dog has large, smelly stool, is gaseous, burps often, sheds constantly, is prone to ear and skin infections, has either no energy or is hyperactive and if his immune system is weak, something may be wrong with your pet’s diet. Although any or a combination of these symptoms may occur occasionally, having them recur often is a cause for concern and reviewing your pet’s diet is one of the first things you should look into.

First of all, your dog needs 45 nutrients to function properly. Major groups for these nutrients are protein, carbohydrates, fat, vitamins and minerals, as well as water. These nutrients have to be in the right amounts so that they are properly digested and absorbed by the body.

Protein Remember that your dog, or any dog for that matter, is a carnivore, meaning his body mainly uses meat. That also means that vegetables and grains are not supposed to have a major contribution to your pet’s diet.

On dog food packages how much protein is in the food is indicated. But finding out how much protein is in the food is not as important as knowing what source the protein came from.

Dog food makers have a wide choice of protein sources to choose from. Aside from meats (beef, chicken, lamb, etc.), plants and grains like corn, wheat and soy are used as sources.

To find out what sources have been used most in the package you’re buying, look at the ingredients list. By law, the largest amount of ingredient used is listed first and others follow in decreasing amounts. You should see 3 meat sources on the first 5 items mentioned. Any less than that and you may not be giving your dog the proper protein for his diet.

Carbohydrates Your dog will also need carbohydrates primarily for energy. But unlike their masters, dogs do not need a lot of carbohydrates to be healthy. A diet high in protein and low in carbohydrates is ideal for your pet.

Since dogs are meat-eaters, diets high in carbohydrates will take a long time for your pet to digest, not to mention resulting to large and smelly stool and gas. The gums can also grow sore due to excessive chewing and his breath can develop a bad smell. So only use a small amount of a carbohydrate source (such as grains) in your pet’s diet.

Fats Two kinds of fat exist. One is saturated (animal fat) and the other is polyunsaturated (vegetable fat). Your dog will need both and taken together supply essential fatty acids (EFA) needed to maintain good health.

Not enough fat in the diet can cause low energy levels, heart problems and dry skin. However, too much fat can cause obesity. Tumors and cancers can also develop. In reading the label, look for a product that has a good balance between animal and vegetable fat in it.

Vitamins Vitamins are necessary to release nutrients from the food that the body can use. There are two types of vitamins: water-soluble vitamins and fat-soluble vitamins. Both types are needed by your dog. Vitamins B and C are water-soluble. Too much of these will not harm the body much since it is urinated out in 4 to 8 hours. This is the reason they need to be in each meal.

Vitamins A, D, E and K are fat-soluble. They are stored in fatty tissues of the body and the liver. It is important to remember that vitamins are easily lost in the making of manufactured dog food. And they break down as soon as you open the package and expose the food to light and air. Vitamins B and C are particularly sensitive.

By: Jason Mann

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When your dog is eating his stool, this can be something that is very frustrating to watch and to deal with. First of all, it can be messy, and second of all, it isn’t healthy. This means that you need to make some changes with the way that your dog is kept, and with his behavior and his eating habits. Luckily, there are changes that you can make to make sure that your dog stops eating his stool, and these changes can be the things that make the rest of the aspects of your life work out better.

What Causes Eating Of Stools

There are two main reasons that your dog might want to eat their stools. One of the reasons is a physical reason, and the other is an emotional reason. Therefore, it is important to explore the two reasons that your dog might eat his stools, so that you can know what you should be doing about it.

The first reason your dog might eat his stools is a physical reason. It means that the food your dog is eating isn’t being properly digested by your dog. When your dog eats his stool, it means that the dog knows that there are still nutrients that are left in the stool, and those nutrients should be eaten as soon as possible in order to help them to be healthy. Therefore, if your dog is eating his stool, it might mean that his body isn’t digesting the food that he eats.

Secondly, your dog might be eating his stool because of an emotional reason. Sometimes, when dogs know that they have made a mistake, they will try to hide it. If your dog is eating his stool, it might be because he believes that he wasn’t supposed to go to the bathroom where and when he did. This could come from him being yelled at for going to the bathroom inside, or for him being startled or frightened when he was going to the bathroom.

What Can You Do About It?

The first thing that you should do is to change your dog’s food to a very high quality food. Make sure that you get one that is easily digestible and one that has great ingredients. Stay away from dog foods that have “meal” in them, and steer away from foods that have a lot of corn content. Corn isn’t easy for dogs to digest.

If the problem persists after you have changed his food, it might be an emotional problem. You should watch your dog very carefully. When he does to the bathroom, immediately call him over to you for praise. Be very happy and very excited about what he has done. Remove the stool from where he went before he can get back to smell it and try to eat it. After awhile of praising him for going and removing the stool, he will hopefully learn that he doesn’t need to hide it anymore. As with wearing dog clothes, learning proper potty routines can be hard, but worth it in the end.

By: Kelly Perry

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There are two ways you will find out there is blood in your stool. You’ll see it when you go or a sample will be taken that tests positive. Both are a frightening experience, because there are some very serious conditions that have this as a symptom.

Let’s start with the least frightening. Every time you take anything with aspirin in it, whether it’s in its original form as willow bark or in the convenient little tablet from the pharmacy, you will have intestinal bleeding. There are no ifs, ands or buts about it. It will always happen. Most of the time, you won’t even know because it tends to only cause minor bleeding.

Hemorrhoids can also cause bleeding, and it usually presents itself as blood, where anything higher in the gastrointestinal tract may be harder to detect. They, too, are usually minor but annoying problems.

The color of the blood in your stools is very important, as it gives you an idea as to where it originates. If it is black, tarry and/or like coffee grounds, it probably occurred in the upper GI tract. Bacteria breaks it down to give it this distinctive color, texture…and odor. It usually smells very bad.

Maroon colored blood is at the top of your lower GI tract, usually the right and/or transverse colon. If it is bright red, it could come from the anus, rectum or colon. Knowing this can help the doctor narrow down what and where to look for problems.

While it is fairly rare, diverticulitis can cause bleeding from this area. There will be other symptoms, including tenderness, changes in bowel habits, diarrhea, etc. Diverticulitis is caused by a weakening in the colon that allow pouches to form.

Ulcers can be a cause of bleeding, and the condition is most associated with the stomach or duodenum, the first segment of small intestine after the stomach. This condition gives you the tarry, smelly stools. It was once thought that all kinds of things led to ulcers, but most of the time, they are caused by a bacteria, called h. pylori. Your doctor will prescribe an antibiotic and it should clear up.

One of the most frightening things that can be a cause of blood in stools is colorectal cancer. Before I go further, if blood is your only symptom, it is less than likely that this is the problem. Many symptoms will appear for this medical condition. Also, bear in mind that many other, less serious conditions can mimic cancer. Your doctor will be able to help you with the proper diagnosis. The other symptoms can include fatigue, weakness, shortness of breath, changes in bowel habits, narrowed stools, weight loss, pain, cramps and so on.

If you find blood in your feces, it is very important that you see your doctor. Even relatively minor blood loss can cause problems with the rest of your body, and if it is serious it is better to catch it early. It’s equally important to know what all types of blood in your feces looks like. Be wary if your stool suddenly begins to resemble coffee grounds, is black, tarry and has a very foul odor. Any combination of these should be assessed by your doctor.

By: Mary Bodel

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How do you know if you need special dog food for allergies?
How do you even know if your dog has allergies?

Does your dog scratch a lot? Have bad gas or smelly stools? How about diarrhea or loose stools? Bad Breath? Does your dog paw at his ears or shake his head a lot?

If you answered yes to any of these questions then your dog has typical allergy symptoms. You may need to start making homemade healthy dog food for allergies.

What is homemade dog food for allergies? Well, the homemade part is easy – you make it. Dog food for allergies refers to a type of food that will help alleviate your dog’s allergies.

But you feed your dog the best commercial dog food already. Maybe you even feed him a special commercial dog food for allergies. Irregardless, your current commercial dog food may be the cause of your dog’s allergies. But not in the way you think.

Your dog may not actually be allergic to any type of food, or anything else for that matter. He may have “allergies” because he doesn’t get the nutrients from his current dog food to keep him healthy. His immune system may be constantly stressed because of a lack of nutrients. When this happens, just like with people, he becomes hyper-sensitive to normal environmental factors.

Homemade dog food for allergies provides nutrients that your dog is starving for – not just food to fill him up. That’s what most commercial dog foods do – just fill up your dog. The food is so heavily processed and made with such sub-standard quality ingredients that your dog’s immune system just goes out of whack. And you start to see it when they scratch constantly, or have constant ear infections, smelly stools, etc.

When you start feeding your dog homemade healthy dog food for allergies, his whole body gets healthier. His immune system isn’t so stressed and hyper-sensitive. What’s the catch to all of this? Instead of scooping out a cupful of heavily processed “food”, you just provide fresh, quality food for him to eat. And the more variety of foods, the better – just like humans.

Just bought a bunch of broccoli for the family? Your dog may love broccoli – really, mine do! Have some extra carrots in the vegetable bin? My dogs love those as well! For vegetables, just throw them in the blender first (a dog’s digestive tract can’t break veggies down quickly enough) and add them to the rest of his meal. There are only a handful of foods that should NOT be fed to a dog, and another handful that should only be fed in moderation. Once you get these down, it’s easy.

By: K. C. Jones

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If celiac disease symptoms go undiagnosed and untreated in a child, it can lead to stunted growth in a child. It can also lead to terminal illnesses such as cancer and diabetes later in life.

The disease is an ailment in which the body does not absorb the nutrients in the food that is ingested. This leads to ill health. It is triggered by intolerance of the body to gluten in foods. The sources of gluten in foods are wheat, rye, and barley. There are many foods that contain these elements or traces of them.

Therefore it is important to be aware of the symptoms of the disease in children and to deal with them.

At What Age Can The Disease First Appear?

Children can first show signs of the disease at any age. Infants can manifest the symptoms, shortly after having gluten introduced to their diets. Medical studies have shown that children who were introduced to gluten during the first three months of life had a five-times greater risk of developing celiac disease than children who were first exposed between four and six months of age. The symptoms in children typically become apparent three to five months after first consuming foods containing gluten, although for some few cases the interval may be as short as one month.

Children have a 5-10% chance of getting the disease, if someone in their family has it.

What Are The Symptoms Of Celiac Disease Children?

Acute diarrhoea is a common symptom to watch for in babies and children of all ages.

The physical symptoms you will see if your baby has the disease, will first appear soon after foods containing gluten are introduced into their diet, such as cereals and bread. Your baby’s symptoms may include:

bulky and pale stools smelly diarrhoea vomiting a swollen stomach failure to gain weight and grow

Here are some of the physical symptoms of celiac disease children, after infancy. They may have:

poor growth or no growth pale and smelly stools diarrhoea tiredness breathlessness irregular heartbeat weight loss bloated belly vomiting tiredness

Behavioral symptoms to watch for are:

Irritability Listlessness Poor appetite Cranky Difficulty with concentration Memory difficulty

How To Treat (regard or think about) Children With The Disease

Parents of children, who have been newly diagnosed with the disease, may ask themselves the following type of questions:

How do we send them to school? How can we keep them from feeling different? How do we handle birthday parties and other special occasions? How can we talk to family and friends about this?

It is most important to treat the child in such a way that does not make the child feel different or inferior. Your attitude, and the attitude of extended family members, toward the child can have a significant impact on the mental and physical well being of the child.

It is also important to educate extended family – aunts, uncles and grandparents – and friends about the treatment of the child. You dont want them to convey an idea to the child that he/she is odd or different in some way. If a parent fails to manage this successfully, you may end up dealing with a child whose actual physical condition becomes worse than the celiac condition.

If you are constantly checking the the child for symptoms and questioning their behavior at school and when they are away from home, you will be focusing their attention on the illness. This is the reverse of what you want.

You want celiac disease children to think of themselves as normal, which they are in every way when they are on a diet free of gluten. The difference between them and any child who doesn’t suffer from the disease, is a physical intolerance to rye, wheat and barley products. The child can live a perfectly happy, healthy and active life, if they are taught to eat a gluten free diet and actually do so. To remain free of symptoms, they will need to remain on this diet for the rest of their lives.

By: Jay Hurwitz

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Are you frequently complaining “why am I so gassy all the time”? If so then today I will explain the #1 reason why you feel gassy & bloated and more importantly what you can do to permanently correct this problem! I’ll provide 3 solutions to reduce chronic gas, including the #1 most important one of all which anyone who suffers from chronic gas needs to take into consideration.

Why Am I So Gassy All the Time? The #1 Reason Why You Feel Gassy & Bloated All the Time!

You need to know what’s really in the food you are feeding your dog. As your dog, cat or pet’s guardian, the greatest gift you can give is every chance at good health! The gift of good health starts with the quality of nutrition that affects every aspect of your dog’s well-being.

The diets of our pets are a far cry from the primarily raw protein diets with a lot of variety of their ancestors. Canines and felines cannot live healthy lives without eating meat. Your pet’s teeth are designed for tearing meat and their stomachs are built to break down meat into important nutrients. One increasingly good popular choice is a holistic raw diet — a diet that has been popular for European pets for decades that supplies higher quality protein sources coming from high quality meat, with only natural preservatives, no by-products and no food coloring.

Do you know what’s really in dog food? Many dog foods are manufactured so poorly that vitamins are supplemented. Heat processing, standard in the pet food industry, destroys important nutrients with up to 100% loss of certain vitamins, up to 60% loss of amino acids, and up to 10% loss of fatty acids. Probiotics and enzymes are destroyed, and fats used in processing can be toxic or rancid. But that is not the worst of the story, and why you should know what is really in the dog food you are feeding, and why a holistic diet should be chosen.

Not all of the pet food manufacturing companies use poor quality and potentially dangerous ingredients, but the vast majority do. Commercially rendered meat meals are often highly contaminated with bacteria such as Salmonella, sourced from animals that died from disease, injury, or natural causes, that may not be rendered or cooked until days after death. While the cooking process may kill bacteria, it does not eliminate the endotoxins resulting from the bacteria. These toxins can cause disease.

Multinational pet food producers through advertising have a tremendously loyal market in which to capitalize on their and others’ waste products, and have a reliable source for such bulk materials.

In 1990, the San Francisco Chronicle reported that euthanized animals were being used in pet food. Pet food manufacturers have vehemently denied the report; however, the American Veterinary Medical Association has confirmed the Chronicle’s story as to what is really in the dog and cat food.

Companion pets and zoo animals are euthanized with sodium pentobarbital and then processed and rendered. The sodium pentobarbital poison does not break down in the processing and goes into many commercial pet foods and feed for cows, pigs and horses.

The FDA’s Center For Veterinary Medicine concluded that it is highly unlikely a dog will experience any adverse effects from exposures to low levels of pentobarbital found in popular commercial pet foods, but such foods would not be allowed for human consumption. Furthermore, informed consumers who love and want the best for their dog companions would not choose to feed such ingredients if they knew what was really in their dogs’ food.

Part of the “witches brew” processed into dog food is slaughterhouse waste including possibly diseased and cancerous meat, grains considered unfit for human consumption, rancid grease and different fats, stabilized with powerful antioxidants to retard further spoilage. These fats are sprayed directly onto dried kibble to make an otherwise bland or distasteful product palatable.

The most commonly used antioxidant preservative is ethoxyquin(EQ) that has been found in dogs’ livers and tissues months after it had been removed from their diet. EQ has been proven to have a synergistic effect that may lead to the development of certain types of cancer and may promote liver disease and other medical problems.

Governmental rules require ingredients to be listed from the largest amount to smallest. Protein is crucial to your dog’s health, yet sources such as soybean meal, corn glutens, corn meal, whole corn, and ground or crushed corn is what is really in many dog foods as protein ingredients. While dogs do need some grains, too many commercial dog foods use grains as a substitute for meat. As a result, most dog foods list grains long before meat in their ingredients, but proponents of holistic dog food know meat should be the number one ingredient in any decent dog food. Ideally, the meat should be high quality human grade, making your dog’s chances for developing a protein deficiency very low. A good holistic feeding plan provides the proper level of vitamins and minerals — greater than many commercial dog foods –so you don’t need to give your pet supplements.

Sadly, protein deficiencies are common among dogs and result in health issues such as excessive shedding, damaged whiskers, poor appetite, compromised immune systems, gas, burping, smelly stools, diarrhea, vomiting, chronic skin and/or ear infections, smelly breath, brown teeth, dull and/or smelly coat, and personality issues associated with aggression or timidity.

Up until now you my not have realized what is really in dog food. Now that you have been exposed to some facts, become informed about what’s really in your dog’s food to give your pet companion the best chance at good health.

Informative Video

By: Jay Jacovitz

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