Throwing up and gases

Good morning everybody! I want to ask you something that the vets here are not really helpfull about...
So Hector has a lot of problems with gases (stinky ones!) and he throws up a lot! Like once a month he pukes (sometimes his food, other times his stomach liquids, if that makes any sense to you, i am not sure how you say it in english) and he produces gas all the time! We feed him in the morning and in the evening, around 11:30-12:00 in the morning, and around 9:30-10:00 in the evening. Before summer we fed him Acana Grasslands (60% premium animal ingredients, 40% regional fruits and vegetables, 0% grain) , but we changed to Orijen (80% premium animal ingridients, 20% fruits vegetables and botanicals, 0% grain). He is 24 kilos and 2 years old. Vets here cant help us :/ So i ask you what you feed your dogs and if you have problems like that. Any opinions are welcome.
Thank you for reading my post
with lots of love Hector and Christos

Any answer would be appreciated!

I think they are just gassy by nature. I believe I've heard that a raw diet cuts it down a bit but I feed dry food so not really sure. We have just gotten used to it.

For the throwing up is he eating anything off the ground while out for walks or in the yard perhaps that is upsetting his stomach?

he shouldn't be throwing up all the time. the food you giving him is one of the food we recommend. is there other vet you can go and see?

Well when he was younger especially he was trying to eat everything off the ground. And when i say everything i mean everything! Even oranges, plastic, leaves, whatever you can imagine.
Now he may eat a litle bone or something when we are not paying attention otherwise he doesnt eat anything. We tried putting him a muzzle but he gets really upset. When we go out with a muzzle he walks next to our legs all the time, he doesnt smell so much the ground and the trees.... but we are thinking about getting him used to it. What diet are you having for your dogs? 2 meals per day dry food? or something else?

yea my as 2 meals a day, but dont throw up all the time gas is normaly my smell alot well my male does anyway.

i would change vets

Is he throwing up all the time or only once per month? If your vet isn't being helpfull I would look into seeing someone else. A vet that you have a good realtionship with is very importatnt.

jstaff wrote:Is he throwing up all the time or only once per month? If your vet isn't being helpfull I would look into seeing someone else. A vet that you have a good realtionship with is very importatnt.

Isnt that pretty much all the time? Once a month i think is very often :/ And i really cant understand why.. the dry food is good quality :/ and both of the vets we have gone (2) said its stomach problems and nothing more...but once a month? :/

Have you tried feeding raw, it's what Billy has, once a month seems like a lot, try a different vets, you could try food for sensitive dogs. Hope hektor is feeling ok today

Is he eating grass? Mine throws it up when she has been eating it on a regular basis, nothing to worry about if it is this!! As for the gas I'm affraid there all rather smelly!!

Although do discourage graas eating as they can't digest it so either they sick it up or you get a grassy bum!!

He eats grass only when he has problems. When he starts eating grass we know he will throw up again so we let him eat some, it helps him a lot. Some times he doesnt throw up if he eats a good quantity of grass :/! I really dont know what to say!
Lynne english is not my native language and i am not sure what you mean with the term "raw". Do you mean not cooked or am i wrong?

Maybe you could try altering your feed times slightly quite late his last feed and also try different brands of food so to get one thats suits him. What suits one dog will not suit another and to be sick once a month is not continual dogs produce loads of bile and he is self medicating himself eating the grass to bind the bile then to regurgitate it (smart dog). If hes very smelly all the time then I say his food is not suited or he is a sesitive boy

If he is vomiting frequently and it is happening at least once a month I would be a little concerned. Does he usually vomit in the evening or in the morning? I have a chihuahua X JRT and when she doesn't eat for a long time she can sometimes be sick. As her stomach is very small she has to eat and defaecate frequently os she gets an upset stomach. If we spread her meals out and feed her 3 times per day without too much time between meals she is fine. The food you are using is very high quality, though high in protein and also quite rich. Are you using the orijen red meat diet? Perhaps switch to the fish diet or the food 'FishForDogs' (not sure if you can get this in your country).

Yes Lynne is referring to uncooked or raw diet. This is raw meat supplemented with meaty bones. You can find links explaining about the diet here -

* http://www.rawlearning.com/
* http://rawfeddogs.net/
* http://www.barfworld.com/

I personally now feed my dogs a raw diet, having tried many ways of feeding over the years. My dogs have never looked in better shape for it and you can control what they are taking in much more easily. Any more questions? Fire away!

He is vommiting in the morning! But he eats at around 11:30-12:00 in the morning (or noon call it as you want ) and then 9:30 to 10:00 in the evening. I don't think so this is a big space from meals. But any other opinion is always accepted! The acana we were feeding is this one (the following pictures and links are not in any way intended to advertise the products, I put them just to be more accurate. If this is still against the rules plz let me know and delete them)

and the orijen is this one: http://orijen.ca/products/adult_dog
so you think that a raw diet would probably solve or limit his stomach problems? Any advice is helpfull and appreciated!

Ok now we may be getting somewhere. You say he usually throws up in the morning, I think that this might be linked to the times you are feeding him. If you are feeding him his evening meal at 10pm say and then not having his breakfast the next morning til 12pm then that is 14 hours bwtween meals. I'm not 100% on this but usually food in the stomach passes through to the intestine after 2/3/4 hours, this means at least 10 hours with an empty stomach. As the levels of stomach acid increase and have nothing to work on this could be causing his sickness. I would try this, feed him in the mornings at 9 or 10pm and in the evening feed him no later than 8 - 8.30pm. Try this first before you start changing his food. See if you get better results.


I notice that the Orijen you feed has a variety of different contributing proteins, although sickness is a very rare symptom of a food intolerence we can't rule anything out. Thats why I suggested possibly switching to Orijen's 6-fish or a raw diet as you can limit which types of meat he is taking in to try and establish if he has any kind of allergy or intolerance to a certain meat protein.

There is too long a gap between the evening feed and the morning feed and this will cause the empty stomach in a dog to make excess acid and gas which must be very uncomfortable for him. Could you perhaps try and feed him two meals about 12 hours apart and see if that helps. Good luck.

I would agree that food is the most common reason. I also feed raw but only once per day. I do more of the prey model and there is very little gas from my guy. I do give him some smaller helpings other times a day but I do a single larger feeding for the most part.

bbimson wrote:I would agree that food is the most common reason. I also feed raw but only once per day. I do more of the prey model and there is very little gas from my guy. I do give him some smaller helpings other times a day but I do a single larger feeding for the most part.

I also only feed once a day now that my girls are on raw and this suits them fine though sometimes they have a chicken wing or lamb bone in the daytime. Previously though when I did feed kibble I had similar problems with one of my dogs and found that putting in an extra feed or making sure that there wasn't such a long gap between feeds made all the difference. BTW your boy is stunning is he english bred? What his pedigree like?

Nosipho wrote:I also only feed once a day now that my girls are on raw and this suits them fine though sometimes they have a chicken wing or lamb bone in the daytime. Previously though when I did feed kibble I had similar problems with one of my dogs and found that putting in an extra feed or making sure that there wasn't such a long gap between feeds made all the difference. BTW your boy is stunning is he english bred? What his pedigree like?

First of all thank you everyone for your replies! I will try that immediately and i will keep you up with the results!
Nosipho about your question for his breed and his pedigree....well we kinda have a problem there because we haven't recieved his pedigree yet. The pet shop that ordered him says that the breeder "refuses?" to give the pedigree :S So that's something that makes us think he is not <<thoroughbred>> (google translation i hope its correct and you understand). We really dont care, we love him the same and even more but the only drawback is he cant be a father regardless how beautiful he is because the litle kids wont be registered, at least thats what i have read somewhere! Today we will call the breeder to see what happens! Because its such a pitty, he is beautiful and there are only 5 Staffies here in Greece! Hektor, Back (the 6 year old male of my best friend) and 3 females we came across! We have done our research and there are no more! So it would be nice for him to be a father!
Something i would like to ask you all of you now. Its about the size of your dog's head. Hektor's head is still smaller than Back's and he is 2 years and 3 months old now. So i would like to ask you when did your's staffy head get at its maximum size?
Soooorry for the super long message, and thank you all
With lots of love
Hektor and Christos

Sounds like the breeder is trying to pull a fast one! Especially since you know of all of the staffords in Greece and know that he is not fathered by them. Hes beautiful anyway though I shouldnt worry about him not having papers. As you say you do not want to breed from him. Staffords usually grow upwards in the first two years and then begin to really fill out. I would say roughly my dogs have been fully mature and the biggest they will be by 2 years and 8 months, although every dog grows at a different rate. It is a hard thing to say. Also a lot of the size of the head is due to muscle tone, my staffordshires love to chew and so this builds up the muscles in the face and head. BBimpson what are Monte's lines?

Nosipho wrote:

bbimson wrote:I would agree that food is the most common reason. I also feed raw but only once per day. I do more of the prey model and there is very little gas from my guy. I do give him some smaller helpings other times a day but I do a single larger feeding for the most part.

I also only feed once a day now that my girls are on raw and this suits them fine though sometimes they have a chicken wing or lamb bone in the daytime. Previously though when I did feed kibble I had similar problems with one of my dogs and found that putting in an extra feed or making sure that there wasn't such a long gap between feeds made all the difference. BTW your boy is stunning is he english bred? What his pedigree like?

Totally agree about kibble. Monte actually traces back to the UK but it is about 4 generations back. He comes to me via a breeder in the US who uses European stock or pedigrees back to the UK and other european lines. He goes back to the Eastaff and Rellim lines. Thanks for your kind words. When I get to it, I'll post his pedigree.