How often do you worm your dog - and what for?

Just curious, because this has come up on another thread.
I don`t routinely worm my dogs, but I know many do.
So - do you worm your dogs regularly? (Apart from puppies I mean) If so, what for?
Also - has anyone`s dog had worms? I`ve only seen a dog with tapeworm once in 40 years, so I wondered how widspread they were.

I don't routinely worm mine either. My mum's dog Louie is forever getting worms, but he will eat anything whilst on walks -cat poo being a favourite. Our trainer advised to feed him dessicated coconut and grated carrot once a fortnight, and it does seem to help keep them at bay. Maybe some dogs are more prone to worms, kinda like some are prone to fleas. I never had a dog with fleas but Rogue has had them twice now. I wouldn't routinely use chemical treatments though, just react to symptoms. I wormed Rio recently as she lost a lot of weight, but it wasn't worms, she just hadn't been eating well.

I don't rountinely worm either. I also just react to symptoms as as yet have been lucky (looks around to touch wood!!!)

I worm 2 or 3 times a year, mainly because my dogs have access to lots of manure/poo etc from horses, chickens and ducks and sheep

However, I tend to buy my wormer online, rather than go to the vets

I have never treated for fleas, and my dogs have never had fleas

We have wormed every 12 weeks so far because they dogs had very bad worms as puppies. I don't know how much longer we'll do that for.
We have to be extra careful with Ben because he doesn't put weight on and it only takes a mild stomach upset for him to lose a couple of kilos so we don't want to risk him getting worms....having said that I don't feel that happy with worming him 4 times a year for the rest of his life when you hear some bad stuff about worming tablets

I worm my 5 about every 4 months or so. They've never had worm since we've had them but I do it just incase!

Good thread, I have often wondered this myself. I never know what the 'right' thing to do is

I don't routinely worm as I'm also loathe to stuff chemicals into my dogs for no good reason, but they have hydrotherapy every fortnight & one of the conditions is that all dogs are regularly wormed & flea-treated. So I pay lip service to this by maybe doing it every 6-9 months (when I remember, when the vets doing a 2 for 1 offer on Milbemax etc).

I am more concerned about lungworm at the mo as my dogs are always jumping in & drinking out of scanky pools & puddles.

I had heard that whilst wormers get rid of the current infestation, dogs can pick up more worms the next day.

We've wormed as a puppy but haven't wormed since and haven't needed to ...we don't believe in worming for the sake of worming...puting poisons in our dog when he doesn't have worms is not something we want to do.

I worm every 12 weeks approximately, with Panacur oral suspension (mainly because we have Giardia in this area due to the human sewage sludge that they spread on our fields at the back of the house). Giardia is actually a protozoa, not a worm, but Panacur is the only treatment for it in dogs ... it works for humans as well! when we get infected with Giardia, we take Panacur too and it works! The human treatment for Giardia is Metronidazole which makes you feel like poo and means you cannot drink, so we prefer to take Panacur.

Even without the Giardia, we worm regularly, probably 3 times a year. I believe it is very important to worm dogs, horses and cats, rather than just wait until they get a "worm belly".