Help with persistent poorly tummy

I have an 2yr old english pointer who we picked up from rescue approximately the middle of January. When we picked him up we knew he had a dodgey belly which we thought was most likely to do with being kenneld- he was losing alot of weight in kennels, he weighed 20.6kg.

We picked him up on nature diet and continued this for a week and then over a week got him onto JWB (specially bought for him). During this time his poo was very variable sometimes he would be very squity and keep trying to go yet first thing in the morning it would be fine. It is also perfect when it is recycled horse poo. We didn't get him all onto JWB as he got me up in the night several times and his belly was very upset. I starved him for 24hrs and then started him onto pasta and chicken. Pasta rather than rice because the natures diet was rice and perhaps the rice didn't agree with him? He got marginaly better but not great. He had a 5day course of amoxycillin and seemed to improve, which makes me think there is some bacterial link, he has since had 10days of amoxycillin and has just finished a 5days of baytril. Subsequent batches of antibiotics do not seem to have helped as much as the first. The next step is to send of a sample. He has gained alot of weight and is now around 25kg, he looks almost right. He has been having 3 meals a day and wondered if it was the volume going through him, hehas been on two meals for 3 days now and has lost weight again. Oh and he has had natural yogurt and that hasn't helped. He has also had 3 days of panacur. My question are:
Has anybody has any experience of this and what did they do?
I am wondering if a raw diet might suit him more?
Perhaps the bluechip probiotic as it is very likely that the flora has been turned topsy turvy.
We have had dogs a long time and never had problems before, it is so fustrating. Any thoughts appreciated

Hi could be an intolerance of some kind to protien or cereal. What food do you have him on at the moment ? I would possibly try a cereal free food to eliminate grain first. One of mine suffers from colitis, when she is bad i give her mashed plain potato and poached white fish, its easier to digest than rice.

He is still on chicken and pasta. May be I will try potatoe instead of the pasta.

He may be intolerant to wheat, try the potato and see how he gets on, hope you get it sorted. Chicken can be a common protein for dogs to be intolerant to, i use fish because its easier on the stomach but of course its your choice

I would definitely put this dog on a probiotic, I give mine the Healthspan ones, capsule, 20 million bacteria of 5 types.

For your dog

I would give

tub of live yoghurt per day (small one)
i banana
tsp manuka honey
slippery elm/tree bark powder

Also give probiotics twice a day

As for food, whilst you are waiting for tests

Giardia
Campy
Coccidoisis (sp)
salmonella
e coli

etc

consider a food which has a novel protein and cereal eg capelin and tapioca etc.

Good luck

I feed raw. I find all of the dogs do well on it, even those with digestive issues. My last foster had a horrible time digesting food for his entire four years of life. I put him on raw and he got much better, but when I added kefir it cured him. Kefir is a fermented milk. You can probably get a starter for it. You just put the little blobs in a jar of milk and keep it in the refrigerator. A couple of tablespoons of kefir once a day with his food may take care of it.

there are kibble specifically made for this - they are expensive but do work

you've only had him for a few months and i wonder about worming - sometimes it takes two or three monthly doses to erdicate?

the type of protein may have an effect - if the dog has had sensitivity whilst being fed a chicken based food then the stomach has 'learnt' to recognise chicken protein and be intolerant to it; often changing the type of protein base will work, such as switching to lamb or fish based, fish being my preference

assume you have seen the vey a couple of times about this?

PS, not a big fan of JWB, probably one of the best off-the-shelf feeds but has it downsides

I've changed him onto potatoe and chicken and his tum is not impressed, got some pro-kolin for him but still wanted to go out in the night. How long do I wait untill I know the potatoe has not worked?

I cleaned out morrisons of white fish, do I then go back to pasta and try the white fish?

We have seen the vet 3 times he has had drontal and a 3day dose panacur. Have looked at irritable bowel disease and worried he might have this? No JWB being fed to him at the moment.

if he were mine I would try the Elimination Diet and try to find out what he is reacting to.

So feed only one protein source - boiled or raw fish or lamb or chicken for example.
Apart from this, they mustn`t have treats, biscuits etc as that will cloud the result. I had one dog who reacted to the colourings in treats.
If after a few days there is no improvement, change to a different protein source.
If after a few days there is an improvement, you add another item. You could go for `fillers` like boiled rice or potato, or you could add another `animal`. (My dogs don`t have any fillers)
The trouble with trying different types of processed foods is that it could be any of the constituents.

A friend had a poodle with terrible gastric problems - every few months he was in the vet then sent home with the prescription Hills which was basically chicken and rice. She tried the elimination method and found he was allergic to both chicken and rice.

I agree. Try an elimination diet with probiotics. We tried that with Coco (more for her skin than bowels really) but during that trial we found that beef and tripe flavoured Butchers gave her horrendous squits and blood in her poo. We also eliminated cereals and seeds and now she's great. Probiotics really helped too.