Your Cart is Empty
When you take your dog out for a walk, be it for potty-time, quality time, or both, you may notice that your dog likes to munch on the fresh grass around them. Why are they doing this? Does it mean that your dog is sick? Well, there are actually a number of reasons which your dog might have for eating grass. In this article we are going to discuss the most likely reasons so that you may better understand this behavior and even give you some tips on what you can do to politely discourage it.
Let’s start with the most common belief about why dogs eat grass.
I’ve heard that dogs eat grass because they are feeling bad. Is this true?
Most commonly you will hear that dogs eat grass to make themselves vomit or simply to make their stomach feel better. As far as the vomiting, statistically less than 25% of dogs vomit after they have just ingested grass. Only about 10% of dogs that are eating grass show any signs of illness or discomfort. So, what could it be, then? There are a lot of opinions on the subject but these are the most prominent answers that you will find to these questions. Here are 4 common reasons why dogs eat grass:
While not completely carnivores, dogs are not really fully omnivores as well. You want to think about a wild dog’s diet in order to better understand this. A dog in the wild is going to eat a lot of herbivores and some of the grass that is still in their stomachs would be digested and used for fiber. Wild dogs eat grass, too, and even wolves. This was evinced by a stool sample study which found that 10% to as high as 45% of wolves were eating grass.
So one of the reasons might just be because this is something that dogs have always done. It could be more than that, however, and it does get a little more complicated with such a long history of the domestication of ‘man’s best friend’.
That fiber which we mentioned before is important to a dog’s diet just like it is for us and it is always possible that your dog needs more. Now, there are ways to help to ensure that it is not a dietary issue and one of them is to make sure that your dog is getting plenty of vitamins through the means of ‘vitamin treats’, such as Hangry Woof Multivitamin chews.We’ll tell you a little more about some specific components from treats like these as we go along.
While a minor amount of grass eating is fairly normal with dogs, excessive eating of grass can be a red-flag which indicates that your dog may need some special assistance from you and possibly even from the vet. If your dog is showing signs of stomach discomfort while eating grass, for instance, then it could be something more serious such as inflammatory bowel syndrome disease or gastric reflux, so if you see signs like these then you should get your dog to the vet for a visit. It is always better to err on the safe side.
One other medical condition that your dog may exhibit is called ‘Pica’ and this is another suspected reason of grass eating behavior with dogs. Pica is the ingestion of items which are not considered food or ‘normal food’. The common belief with this is that is caused by a nutritional deficiency. We’d mentioned that there is a way to combat this possibility, however, when we briefly touched the subject of fiber and roughage. Let’s talk about what you can do to stop your dog from eating grass.
To rule out a nutritional deficit in a way that will energize your dog as well, here is a method which you can try. When you are taking your dog out for daily walks, bring along some Hangry Woof n ichew treats with you and keep a close eye on your dog.
When your dog attempts to lean down to chew on some grass, you can gently distract them by a light tug or by calling their name while walking towards another direction. After the dog follows you there, reward them with a Hangry Woof Multivitamin chew and some friendly verbal reinforcement.
Keep the treats infrequent, more commonly just giving a ‘good dog!’ and a quick pat or two and in this way you your dog will eventually realize that you don’t like it when they are eating grass and may ‘phase out of’ this behavior. As a bonus, if this is a nutritional issue, Hangry Woof treats can prove it very quickly because of the quality natural ingredients that come in every chew.
The full list may be viewed here but these are some of all-natural ingredients that are specific to common doggy ailments that might interest you:
If you are dog is still trying to eat grass after you have ruled out potential health issues or vitamin deficiency, you still might not have a cause to panic. Some dogs simply can’t resist chewing on fresh, spring grass. So if the grass eating is only on occasion and you notice that it happens to look fresh and shiny green, then don’t worry too much.
Just keep them near the fresh grass, away from other dog droppings which may carry harmful intestinal parasites, and be sure to reward them on occasion with delicious Hangry Woof Multivitamin chews.
That way, if your dog still wants a little grass, you’ll know that they are at least still getting their vitamins!
