[GusDad]

I've been feeding my almost-5-month-old goldendoodle Hill's Science Diet, which I fed my last dog as well. I have noticed the quantity of poop Gus generates is higher than I would have expected, however. I am giving him about 3-1/2 cups per day and he gets a lot of Red Barn raw food as part of his training (at least half cup per day). I think I have the quantity of food balanced alright... Gus is a nice weight, you can feel his ribs but he's not too skinny. He just generates a lot of poop. A friend recommended something called EVO; anyone have experience with it? I am trying to stick with a kibble-type food and also get something that is widely available.

 

[ioreks_mom]

in my opinion evo is a really good food, but i don't know if it is the right food for a large breed puppy, too much protein.

http://www.dogfoodanalysis.com/ this site has a lot of good information if you would like to find a food that will produce less "waste" from your dog

i am sure that there are lots of people who can give you much more information than i can. good luck with it all

 

[pawcurious]

Science diet is notorious for generating high volume poops. You're not alone in that experience.

I second the suggestion to check out the dog food project. Evo is fairly easy to find but not as ubiquitous as Hills.

 

[AkiraleShiba]

My dad's dog pooped a lot when he was on Science Diet and he also got pretty fat after a year.

My dog is on Orijen, he does not poop much, it's quite compact and small for a 30 lbs dog ! However, I do not know much about large breed puppies, maybe you should do some research. One member gave you dogfoodanalysis link that is great. Generally, the most digestible a kibble is, the less residue there is. If you are up to it, there's also the Raw Diet that is the lowest residue diet but that requires a little more work than kibble

 

[ioreks_mom]

the reason to stick away from high protein foods for large breed puppies is that the high protein could make the puppy grow too fast and that could cause problems with their bones and joints. i think that orijen makes a large breed puppy formula but i sort of remember some members talking about it still being too high in protein.

i feed raw now after unsuccessfully trying a bunch of different types of kibbles. it is a lot more work than pouring some kibble into a bowl but iorek's poops are about 1/2 or even 1/3 the size of his kibble poops! that is not the only benefit either! raw takes a lot of research too.

 

[Pai]

Science Diet is mostly made of grain flour, which is very low digestibility for dogs. Your dog is pooping out most of what he's eating -- that's why his stools are so big.

Here's another good dog food site that explains what all ingredients are in dog food.