My dog eats his own and other dogs poo. Also he eats rabbits and sheeps.
Can anyone please please help me on how to stop this dirty habit.

sorry but as far as i'm aware it's a natural behaviour in dogs... some dogs pick it up from their mum. Only really reliable solution is to pick up the poo before they get to it :-(

Use the search facility and put in Copraphagia (this is what poo eating is called) you will see numerous posts on the subject. Its perfectly normal though so dont worry.

You may need to register to use the search facility though.

Yes, horrible isnt it?

My dog used to be terrible with it, ran up straight after he did one and ate it, He is alot better now but if I leave him outside and I'm not around he will still have a nibble.

I remember once he had his muzzle on a ate some poo through it....he then decided to come charging up to me a nuzzle in between my legs :o

My beagle was obsessed with poo and I rewormed her and she doesnt do her own or other dogs but still loves rabbit and horse poo.  Might be worth a try.

My dog used to do this all the time, it is a perectly natural behaviour but one us humans obviously find disgusting. My dogs live out so I was not always able to clear it up strait away and it got to the point where it made him runny by eating his own poo, and he started loosing a lot of weight, to the extent I was scared to walk him in case people thought I was cruel, he also found it hard to live on complete dog food and this made things worse.

Then one day on the local market I saw a butchers with raw bones on his stall and thought I would get the dogs one each, i pondered over getting him one as anything he didn't normally have would upset his belly, but was I glad I did, now he has a raw bone everday along with raw meat with a small amount of his complete and he is solid as can be and NO more poo eating!!! :D

Read an article on this today actually, the chap said (among other things) that one of the "cures" was to add pineapples, tinned, to there food as it makes poo taste foul. EH! as if it isnt already! Dont know if it works but it was in a dog mag I read today.

Was fascinated by pineapple comment so looked it up in a behavioural textbook and it's indeed mentioned.  This is a direct copy of the info on coprophagia.

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Coprophagia is normal in some circumstances, such as when bitches eat the faeces of their puppies in order to clean the nest environment.  However some dogs will consume large amounts of their own faeces or those of other animals and may suffer vomiting, diarrhoea and other illnesses as a result.

Coprophagia can occur in normal dogs with no apparent gastrointestinal disease, but it is sensible to check exocrine pancreatic function and to look for evidence of occult blood or bacterial overgrowth.  These are conditions which can encourage a dog to become interested in its own faeces.  Other animals in the house whose faeces have been exclusively selected for consumption by the coprophagic dog should also be medically investigated.  Although dietary deficiency is rarely a cause of coprophagia or pica, it is worth checking that the diet is balanced and complete.

An accurate history including age of onset and the context in which coprophagia occurs is important, since coprophagia can develop in a number of ways and an understanding of the motivation will assist in finding a solution.  Potential causes of coprophagia include

- attention seeking behaviour (which should be dealt with in combination with the main problem of coprophagia).

- activity in a barren environment (either during puppyhood or due to prolonged kennelling in later life).

- observation of the dam cleaning up a perpetually soiled environment.

- normal exploratory behaviour.

- hunger.

Treatment:

- the dog may need to be provided with outlets for those energies currently devoted to coprophagia.  Activity feeding and food-finding games are ideal.

- A "leave" command should be taught so that the owner can prevent the dog from picking up faeces when supervised.

- In some cases, treatment may be limited to denying access to faeces (by allowing only lead exercise) or may be confined to counselling the owner to accept the behaviour, if it is not harming the animal.

If the behaviour is to be stopped, the process of investigating and eating faeces should be made unpleasant for the the dog.  Methods should aim to discourage the dog from sniffing and investigating stools.

Pepper: Irritants such as finely ground white or cayenne pepper may work well by causing sneezing and irritation when inhaled.  A good strategy is deliberately to bring the dog into contact with faeces that have been prepared with a sprinkling of pepper.  The dog may occasionally be warned off sniffing by using a "leave" command but if it persists in investigating the faeces the sneezing and choking will discourage future attempts.

If these exercises are repeated several times a day for several weeks, the dog will become more responsive to the owner command to leave the faeces as there is a reliable discriminatory punishment associated with the attendant faeces if the command is ignored.  Owner consistency, supervision and environmental control are necessary if this treatment method is to be employed.  If the dog is able to sniff out and ingest "untreated" faeces, he will have been rewarded for his efforts and the behaviour will become more persistent rather than less.

Remote-operated spray collars: The use of a spray collar (but not a shock collar) can be effective.  As the dog investigates the faeces, the collar is activated to release a jet of gas or spray.  In order to be most effective, this type of reprimand must be administered each and every time the dog approaches faeces.  This requires good owner compliance, supervision and control of the dog and other dogs in the home.

Trypsin:  In some cases, the behaviour can be markedly reduced by trypsin supplementation or the additon of pineapple or other meat tenderisers (which can have a similar effect due to the presence of papain or bromelain) to the diet of a coprophagic dog.  The reason for this is unclear as there are often no overt physical signs of pancreatic insufficiency.

Prognosis is guarded, especially in long-standing cases where the owner wants the dog to be allowed to run free.
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Gosh, that was longer than it looked in the book!  Please don't flame me - I hope some of this information is useful but it doesn't all reflect my opinion.  Personally, I wouldn't use the pepper method unless the behaviour was making my dog seriously ill, but everyone has different ideas about training.

In my experience, most coprophagic dogs have no medical or behavioural problems they are simply displaying "normal exploratory behaviour", to borrow a phrase from the book.  Also a lot of dogs seem to go through this phase at about 6 months and then grow out of it.

HTH

That was really interesting, Mary-Caroline! :) I was particularly interested to see that going down the lacing-with-pepper route can backfire if the dog ever comes across untreated faeces, but thinking about it logically it makes perfect sense - the same as a dog who sometimes gets a titbit at human mealtimes will scrounge and drool far more than one who never gets one; indeed, it's the same principle as gambling - as long as you sometimes win, you'll keep doing it!

The medical investigations are interesting too, as well as the possible cause of puppies being kept in dirty environment, with the bitch doing the clearing up rather than the owner.
:)

It's horrible isn't it. We've just introduced a new dog into the house and our other girl has started eating other dogs business, so it's obviously an attention seeking thing with here. I just wish other people would pick up after their dogs (as it happens, I'm doing this if I see the poop before Millie does!) then we wouldn't have this problem!

My First Dane used to eat his own poo, and any other poo he could find too,

I was told that a pup sees its mother clearing pooh and copies it.

Its worse when the dog comes in out of the garden and gives you a big lick! eeeaaerrrrr, yuk

Paul