Dog Eating Grass

Does Your Dog Eat Grass?

Dogs have been eating grass forever, with few ill-effects, apart from the peculiar bout of throwing up. This usually seems like one of those things that bother owners a lot more than their dogs. A lot of dogs seem to simply re-ingest the vomit and go about their day normally.

Honestly, no one really knows why dogs eat grass. Theres an assortment of theories as to why animals that are mainly thought of as carnivores would want to eat moderate amounts of vegetation(grass).

One of the theories says that dogs are not actually carnivores, but that they are omnivores, which basically means “eat anything”.

This theory says that dogs eat grass puposely for the reason of getting more nutrients that are missing from his regular meals. The center of this argument is that dogs, as omnivorous animals, consume too much meat and need to balance this out with some vegetation on the side - just like you or I may crave a salad to go with our steak.

Personally, I think this is total nonsense. First off, a lot of us feed our dogs mainly on kibble, which has the full spectrum of fully-absorbable nutrients that dogs need. If you just feed your dog meat alone, there could possibly be some truth to this theory. Dogs need a full range of vitamins and minerals for best health, and many cannot be found in fresh meat. It is true that some canned meat has some added nutrients, but the main concern with canned food is that it is too soft and jelly-like for keeping healthy teeth and bowels. Dogs that mainly eatcanned food are far more likely to develope dental disease at a pretty early age.

Another common theory is that dogs eat grass as a way to puposely throw up. Since a nauseous dog does not have the bodily structure needed for the good old ‘finger down the throat’ act, he’ll use grass instead. It is true that grass does occasionally make dogs vomit – those tickly stems can bother the stomach lining.

However, I have to say that this theory is also total nonsense. Dogs can throw up all by themselves if they want to, without the need of eating grass.

If you are concerned that eating grass will harm your dog, you can put down that concern to right now.

Your dog eating grass is really nothing to worry about. Grass eating is a life long habit with a lot of dogs, and if your dog decides that it is no longer in his best interests, he will stop doing it.

However, you should watch him around lawns with pesticides, since many garden chemicals are extremely toxic to dogs. Really, you would already be keeping an eye on him if he is around those substances, but grass-eaters have a higher chance of digesting something toxic since they are more likely to eat plant and grass matter that weedkillers and other toxic chemicals have been sprayed onto. It would also be best to keep him away from those dried out clumps of grass that after the lawn has been mowed. It should not really be a problem if the grass is mowed by a push-mower, but if it is cut with a gas-operated lawn mower, the grass will be stained with petrol fumes and grease that can make him pretty sick.

If your dog’s grass eating is really annoying you, maybe this is out of worry for your lawn, rather than your dog, since there is really no evidence that dogs suffer any bad effects from frequent grass-snacks. There are a couple of things you can try doing to slim his desire to supplement his diet with grass from the backyard – but, since this is one area of dogdom that no one really knows that much about, the success rate is more hit-and-miss than guaranteed:

Truthfully, there isn't much you can really do about your dog’s grass-eating habit (aside from deny him access to grass absolutely, which wouldn’t be fair to your dog and would make your daily dog walks more of an exercise in frustration than a relaxing stroll).

The general consensus from the experts seems to be that grass-eating, although somewhat of a puzzling interest to us humans, is just ‘one of those things’ as far as your dog is concerned. It will not do him any damage, and you can be sure that if he’s eating it, he’s enjoying it – so there’s really not a lot to be said for stripping him of that simple pleasure.

Learn More!

For more information on dog psychology and general canine behavioral traits, with a particular focus on problematic behaviors, you’ll probably want to take a look at SitStayFetch. It’s a complete, detailed manual for the intelligent and responsible owner, and covers everything from obedience training through to preventing and handling a huge variety of common problem behaviors. Well worth checking out!

You can visit the SitStayFetch website by clicking on the link below:
*http://www.kingdomofpets.com/dogobediencetraining/?aff=wma04&type=nohop

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