Hello everyone

I recently rescued a Pit Bull puppy about 4 months ago and am having a lot of problems with her toilet habits. She will intentionally back her butt up to an object and poop on it. She does have diarrhea and I am currently consulting at vet about it and trying to solve this problem. So, as you can imagine, this is very messy and gross to deal with. I have thought about chaining her to an area or introducing a remote trainer and using the flag system to teach her not to go in that area. Does anyone have any advice on how and why this pup may be doing this?

As for her diarrhea, I have spend well over $200 on this issue and it still continues as bad as ever. She has been tested pos. for coccidia, giardia and hookworms. Her first treatment was 3 days of panacure, 7 days of metornidazole and 7 days of pro biotic tabs. Her second treatment was a liquid (cant remember the name) for 7 days at about 5 cc each dose. Nothing has affected her. She has a low grade temp. This poor little pup can't be feeling good! Going to the vet is just too expensive and has no results. Does anyone know of any natural remedies or solutions to this problem?

I appreciate you reading this!

How old is the pup?

I have a poodle here who does the same thing... if I leave a jacket or a shoe on the floor she will deliberately poop on it, she does it because she knows pooping on the floor is wrong so she is trying to be clean by going on something.

As for the diarrhoea have you been giving her plenty of fluids and electrolytes?
If she has been mildly dehydrated for such a long period that could be the cause of the low fever not the mention liver problems.

Have you changed her diet to see if that helps with the diarrhoea?
Always remember when changing a diet to do it slowly... I start with 25% new food to 75% old food and gradually up the percentage of new food over the coarse of a week.

Have you contacted the place you rescued her from about her problems, some shelters will provide cheaper veterinary care for ongoing problems...
And it has to be said, $200 really isn't that much.

You say this puppy has a bacterial infection, a fungal infection, and worms. I seriously doubt that only a 3 week course of treatment was enough to cure all of that. The giardia alone should take a couple of months, after the worms and the bacteria are knocked down. Hookworms are notorious for reducing the efficacy of antibiotics. I think they actually eat the meds themselves.

As for the fever and diarrhea, those are the normal symptoms for these infections. Keeping the pup's electrolytes up will help some, as will increasing the starch in her diet. We have some veterinary people as members, I will ask them to read your question since most of my knowledge is only what I have gleaned as a breeder.

Edit: On your puppy's behalf, thank you for taking her in.

The pup does have access to water all day. I'll add some Pedialyte to the water to help with the electrolytes. I did suspect that the hookworms came back. I read online that they actually have a monthly cycle through the body, so I will worm her again. Thanks for confirming my suspicion!

As for her pooping. Its not on objects in the house. Its outside. In colo, we have what you call a crawl space, She will poop on the door to this crawl space, she will poop on the large rocks that surround the crawl space and just the other day I watched her deliberately pee on a piece of wood. I just think this is very strange behavior and am wondering if it's the result of training a small puppy to go potty on a puppy pad. Perhaps I'm wrong?

Your suspicions about the puppy pad might be right you know.

If you don't want her pooping on the rocks (who would) then you can try training her to a grass square.
I know of a few people who have successfully trained their dog to potty in one corner of the yard.
What you do is get some plastic garden edging and make an open ended box on the grass wherever you would like her to poop (a back corner is good)
Then take her out on leash and take her to that spot... when she poops in it give her lots of praise.
Another option is letting her run free but when you see her go to poop pick her up and move her to the grass box.

Eventually you can remove the garden edging and they will just keep going in the same spot.


The important thing at the moment is just to keep her fluids up until you can get rid of those darn worms.

The only problem with that, is there won't be any consistency. I work from 1pm till 10pm mon-fri and my mom is in charge of my dogs during that time. She also runs a rescue consisting of 19 dogs that are in constant need for something, so saddling her down with more thing isn't an option. I might just have to introduce the invisible fence.

As for her diarrhea, I'm re-worming her and I think I will be worming her for the next three weeks to try and get rid of these icky hookworms. I have also got her on Black Almond to help settle her stomach until I can get her into the vet that I want to see and trust more so then the vet I am seeing now.