Is my dog in need of a change to her diet?

[Holdbacktheriver]

Sorry for the slightly vague thread title but I couldn't think how to word it.

We moved house in October and no longer have a side yard for my pooch to toilet in so she has to go in the main garden where the children play. She is going a lot. I feel like I'm spending all day picking up after her. I've watched her and she will spend 10 minutes going in maybe 4 different spots in the garden 3-4 times a day. If the dc are out playing with her she will of course go again.

I had thought it may have been the move initially that unsettled her but now I'm wondering if it's her food? She's on James Wellbeloved and is an otherwise fit and healthy 3year old terrier. She seems very happy no signs that anything is bothering her and the vet is always pleased with her.

I'm sure I wasn't clearing up this much from the yard at our old house. She will also go 2 or 3 times on a walk am I missing something?

I don't think that sounds normal. What are the stools like? My dog goes 1-2 times a day on her walks, never in the garden, they are firm enough to pick up and not leave a mess behind.

Completely normal looking and firm.

She's not over weight we weigh her food (my childhood dogs ended up very overweight so I've always been very careful probably a bit paranoid with her food so as not to over feed her) we give carrot and apple or leftover chicken as treats and I'll occasionally let her have a little bit of yogurt but she's not had that since we moved to rule out it being a cause.

Before we moved she would go in the morning, on her walk and in the evening.

I'm completely stumped. She's wonderful in every other way but I'm dreading the summer and starting to worry there might be something not quite right with her.

It does seem rather a lot. Mine goes in first thing in the morning, during her morning walk and occasionally during the afternoon one. She can have a delicate stomach but then it is 'squishy'. She is on Royal Canin Sensitive Chicken and Rice which cost a bloody fortune!!

The fact that she spends so long I wonder if there's an element of the novelty of having a big garden to go in , although that doesn't explain why she's going so much in a day . Would it be possible to fence off a bit of patio to let her out on . My dog (13kg terrier) goes once or twice a day , we feed Millies Wolfheart ranger mix , although he will squeeze out an extra poo on a walk sometimes .

Is she marking the area? Establishing it as hers?

The marking and novelty are both good points. Unfortunately there isn't anywhere I can fence off as we no longer have side access so don't even have a little bit of path I could make hers.

She's a very excitable dog generally, and you can see she is really enjoying having free run of our nice big garden. Her walks are now out in the country across lots of fields (moved from a city to a tiny tiny village) and again she's incredibly excitable on walks so I'm wondering if that could maybe be playing a part in it and she needs a little longer to settle down?

I have a friend that's recommending raw feeding but I'm a bit OCD and she drags her food about the kitchen as it is. Im not sure I'd cope if she was dragging raw meat across my kitchen floor

I love raw feeding. I'd say you can train the dog if she's biddable. In my case, the dog trained us to be a bit less particular!

We put an ornamental fence around our fairly large patio so that our dog can't get on the grass unless someone is supervising , we did it because he digs and when he was a pup he nearly killed himself chewing daffodil bulbs that he had dug up .

I fed mine raw but it was frozen blocks or nuggets from pet shop which I defrosted and more like a mince/pate so even if it got on floor it was easy to clean up with a paper towel and there was no blood. I think a bit of dry though is good for the teeth and prevents tartar build up by sloughing off the plaque etc.