Dog eating soil

[Woollymonster]

Any ideas about why my young dog is eating soil? He is fed on Burns kibble. I have just started giving some tinned meat after reading that there can be a link with anaemia.

I would suspect either a vitamin deficiency or he just likes doing it?! Dogs can be weird 🤣

yes they can be weird!

My old boy is 14 and has eaten soil/coal cinders/compost/dead birds and even other dogs poo, but has never been ill other than getting older and stiffer!! My last dog tried to eat a week old, stinking placenta from a horse that had given birth on a nearby field. Weird indeed!

One of my dogs loves fresh compost. Will take mouthfuls of the stuff 🤷‍♀️

Is there poop in it… my Lab has eaten soil.

Mine likes the roots from a mint plant so he digs round it and chews the ground.

They seek minerals and bacteria (probiotics) from soil

Mine does it too. Vet informed me that some dogs are just weird.

Inappropriate eating is sometimes caused but nutrient deficiency - but not very often. If you are feeding a well rounded food, I would discount that as a cause unless I saw other symptoms, such as hair loss or lethargy.

IME lots of young dogs eat soil - supervision, prevention and time grow them out of it (mostly).

You can buy soil based probiotics too. Animals when past daft chewing stage are often pretty good at foraging what they need, many plants have nutrients or medicinal qualities they seek to feel better. My dog would carefully select sweet couch grass, blackberries, occasional dandelion flowers, geranium cranesbill leaves, peony flower 😕 and cleavers those sticky ball weeds are good for lymphatic system and help flush toxins from urinary tract & kidney.

Wasn't peony, I'm thinking of wrong plant. I checked at time worrying it maybe poisonous but wasn't and used in some herbal concoctions.

Yes ScattyHattie, my old dog in her last few months with kidney disease used to specifically seek out verbena in the garden to eat.