I've noticed in the past couple of days that Louie has been making this noise/action with his mouth that looks like he's gulping/moving his tongue around in his mouth and sounds like he's smacking his lips. And I've also noticed that he burps and vomits a little bit (small mucus like puddle) sometimes an hour or 2 after eating his meal. He's not over drinking water as far as I can tell as I've read that can cause vomiting.
I have no idea what would cause this or if this is minor or serious. Has anyone seen this kind of behavior and knows what might be going on? Thanks.
The vomitting seems to happen an hour or 2 after his night time meals. I've caught him doing that 3 times in the past 2 weeks, latest being last night before bedtime. It's hard to see/tell sometimes because it's quick and not a lot comes up. I think my wife saw him burp up some treats (hot dog) once and he immediately ate it back down.
No changes of behavior that I can tell. Yesterday we took him to the vet for a checkup/microchipping and he was deathly scared (shivering almost the whole time). He had some bad diarrhea (earlier meal of 8oz chicken RMB 7 hours prior) a couple hours later but I attributed it to stress from the vet visit. His behavior recovered fairly quickly after getting back from the vet. Food/mealtimes has been consistent over the past month with chicken rmbs, ground beef (10% fat), and pumpkin.
I heard a lot of lip licking/stomach gurgling after we all got ready for bed, so I ended up taking him out at 2am and he had a little poop (small solid broken up log). His poop this morning (7:30am) was normal again and I scooped some up and sent it off for fecal testing as part of his checkup.
Lynne Barrows Webboard User Reg: 09-22-2007
Posts: 2531
Loc: S. Florida
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Simon, have you added in a probiotic to his meals yet? That might help some of his stomach issues. You could try a tablespoonful of kefir or yogurt daily (either one, plain, unsweetened with live cultures)and see if that helps...
I didn't really notice (put 2 and 2 together) the lip licking and the vomiting until late last night after the vet visit. Last night was the first night I heard his stomach gurgle/grumbling. To be honest the first time he vomitted I thought he just burped up food like who I do sometimes. I told the vet about his diarrhea weeks ago but that it had resolved itself. She didn't seem to be that concerned. I'm not totally sure what palpate means, but she did feel up and down his abdomen (he was standing) with a stethoscope for a minute or 2.
Have any recreation bones or chewies gone missing? Did he "get into the trash?"
If the dog is not depressed, and especially if he eats it right back up, I think that is normal behavior for lots of dogs.
Knowing this dogs history, I suspect he was terror stricken going to the vet, and it may take a few days for him to "get over it."
FWIW, I find hamburger to be pretty hard for my dogs to digest. Annoying, since we raise our own beef and always have plenty of it on hand. A few meals of ground beef in a row leads to GI upset in my dog.
No recreation bones for him and he's not interested in toys so those have been put away for good. Not a trash guy either but I'll double check when I get home tonight to make sure.
I'm leaning towards the terror vet trip theory too. I forgot to mention that he had blood taken out for the heartworm test and also was microchipped (big needle in his back). I'm sure I'd be terrified too if that happened to me and I had no idea why it was happening. I will keep a closer eye on him for the next couple of days and see how he is.
In the month since we've started feeding raw, I've noticed that he does better with the hamburger than he does with the chicken. We're still trying to find that good balance between beef/chicken/pumpkin/etc, but until that nasty diarrhea yesterday his poop was looking on the up and up.
Connie Sutherland Moderator Reg: 07-13-2005
Posts: 31571
Loc: North-Central coast of California
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Simon, there are too many possible bloat symptoms mentioned for me to think it's OK just because the vet did an exam, because if she did not know of the vomiting, stomach-gurgling, and lip-smacking, then she probably was not looking for what she would have been had she known. I asked about palpation because I was wondering about distention of his abdomen.
I would call. I'd explain that there were things going on that she was not aware of and tell her each one. (I'd have a list of everything you mentioned here in my hand for the call.)
Bloat can resolve on its own and bloat does not always lead to torsion. That is, bloat can happen and resolve, and then happen again and lead to volvulus. So many things you mention, including "gulping/moving his tongue around in his mouth and sounds like he's smacking his lips .... burps and vomits a little bit" sound very much like possible bloat warning signs.
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