Why do dogs eat feces?

Ahhh, coprophagy…. Many animals reingest their feces to extract nutrients from the food that they didn’t get the first time. Rabbits are the prime example of this, along with many other folivorous (leaf-eating) mammals. I’m not sure if dogs do it because of this or because they just like to eat stinky things. Many animals that do not exhibit coprophagy in the wild will eat their own feces in captivity. This may be a result of psychological stress on the animal, and such stresses cause stereotypical captive behaviors (stereotypies), like eating feces, pulling out hair, and the pacing back and forth seen often in the big cats at zoos (next time you go to the zoo watch the cats pace all day long, it’s sad). I hope this kind of helps.

brownlemur is correct, it can be caused by either physical or behavioral issues. You should at least consider having a fecal exam run to check for parasites – many dogs will eat feces due to a nutrient deficiency brought on by intestinal parasites.

If it is a behavioral problem and it is his own feces that he is eating, there is a product called Forbid that you sprinkle on the dog’s food. It apparently makes the poop taste bad (hard to imagine that it could get worse). Rumor has it that the same ingredient is present in meat tenderizer.