How to stop your dog(s) from eating poop and feces! ("get away from that!")

Coprophagia is the behaviour where a dog eats it's own poop. I had previously never heard of such a thing, until my dogs started to do it around the same time. From what I have read, this is normal behaviour, and can be learned from other dogs. If your dog is eating only it's poop (or in the case of our dogs, just theirs or each others), it is fine. It is certainly disgusting, but by no means dangerous.

If on the other hand the dog is eating poop at a dog park or during walks, this can be more problematic. The problem lies in that poop can carry parasites and viruses, which can be very dangerous to your dog if not caught and treated quickly. If your dog has ingested feces from another dog which you are unaware of it's medical history, please call your veterinarian immediately.

Reasoning:

There are many reasons scattered over the internet, and by veterinarians themselves, but as far as I can tell, nobody is quite sure why dogs do this. I have been told or read that dogs do this because they see you cleaning it up and want to help, because they naturally enjoy the taste, or because they want attention. Take your pick, the jury is still out!

Treatments:

There are a few clicker training exercises that you can try if your dog has had some training and you are dedicated, this is a more permanent solution but requires the most attention.

You can simply make sure to clean up after them each and every time that they go to the bathroom, which means there is never anything for them to eat. We tried this, but eventually realized that we are too lazy to venture out into the -40C winter wonderland four times a day to collect poop from two dogs!

There are medications that they can take (ask your veterinarian, Excel and Four Paws Potty Mouth come to mind, but there are others) that you feed to your dog, and upon digestion make their feces taste terrible. This is akin to putting that bad tasting nail polish on your nails when you chewed them, and just like that nail polish, there are some dogs that don't mind the taste.

Finally, there is pepper spray. I'm not saying go and buy a bottle of mace, but a solution of cayenne pepper and oil will do the trick. You could add jalepenos, hot sauce, it's up to you, make it your own, it isn't important so long as it's HOT! Spray it on the poop in the back yard, and maybe that will stop the dogs from eating it.

To summarize, if you want your dog to stop eating other dogs poop, training is in order. To stop them from eating their own, try any of the above methods. Good luck!