When your dog has diarrhea everyone in the house is unhappy. When you look into their sad eyes, you get a sense of meaning to the phrase "I'm sicker than a dog!"

Diarrhea is the number three reason people take their dogs to the vet. Before running off to the vet, look around at what you might be doing to cause your dog to have diarrhea. The good news is that most episodes of routine diarrhea can be prevented, or at least minimized.

The usual suspects are:

• Food- either too old, left out too long, or exposed to high temperatures. Such exposure can happen while being transported to the pet store. Bugs and flies may have climbed into open bags, laid eggs and left droppings during packaging or in your home after they being opened.

• Chlorinated water- your dog’s intestinal tract requires a variety of bacteria to break down and process the food. Chlorinated water can kill these bacteria, causing diarrhea.

• Cleaning agents. Don’t forget, dogs living indoors are walking barefoot. If not sufficiently diluted, many cleaning agents can burn their pads, their eyes, and their lungs. They will often lick their pads to stop the burning, which can lead to diarrhea.

• Pesticides/Insecticides- Similar to cleaning agents in that when dogs lick their pads, they will ingest some of the chemicals. They might also eat a bug that has been exposed to insecticides.

Dogs are notorious for eating bacteria laden morsels out of garbage cans, or found while out on a walk. Dogs off leash are more likely to drink from a stagnant puddle. A few slurps is all it takes! Puddles can be toxic cocktails containing anything from bug larvae, discarded food morsels, infected spittle, leaked automobile fluids like transmission oil, or antifreeze.

Stress is another cause of dog diarrhea. Stress comes in many forms. Small dogs are particularly sensitive to non-harmonious living environments. They prefer peace and quite to yelling, screaming, or fighting; many get crazy if you run the vacuum cleaner, blender, or just leave the room.

Travel, or the anticipation of travel (with or without them) causes stress. Traveling with your dog often means different air quality, humidity, water, sounds, even food. Rescue dogs also feel the emotional stress of all involved in the rescue mission. Now that's travel stress! Any one of these can cause your dog to have diarrhea.

Female dogs in heat will drive male dogs that have mating experience into a frenzy that can cause loose and bloody stools. The female doesn’t even need to be in your house. It could be a neighbors dog out on a walk.

How to handle routine dog diarrhea?

A lot of people think it’s a good idea to let their dogs outside to eat grass when they have diarrhea. Well, that’s partially true. Dogs eat grass even when their GI tract is not upset. If you look carefully you will notice they pull at the grass. They do this to get at the dirt around the roots, which is teaming with soil-based organisms (SBOs). SBOs are essential digestive aids that also help maintain optimum intestinal balance.

Healthy grass and soil contains organic sulfur (MSM), as well (SBOs). However, if you live in an area where lawns are watered with municipal water (chlorinated) or are treated with inorganic fertilizers, or sprayed with pesticides and insecticides it is not a good idea to let your dogs eat the grass.

The actual cause of diarrhea is an intestinal imbalance between what is commonly referred to as “good and bad” bacteria. A balance of both is essential to break the food down so that the nutrients can be absorbed through the intestinal wall, as well as to push along what’s left to be eliminated. The good bacteria get spent in the digestive process and need to be replaced daily to maintain optimum GI balance. Once the “bad bacteria” get the upper hand, they breed quickly.

As I mentioned earlier, in most cases it is not a good idea to let your dogs eat grass. Supplements that contain SBOs are available today that are specifically formulated for dogs. If you were to give SBOs to your dogs on a daily basis, all but the most treatment resistant cases of diarrhea could actually be prevented. A side benefit is that they would be more alert, easier to train and have improved physical performance.