Coat issues - Page 1

I have a five year old black male LSH gsd. Lately i noticed that some patches of his coat are turning rustybrown. Mainly on top of his schoulder. After fifty years of having gsd's i am still in the dark with this one.

He is on a raw meat diet without any supplements. The rest of his coat seems normal and shiny.

Any thoughts or similar experience are welkom. .

His coat is getting sun bleached You can use a sun screen spray on him or keep him out of the sun It will shed out and be black again

Most common reddening issues are related to copper and zinc. 

Do you have well water Allan? I had that happen with a certain well at an old house. My black dogs and my black horses turned red. We moved and it never happened again. Heavy metals, minerals...check it all out. That's typically your culprit. 

Jenni you are right that is another way I have well but the sun is my enemy. Another trick is to feed vinegar. You can make that black so black learned that from a horse person 80 years ago. Take a Palomino with chocolate points and you can turn them so dark and if no points then really dark gold.

Dogs get really deep rich over all color. Don't need that special shampoo

What type of vinger?

I have used the dark one and if you can find it at 5% instead of the usual 4% even better I will give a dog about a 1/2 cup a day as I also feed raw
You could use that 3-4 times a week or every day as I do.

Thanks W rider

Thanks Western Rider & Jenny78.

Jenny I don't have a well but he has a habit of drinking rainwater out of puddles whenever he gets the chance. Maybe the puddles are contaminated, i will definitely check this out.

Western Rider i am going to try the vinegar trick you mentioned.

Thanks again

 

 

No, puddles wouldn't do it. It's heavy metals in the well. Loads of iron in some places, others have different issues. There is more published on the issue in horses but the same principles apply. Search for info on black horses fading in your area and see what's fixing it. It's typically minerals in soil, wells, and their hay, but if they're all drinking the same water, eating the same dirt, etc....you get the picture. In my case, I only moved a few miles away and all the fading stopped, so I know beyond a shadow of doubt it was the water source because nothing else changed. The sun isn't that much weaker 7 miles away, LOL.