Meeko was in the hospital for most of yesterday for skin tests. His hair can be easily pulled out off his back and parts of his skin are crusty underneath. The test results came through this morning and they can't find anything wrong. They think he's had a reaction to something. I've no idea what it could have been.

In general he is in excellent health. Very strong and being his usual disobedient self with other dogs :blink:

Has anyone else come across something like this before? I will be speaking to the breeder later today. The vet also recommended I get him professionally groomed as some of the dead hairs can not easily remove when I brush him everyday.

Skin problems are some of the worst to deal with. Has your vet had a look at his diet? That's always the first thing I think about when there are skin or digestive problems! Many of the artificial additives and also high protein levels can cause skin problems.

When we first had Troy, we put him on a good quality dry food. He started losing a lot of hair (and got quite ill)... We put the hair loss down to his illness, but changed the food anyway as he didn't eat it anymore. We then kept him on a different food that he liked better. Many months on, I tried him on that original food again and his coat started falling out again. So he was allergic to something in the food... no idea what ingredient though as it was an all natural food. But they can be allergic even to natural substances.

I hope you can get to the bottom of this! But certainly look at the diet if you haven't done so yet.

Vera

He is currently on Royan Canin Giant Junior which is a dry food. He has been on that since I had him. I only first noticed the skin problem in December.

I would have considered Royal Canin a very good food product. Does anyone have a recomended dry food for pyr's?

Does Royal Canine contain any artificial additives (E-numbers, preservatives)?
Does it contain (wheat) gluten (some dogs are allergic to gluten; our pyrenees is one of them)?
What is the protein level (you should not really be much over 20% for a pyr older than about 5 months)?

Some dogs can also be allergic to chicken, rice, dairy products, egg, soya...

Our pyrenees is on CSJ CP18. and he is doing great on it. It is gluten free and free of artificial additives.

Other good foods are Burns, James Wellbeloved, Nutro... to name just a few.

It is just a suggestion... :)

I will check the details when I get home. I think the protein level is quite high but I will know for sure when I get home.

I'll also have to check up on some of the products you mentioned and there availability in Ireland.

It always amazes me that vets don't consider the diet at all in skin problem/digestive problem cases... no idea why! :unsure:

Even if it is not an allergy to any ingredients of the food, it will still help the skin loads if it doesn't have to deal with all the chemical stuff they put into dog food on top of whatever is causing the skin problem. :)

Vera