Hard water and frequent urination

So it's been a week now that Ace is here and I have noticed that in the evenings, he will need to go to the bathroom as frequently as every 20-30 minutes. While I understand that pups of four months can pee often, this is a little excessive. I've been reading around and noticed that his urine is consistent with being of a watery, alkaline quality moreso than acidic. The tap water here in France is quite hard, and his peeing frequency rose only in the last two days. Is it possible that what he's drinking now is too hard for him thus creating the need to evacuate more frequently than when his body was getting softer, more acidic water?

He has been to the vet just a couple of days ago and a UTI was ruled out. I've been thinking about trying to treat the alkaline urine thing at home by replacing the hard water with bottled, and giving a vitamin C supplement. Aside from this surge of needing to pee, he is a perfect gentleman with not soiling the inside of our flat. As he gives no clues whatsoever of needing to evacuate (he'll be on leash with me, then suddenly stand up and pee) and we live in an apartment - no yard - there's been quite a lot of accidents thanks to this new fad of frequent urination. We want to help him from the inside out, if that's where the problem lies.

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Permalink Reply by Lou Ann Lemaster on September 11, 2011 at 8:20am

Has he been drinking any water from a pond or stream in the wildness? He could have gardia (SP?) It's caused by wild animals drinking in the water, especially standing water. Duncan had that once, and he did a lot of peeing and drinking water.

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Permalink Reply by Ludi on September 11, 2011 at 8:58am

Nah, we live in a pretty urban area and I have been very careful to not let him drink from stagnant puddles, and to clean him off when we enter the flat.

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Permalink Reply by Jane Christensen on September 11, 2011 at 9:16am

Could you try giving him more in the am and decrease the amount available towards evening? He still needs it but maybe less?

Sorry that is all I can think of. He should get used to the water though as mine drink different water from places all the time.

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Permalink Reply by Sam Tsang on September 11, 2011 at 10:08am

We use pur / brita filter, if you own your own home, you can look into reverse osmosis system. Vitamin C supplements are water-soluble = expensive urine.