Hi Cathy!
Glad you liked the liver seminar. Hopefully it serves you well!
With a pulse that is deep and thin in the middle of summer, we know this dog has problems exteriorizing Qi and Blood, making it prone to interior congestion (in the Lungs, causing consolidation) in the winter. That could be caused by a Shao Yang excess, as you say. I, too, see the Blood deficiency in the truncal alopecia; and the bit of Dampness; and the Spleen deficiency, causing the soft stools. The question is how it all fits together, and more importantly, where to start.
My first temptation given the pulse and soft stool is to look at this as, in part, a Wei Qi deficiency. This condition tends to be worse in fall through spring; and would make the dog vulnerable to invasion even from a simple camping trip. It would explain the recurrent nature of the pneumonia, since Wei Qi deficiency is tantamount to local (i.e. epithelial) immune deficiency. Antibiotics generally require an intact immune system to work well, and the TTW apparently showed lingering infection in spite of treatment, calling for another round of antibiotics.
How I would piece all this together, then, is to look at the dog right now as having Spleen Qi sinking. This is not only Spleen deficiency, creating a secondary Blood deficiency and tendency to mild Dampness development, but also a problem of interior Stasis, leading to the pneumonia, unexplained soft stool, deep toned pulse, and superficial Wei Qi deficiency.
Spleen Qi Sinking is, in part, Liver Qi stagnation, so Qi and Blood do not circulate well, leading to Wei Qi deficiency on the surface, and a vulnerability to infection, particularly in the Lungs. Shao Yang disharmony can aggravate that tendency to central Stasis, but isn't needed right now to explain pretty much all we are seeing. You might notice as the dog gets stronger that it's pulse becomes a deep, toned full Shao Yang pulse, requiring us to 'finish the case' with Minor Bupleurum. But it may get better just with BZYQT.
If the pulse were much stronger, I'd start with a Shao Yang approach, but as it is, my temptation is to try Bu Zhong Yi Qi Tang first. If it's the right formula, the stool should firm up and the pulse should lift after a couple of weeks. If it does, and assuming the dog doesn't then start showing signs of a pure and simple Shao Yang disharmony, I'd use BZYQT right through fall and into winter, to try to prevent pneumonia from recurring. Meanwhile, and microbes in the Lungs that are latent should get cleared through the immune stimulating effects of BZYQT.
If that doesn't help, or there are some immediate adverse developments, which would suggest we are tonifying an excess, then I'd be tempted to use Xue Fu Zhu Yu Tang and Xiao Chai Hu Tang in tandem. As you've noted, though, there seems to be a Spleen deficiency element here that is strong enough to serve as a treatment focus, and XCHT is not quite up to that. If the diarrhea had been large bowel, that would have been different, but because it's small bowel, my temptation is to try BZYQT first
Hopefully that makes sense and gives you some guidance on how to proceed! Let us know how it goes!
Steve