Hello and thankyou for any comments I have posted before about similar. I live in UK, have a very fit, healthy, working type (but family pet) intact black boy, 3 years old. He eats anything - of course - but has never really had good output ever - we even sought professional nutrition advice from a nationally acclaimed nutritionist in UK and were advised to change over to Acana food- no difference to previous food (arden grange) This was as a puppy. As it is not advisable to constantly change food, I haven't. But, over the years have tried several in UK - millies wolfheart, Barking heads, Forthglade wet and many others but not raw...yet. He is always in great shape, did have a tendency to be a bit thin, not so much now. So the issue is the usually quite volumous, soft poo - i.e has never really ticked the apparent dream ticket of kickable, pickable poo- interesting thought of the day: - why is it in human health, the emphasis is on producing exact opposite?! So, this isn't a great problem but a pain picking up in public places. He is currently on Millies Wolfheart as this seems to suit best amongst kibble. My feelings are that all kibble as good/bad as the next, within reason? Sometimes I think he may be better on a wet diet but have tried this to no definite better result. As said earlier, I can't simply try every food out there as apparently not good to chop and change. I would really value any suggestions what else try - I would now consider going over to raw if this clearly a no brainer Do appreciate any comments at all thank you
I can't see any logical reason not to change. The mainstay of a healthy balanced diet is variety. Why should dogs have to eat the same brand and the same flavour day in and day out? Seems like a recipe for trouble to me... especially when problems emerge with particular diets and ingredients eg the recent scare with the legume content in grain free kibble. I think rotating brands seems like a really good idea if you absolutely must feed kibble. I love raw feeding. Dog is happy and shiny, teeth clean, poo firm. I enjoy planning meals, sourcing ingredients and knowing exactly what he's eating. Id say it was definitely worth a try - Pets at Home sell complete balanced minces if you just want to give it a try without the commitment of ordering a load of stuff on line. Plain tripe is a good place to start as well tolerated by most dogs (smells horrible to humans - be warned). If your dog gets on with this there are lots of online suppliers that do higher quality/better priced options.
thank you - yes you make complete sense - Can I ask couple of questions. I reckon I spend about £1 a day on kibble. He's only about 23kg - just wondering how much more raw feeding costs. I hear from people it doesn't cost so much, some even saying it's cheaper- my calculations don't agree. I would probably go for ready prepared frozen stuff and it looks quite a lot more money? I don't mind spending some more BUT I'm not prepared to spend £1000 or more a year on his food! And do you feed split twice a day? And finally, what do you do if e.g. going away on hols with the dog - is it perfectly OK to substitute to ? forthglade trays or whatever for a bit or is it not advised. Same goes, I suppose for other scraps/treats/kibble .
As a very rough guide, a 500g 'pouch' of raw meat costs me around 90p. My labs weigh between 22 and 25kg. One of them has 2 full pouches a day, so around £1.80. Another has two thirds of a pouch per day, so 60p. Every dog is different.
Cost depends a lot on what brand you choose and whether you can buy in bulk. I save a lot of money because my butcher gives me bones and scraps for free and I have friends who give me venison carcass, pheasants, rabbits etc. The money I save I choose to spend on organic tripe from Paleo Ridge, and higher end completes from Naturaw which are about £4 /kg but worth it for the organic ingredients and biodegradable packaging. I supplement this with veg from the garden (often things that humans don't eat like beetroot and carrot greens or outer leaves of cabbage and kale stems) and eggs from my hens if I have surplus. I buy fish and offal in Morrison's - sardines are £3.50 a kilo and they often have things heavily reduced. It obviously takes a bit of work to put together meals like this and also a bit of research to ensure nutriinal needs are met but for me it's worth it as I have access to so much free stuff. I spend around 30 to 40 £ a month but it really varies depending on the season. If I just bought completes from Naturaw or Nutriment I'd spend double that. Some suppliers are incredibly cheap: DAF, Bulmers and we have a local one called Nature's Best that cost around £2 kg but I wouldn't want to use them, at least not all the time. They are complete in the sense of containing meat, bone and offal in the prey model ratios of 80 10 10 but rely on a lot of cheap ingredients like lung and fat so I'd be concerned about missing nutrients. That said, lots of people swear by these brands and have healthy looking dogs. I feed twice a day - do whatever your dog prefers, I don't think there's any strong scientific evidence either way. On holidays I carry on with raw because he loves it so much and it's not that hard if you're going somewhere with a freezer. I found a local raw food shop on our last holiday to Scotland but I'd have been equally happy to feed him supermarket meat. If camping I'd take tins - I'm enthusiastic about raw but not obsessed, I see no reason not to use kibble or cooked food for training. If your dog responds really well to raw you might not want to go back in which case you may want to invest in an electric coolbox if you travel a lot. Long post, sorry, I get a bit carried away!
If you are thinking of staying on kibble we feed our 14 week old puppy Simpsons 80/20 premium puppy food along with some salmon (cooked) and carrot once a day and steak (raw) once a week. Snakes we use are banana and watermelon. She is very healthy, her coat is shiny and her poops are really good. Shes been on this since we got her and not had any issues at all. It is £48 for 12kg on pet planet for the adult version.
Hi, my black lab will be 3 years old in March. she has been on Hills Science Diet for the last two months, she now weights 69lbs . The problem is that all of a sudden the pet hospital no longer is doing the diet program. I am so upset that I may change to a different Vet. I don't know where to turn now and yet I have to decide what to do, and what food to choose. She is very healthy and I am not sure even how to handle this. I took her in today for a weight check and was told that the weight program wasn't being done anymore. I told them I wanted to talk with the Vet and was told he wouldn't be back in till next week. I only have about one week of food left. Being this is a diet food, I can't just ordered it without a vet approval . Any suggestions would be greatly apricated. Puppy Mom
Hi Puppy Mom you really don’t need expensive dog food from the vets to get your dog to lose weight. From your previous post it doesn’t sound like it was working very well. Take the previous advise and up the exercise with a dog walker if necessary and if you want to stick to kibble feed less of a good quality food you can buy in a pet shop or online. You can compare the calorie value of this food with any others.
Hi, thanks I have done just this. I increased the exercise and I am looking for a walker at this time. I also looked into her food. Do you know anything about Fromm Food ? I am trying to find what will be good for her and I also am looking into getting a scale for myself. I can't lift her otherwise I could just hold her and use my scale. I am also looking into another Vet. puppy mom
I haven’t heard of Fromm but someone else might have. My vet’s scales are in the waiting room and it is ok to just pop in and use them anytime. Maybe a new vet might have the same. I would imagine they are quite expensive to buy.
I haven't heard of Fromm. I agree with JD, you don't need special diet food just work out how many calories you're currently feeding and feed a bit less. I bulk out my greedy dog's food with veg and water. https://www.pfma.org.uk/dog-calorie-calculator-nrc-method Quite a few pet shops here have scales you can use. Even the small raw food supplier I use has scales. I prefer this to the scales in the vet's as he's calmer and keeps still and we can take our time.
Find a feed you are happy with, find out what the recommended feed rate is and try her on a bit less than that, say 10% less. If she doesn’t look lighter after a few weeks reduce further, like wise if she looks like she is more voluptuous. Scales are great for a reference, but go on how she looks. Ideal wight might be 34kg-36kg for example, but my 6 month old male pup is already 33.6kg, a little overweight, but not too much, he is also 57cm at the shoulder and he still has a waist. Our vet want him to trim down so he can see the definition of the last rib.
I've fed mine, twice a day, Eukanuba large breed puppy chow and a 10 months old I switched to Eukanuba Breed Specific adult kibble and feed once a day. I feed raw twice a week and put fish oil on her kibble daily. Also, I use Fido Vite brand Sportz Dog vitamin powder on her kibble every other day. She's just over 1 year old now, weighs 78 pounds, is a slim girl with a lot of energy to boot.
