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i'm sure this has been discussed before but i have some pretty specific questions so eh.
sadie has multiple food-related issues - she's picky and will go all day without food if she doesn't like what's in her dish, she seems to be allergic to the food i recently switched her to (she's been scratching & chewing like crazy since she switched), and she has a sensitive stomach so she can't take switching foods a lot (and some foods just disagree with her). but it seems like i always get a little bag of something and she likes it, then i get a big bag and she gets sick of it. so i am thinking about switching her diet to the best/simplest foods i can afford, with consistency but some variety.
what i am thinking about is taste of the wild prairie whatever (with BISON in it, which cracks me up) supplemented with this stupidly expensive dehydrated food called thrive by honest kitchen. i got a sample recently and she LOVED it. i plan to give her totw in the morning and then totw & thrive mixed at night. i'm going to try her on those for a while and see if her itching stops. if that works out i might slowly mix in some high quality wet foods, to keep her interested.
anyone have any experience with either of these foods? or do you have any suggestions? a strategy for systematically working out what her food (or other) allergies are would be great. i am pretty sure it's not fleas because i haven't seen any, and she's had fleas before and actually wasn't this distressed over it, so i doubt she has a flea allergy.
she is due for her checkup soon so i will be asking my vet these questions as well, but i'd like to get her un-itchy as soon as possible.
oh the food that she seems to be allergic to is chicken soup for the dog lover's soul senior formula. that reminds me, glucosamine is also an issue because she has arthritis.
ha, this thread makes her sound like such a mess! she's actually a really healthy dog and these issues are all pretty minor, but i still want the best for her.
Location: Montreal -> CT -> MA -> Montreal -> Ottawa
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Artie was eating TOTW (bison) until he got tired of it. He enjoyed it... until he was bored. But that's just him being finicky. Now he's on Orijen... until he gets bored of that.
He didn't like any of the Honest Kitchen stuff but, then again, he's not known as Mr. Finicky for nothing.
I think that the only way to systematically determine what Sadie's allergic to is giving one ingredient at a time. (I suspect, too, that the Chicken Soup food may not have agreed with her because it has milk in it. That's a possibility.) I also think that it's the protein in the food that you have to systematically check. So if you used to feed her a food with chicken as the protein and she was itchy, switch to another protein -- in this case bison -- and see if it makes a difference. It should.
By the way, I know that you're supposed to transition a dog when you start a new food, but when I changed Artie to grain-free, I did it cold turkey. I figured that the grain stuff was bothering his tummy something fierce, why should I prolong that. Your mileage may vary, of course.
Good luck! I hope you can get to the bottom of this soon so that Sadie feels better.
i'm not sure if it's the chicken in the food that's doing it - the food i switched her from had chicken. milk makes sense, although i've fed her yogurt before with no ill effect - but never for a prolonged period of time. i almost wonder if it's the turkey, but from what i've read turkey is considered a pretty allergy-friendly protein.
i'm definitely going to get her off of wheat, maybe grains altogether - my husband isn't going to be happy about not being able to give her snausages anymore! she really adores the natural balance duck & potato rolls though, and they don't have any grains.
oh the food that she seems to be allergic to is chicken soup for the dog lover's soul senior formula. that reminds me, glucosamine is also an issue because she has arthritis.
ha, this thread makes her sound like such a mess! she's actually a really healthy dog and these issues are all pretty minor, but i still want the best for her.
I can weigh in on the glucosamine issue. My vet had me give my Westie the human form of glucosimine she was born with hip dysplacia (SP?) it is pretty expensive so the vet also suggested that I give her fish oil caps both work pretty well. Gives her alot more mobility. Ask your vet though.
Location: Montreal -> CT -> MA -> Montreal -> Ottawa
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Quote:
Originally Posted by groar
i'm not sure if it's the chicken in the food that's doing it - the food i switched her from had chicken. milk makes sense, although i've fed her yogurt before with no ill effect - but never for a prolonged period of time. i almost wonder if it's the turkey, but from what i've read turkey is considered a pretty allergy-friendly protein.
i'm definitely going to get her off of wheat, maybe grains altogether - my husband isn't going to be happy about not being able to give her snausages anymore! she really adores the natural balance duck & potato rolls though, and they don't have any grains.
Yogurt and milk are completely different. Artie can't tolerate milk (e.g., cheese) but can eat a ton of yogurt with no problem.
I still give Artie some treats that have grains in it. I can't be spending all sorts of $$ on grain-free treats, too. He gets chicken jerky as a treat, and then some liver things that DO have grains. As long as Artie's diet is not full of grain (i.e. his FOOD has no grains), he does well.
Have you tried lamb as the protein ingredient? If she responds well to her duck treats, you can get kibble whose protein is all duck.
My babies eat wellness small bites mixed with wellness canned chicken stew(chihuahua and chihuahua mix) Pepper and Chili ~ Chili has a sensitive digestive tract and the wellness brand did not upset intestinal tract at all. They come in different flavors if you think it might be the chicken but the chicken is their favorite!
For the arthritis/jointissues I give them one chicken jerky w/glucosomine every night. It's a little expensive but they are worth it and they are healthy, and Chili doesn't have diarhea all the time anymore..
i haven't - my husband and i don't eat meat and although we feed sadie and our cats meat he draws the line at a few things for dog food - lamb is one of them. i suspect he wouldn't be too happy with rabbit or venison either.
one thing i like about thrive is that it's made with certified humane chicken. *i* still wouldn't eat that, but if we're going to feed her meat i like that it's certified humane (and i looked into the certification and it actually means something).
i was actually feeding her the mid grade costco food before i switched her to chicken soup - not the grain free kind which is apparently identical to totw salmon (they don't carry that at my costco and she didn't like that totw flavor much anyway), but the kirkland premium or something like that. she was hesitant to eat it though, and i know there are better foods out there.
Location: Montreal -> CT -> MA -> Montreal -> Ottawa
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I knew that you guys didn't eat meat and I was so uncomfortable even TALKING about meat, even though I knew that you fed Sadie meat.
Artie didn't like TOTW Pacific Stream (salmon) either. Been there, tried that, tossed the bag. Thankfully it was only a small bag, just to try it.
I'd definitely try her on the TOTW bison kibble. Artie did really well on that.
If chicken is not her allergy, Wellness Core and Orijen are both really good... and really bloody expensive. In the grand scheme of things, though, my friend calculated the price difference and how long the bag lasts -- it's just a couple of bucks more per month to feed the great stuff, so...
Anyway, I'm anxious to hear how she does on the bison.
Are you going to switch her cold turkey like I did with Artie? It's not recommended, but it worked for us.
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