Recommend a good quality dog food
He is currently eating Purina Beneful. I have previously tried Canidae, Wellness, and Nutro Ultra. He got bad gas/diarrhea from all three. He currently licks his paws and is experiencing some sort of problem with his anal glands but he has good poop and no gas! He is super lazy, a few lbs overweight, has allergies, a sensitive stomach, and has aggression issues. What would you (slowly) transition your dog to if you were me? |
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| I have an allergy prone girl and we are feeding Natural Balance Limited Ingredient Diet lamb and Rice. We have had good luck with it. |
| Yuki did real good on Science Diet z/d found at the vet clinic only. It was the only one that didn't give her gas, loose stool, or anything ...and stopped the itching. While I know my dogs get gas from foods that aren't sitting well with them (currently transitioning my pup) ...can some of Walter's gas be from eating TOO much? I only say that b/c if I increase my dogs by even a tad, they start having gas/stool issues. |
| I was giving my dog the Science Diet ZD allergy food for a while until her body realized it was still chicken. She is allergic to chicken and the food was over $70.00 for an 18 lb bag. I am glad to have found an alternative. It is outrageous that you can pay so much for that food. |
| ^^
It is expensive. Funny though, because mine was allergic to your recommendation. haha Mine also doesn't do well w/chicken but did on that food. ...not that I knew there was any chicken in it. |
| We fed our dog Wellness last year when we got her, and it was great until they apparently slightly changed the formula to something less high quality, and it made her so ill with horrible gas and stomach upset.
We switched to Blue Buffalo Life Protection Formula - Chicken & Brown Rice Recipe (occasionally lamb, for a little change), since she's a Shar Pei and we want to be careful about potential sensitivity, allergies and stomach probs. http://www.bluebuff.com/products/dogs/l ... hick.shtml I have been SO happy with the result. She loves it, too. There are no byproducts, artificial preservatives or colors, no corn, wheat or soy either. It has a good balance including fruits and veg, but it does have barley. Not sure if your dog is allergic to that or not. Hope this helps! Good luck and hope you find something that works for Walter  |
| I've always heard Benefel was the worse food to feed - sort of like sugared breakfast creal.
Before we went to Raw I liked the Orijens. |
| I feed Lulu Buffalo Blue Weight Control and she loves it. About 6 months ago I switched her food and in 5 months she gained 7 lbs. I just went back to Buffalo Blue. Took her into the vets today to get weighed and she has lost 3.8 pounds. You can get Buffalo Blue at Petsmart or Petco and they have several different flavors. I also add a spponful of Buffalo Blue canned into their food. Ellie (1 yr OES) gets the Lamb and Rice formula. And my diabetic Bichon on Steroids gets the weight control and is doing great even with his diabetes.
Michelle |
Lulu&Michelle wrote: I feed Lulu Buffalo Blue Weight Control and she loves it. About 6 months ago I switched her food and in 5 months she gained 7 lbs. I just went back to Buffalo Blue. Took her into the vets today to get weighed and she has lost 3.8 pounds. You can get Buffalo Blue at Petsmart or Petco and they have several different flavors. I also add a spponful of Buffalo Blue canned into their food. Ellie (1 yr OES) gets the Lamb and Rice formula. And my diabetic Bichon on Steroids gets the weight control and is doing great even with his diabetes.
Michelle HOORAY they sell it at Petco now! There aren't many PetSmarts in our area. |
| I fed Blue Buffalo but Bella seems to have plant allergies. The chicken liver in the ZD diet is hydrolyzed, so the body doesn't recognize it as chicken, but hers did after 3 weeks. The Natural Balance Limited Ingredient Diet is only Lamb and Rice...but there is Duck and Sweet Potato and one or two other LID foods. They all seem to work different for different dogs. I have tried almost everything since losing my last boy to the melamine in the Nutro. Before all that happened I swore on Nutro...won't touch it now. |
Lil Walty wrote: He is super lazy, a few lbs overweight, has allergies, a sensitive stomach, and has aggression issues. What would you (slowly) transition your dog to if you were me?
A test for thyroid function? 
The real deal, sent to MSU or another approved lab, not the simple T4, either. Or better yet given his history, consult with Dr Dodds. Somebody here must have her contact info. Hemopet is it? As far as food, you have to experiement. What works for one dog won't necessarily work for another. I'm trying to remember what people have mentioned worked (the Blue Buffalo is excellent, but if he didn't do well with Wellness, who knows?) Whatever you try, I guess don't run out and buy a 30 lb bag of it unless your local animal shelter will accept open bags of dog food
I think some have used ProPlan Sensitive Stomach or something like that with good results. Whatever you try, you probably want to pick something with lower protein levels. When I asked my holistic vet for help with my last neurotic foster dog he reminded me that there is a school of thought that dogs with certain behavioral issues can benefit from lower protein diets. Though you don't want to restrict it too much. Just select for less over more when given a choice. Kristine |
| My tender tummy sheepdog is on Wellness Duck Potato, no problems. |
notisolde wrote: We fed our dog Wellness last year when we got her, and it was great until they apparently slightly changed the formula to something less high quality, and it made her so ill with horrible gas and stomach upset. Which Wellness, and do you know what they changed?
Thanks |
| Eukanuba would be my recommendation... |
| I have an older boy who always had a sensiteve intestinal tract. My vet suggested switching him from Proplan Lamb & Rice (what my other 2 do well on) to ProPlan Sensitive Skin & Stomach. It is Salmon based. He has done extremely well on it. |
| Eagle Pack Holistic Select foods like this one-
http://www.holisticselect.com/HS_Fish.html You might try these digestive remedies to transition over to a new food and for stomach upset- http://www.holisticselect.com/HS_DigestiveAids.html |
| Thank you! I'm going to look into Blue Buffalo and the Natural Balance. Does anyone feed Fromms?
Kristine- My vet didn't think he had a thryoid issue, but it has been on my list of things to do for a while. If you have contact info for me I would really appreciate it- wouldn't mind traveling to Wisconsin. And do you have any recommendations for protein levels I should look for? I think low protein was suggested to me before, probably on here, and I'd like to try that route. |
Ron wrote: notisolde wrote: We fed our dog Wellness last year when we got her, and it was great until they apparently slightly changed the formula to something less high quality, and it made her so ill with horrible gas and stomach upset. Which Wellness, and do you know what they changed?Thanks It's a bit of a mystery to be honest, I'm sorry. Tis why I said "apparently," haha. Maybe there's more documentation out there now than there was last summer. WellPet bought them out...our dog suddenly started with tummy troubles, diarrhea and horrible rotten smelling gas. We finally linked her issues with the food, I believe it was the Super 5 Whitefish & Sweet Potato that we fed her. We looked it up and saw many, many complaints of the same issues, some who had reacted worse and owners who all linked it to the Wellness. We discussed this with our vet who said that he had heard other complaints about Wellness suddenly too, and that if the company - who at the time at least said they hadn't changed anything - had indeed made any changes to the formula, they wouldn't have to change the packaging for potentially another 6 months according to TPTB. Can't remember the organization that controls things like that =/ I've got the Friday night dummies apparently. I haven't looked recently to see if the company has mentioned any changes, and maybe it was just a really weird coincidence that so many dogs were suddenly having issues. Or, maybe it was so minute but sensitive tummies just couldn't deal. If it wasn't a change, I'd be curious to know what caused all the upset =/ She was fine once we switched her off the Wellness. So weird. |
| Heather - I feed Fromms.
When I was growing up....years ago.... we (family) fed it to our Brittany's. We got it by the pallet load, and were kind of unofficial distributors. I remember as a kid Brittany people came over to buy dog food....
It hasn't been available to me locally until just recently. I am on my 4th bag, and all are doing well. 
The store is testing it out, to see if people buy it (they know it's good, just to get it promoted so people buy enough that they can carry it). I hope it goes well - I am happy! Right now they just have the adult food in the purple and silver bag. |
Lil Walty wrote: Thank you! I'm going to look into Blue Buffalo and the Natural Balance. Does anyone feed Fromms?
Kristine- My vet didn't think he had a thryoid issue, but it has been on my list of things to do for a while. If you have contact info for me I would really appreciate it- wouldn't mind traveling to Wisconsin. And do you have any recommendations for protein levels I should look for? I think low protein was suggested to me before, probably on here, and I'd like to try that route. Heather - I feed Fromms and I love it. It's made pretty locally to me (so sort of to you as well) which I find somehow oddly reassuring.   Anyway, a number of sheepdog people in this general area have switched (I rotate foods as a matter of course, not necessity, so I don't feed it all the time) and I haven't heard one complaint yet for what it's worth.
As for checking his thyroid function. He may not be hypothyroid, but it's so widespread in the breed that I screen mine as a matter of course. Well, in part because I need to - even if I never breed any of them, they are related to dogs who are or may be bred, so it's valuable information. But just in general it's not a bad thing to keep tabs on with an OES. So I'm a little surprised a vet would be reluctant to check it in a breed like ours, yet it's nice that your vet isn't trying to foist things on your either. Anyway, because I do OFA thyroid screening, I just go to my vet, she draws the blood and sends it to the MSU lab (there are others, but that's probably the most commonly used one in the Midwest). It's expensive (covered in another thread). Some vets feel that you're fine with a pretty basic test for non-breeding dogs that they can run closer to home and for a lot less $$$ My vet, in fact. I rarely disagree with her, so maybe she's on to something. Anyone else have an opinion/any experience with this? Though he certainly doesn't need an OFA number or the application and the extra fee for that, the OFA does have some good info that may be useful: http://www.offa.org/thyinfo.html A number of OES people swear by Dr Dodds. I've never used her/her lab. So many others have that I'm hoping someone will jump in. Some vets take issue with her somewhat liberal interpretation of data, and also some of her theories, and feel her research does not stand the test of scientific rigor. A number of pet owners, especially rescue people it seems, going mainly on personal results, feel differently. I don't know first hand so I really can't say. If he comes back fine, at least you have a baseline if you ever need to test again later. OES don't always present with classical hypothyroid symptoms which may be why your vet feels it's a waste of money. He or she may be right. It's hard to say. We tested one rescue dog who came quite overweight and with thinning hair (she was only 3) fully expecting her to come back positive but she did not. It's really hard to say. Anyway, back to food. The Fromms website is: http://www.frommfamily.com/ Their 4 stars (excellent) range in protein from 23-25%, with the exception of their grain free variety (which I haven't tried) at 30% The adult largebreed gold is 23 % protein and 12% fat which isn't too bad (numbers - I've never seen it around here) You can find lower protein in other brands. The adult gold is 24/16%. If you can find it, you may want to just start with the adult large breed gold. Even their Classic line is good and their Mature adult is 21/11 % (21% is relatively low by premium brand dog food standards) which might be something to consider. I've fed the Adult Gold because I can't always get to a store that carries the four stars line and my dogs do well on it. My other two favorites are Wellness (which you've already ruled out) and Eaglepak Holistic. Kristine |
| I just start natural balance lamb and brown rice , limited ingredients, as rosa is scatching her self to death, since canadea changed their formula. Today was our first day of mixing, so I am keeping my fingers crossed. Petco had company reps at the store yesterday with samples, that got me to try their brand. before that I was considering Blue Wilderness. |
| Hi Heather,
Between Oscar and Dudley we have the same problems as Walter (again, something about their breeding??????). Like Kristine, I feed a rotation of food. Right now I am down to two two, Blue Buffalo and Avoderm, because like others, we began to have problems with Wellness (awful gas and diarrhea). I am looking for a third food to rotate in right now and have tried Pro Plan and Eukanuba and ended up with the same problems as the Wellness. I was convinced that Dudley had a low thyroid problem and have had him tested twice through the thyroid aggression study at Tufts Vet School. Both times he came up normal, not even borderline. He also tends to the tubby side. Tufts advice was to give him one cup of a high quality food twice a day (which he gets) and throw in a cup of green beans each time to keep him feeling satisfied. This works for him and while he could be a little bit thinner the vet is basically happy with his weight. His brother Oscar on the other hand barely eats two cups a day (also fed twice a day) has terrible allergies and a very sensitive stomach, but is much more active than his brother and the perfect weight. Go figure. Good luck with finding the right food. You have my sympathies on this one, but we still love them! Kathie |
| Walter sounds like a mix of Oscar and Dudley, very funny. He has allergies and a sensitive tummy. He's a tad bit overweight, but that is our fault since he gets SO MANY COOKIES.
We started him on Fromms yesterday. Whitefish & sweet potato. I gave him half a cup of that and mixed it with the beneful and he licked the bowl clean! No diarrhea or gas yet, keep your fingers crossed for us! |
| Thanks for the info on Fromms. Same store as I buy Van Pattens. I'll check it out. |
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