[Barb E]

Ok I keep seeing where folks are speaking of not feeding potatoes to dogs with Arthritis so tonight I did some quick looks around the 'net and found a reference to not feeing them on http://www.dogaware.com/arthritis.html

So now my question is, are we talking symptomatic dogs here?
Dante is DJD Grade I in one elbow but has no symptoms what so ever. He's on Synovi G3 daily.

I moved him to Wellness Core after getting tired of not having my questions answered by Timberwolf and it has potatoes as do most of the grain free foods.

I'm VERY limited on foods with grains as Barley blows up one ear

 

[BowWowMeow]

If you're feeding kibble it's hard to get away from, especially since Timberwolf changed all of their formulas. So Chama has pretty severe arthritis and she eats Orijen. I try to minimize the impact by also feeding her canned and preprepared raw so that she's only getting 1.25 cups of Orijen a day which, I expect, does not include much potato!

So I think as long as the potato is a minor ingredient then you should be ok, especially if Dante is not showing signs of arthritis! I only started worrying about this in the past year for Chama.

 

[dOg]

But Sweet Potatoes are ok.

 

[3K9Mom]

Sweet potatoes are ANTI-inflammatories. So they're excellent.

I think what we need to do is look at the food overall. Potatoes with fish like salmon (which is highly anti-inflammatory) is better. Potatoes with beef (which is has high inflammatory properties on its own), not good.

Grains have inflammatory properties: rice less than corn or wheat, but even rice isn't very good for dogs battling arthritis, allergies, congestive heart failure -- anything where inflammation may play a role.

It's a balancing act. There's no one perfect kibble out there. We've kind of kicked this around in the seniors forum. The one potato-free grain-free kibble is Instinct, but it's high in fat and protein, and has a high calcium load. That's not good for all dogs either.

Orijen Fish for some arthritic dogs is best. Instinct for others. Maybe other dogs work best on another grain-free option, like chicken or turkey. (Poultry is less inflammatory than beef or lamb). We have to look at all the ingredients. As always, it depends on your dog...