hi, two weeks ago I decided to switch my 12 month boy from royal canin gsd 24 to wellness core- - the problem, he picks through the wellness to get the little ammount of royal canin I mix with it, he doesnt seem to like the wellness at all! his bm's are really good , but he seems to go more often. Louie has lots of eye gunk and while the itchy skin initially went away it is back with a vengence. seems I cant win , can I change again so soon? he is getting 4 to 1 wellnes as I am just trying to get rid of the royal canin. Myabe I should switch to canidae? that seems to have some grains? maybe he needs the grain product? raw is out of the question as it would not work with my current situation. Any one feed fromm?
problems with grain free diet
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What are the proteins in the two different foods? What about the protein levels?
I would be looking at that first.
That said, not every dog does well on a grain free diet or a higher protein diet or likes the same foods. If he doesn't like the food then I would look for another one because it will be a constant struggle to get him to eat.
I would be looking at that first.
That said, not every dog does well on a grain free diet or a higher protein diet or likes the same foods. If he doesn't like the food then I would look for another one because it will be a constant struggle to get him to eat.
I choose wellness because it seemed to have the least ammount of protiein in the grain free foods I looked at - it has 34% , I will look but I think fromm has the same amount. Does the protien have something to do with itchy skin and goopy eyes? I would think the more protien the better my dog would like it? He really did well on the royal canin lg breed puppy. As soon as I switched to adult food all this stuff started - loose stools, itchy skin , bad breath , goopy eyes ect..
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What is the source of protein (chicken, fish, etc.)? If he has an allergy to a particular protein that's what you could be seeing. If the protein amounts are the same then that's not the problem.
G
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·Our dogs are on EVO Red Meat Large Bites. It has beef, lamb, venison, and buffalo as the meat source in it. 42% protein and both dogs are doing quite well on it. Particularly Odin who has long had food issues.
turkey is he main ingredient in the wellness i feed. maybe that is the prob- but turkey & chicken are pretty much the same thing??
I had another thought- since the weather is getting better I have been taking louie to the barn every day- he loves horse poop! could it be he is reacting to the grains in the manuer? I try really hard to keep him from eating it but he always sneaks some. He also gets into the horse grain when he can. I dont want to stop taking him , he loves it and it is great exercise for him as well as socilization with lots of different people and dogs.
I had another thought- since the weather is getting better I have been taking louie to the barn every day- he loves horse poop! could it be he is reacting to the grains in the manuer? I try really hard to keep him from eating it but he always sneaks some. He also gets into the horse grain when he can. I dont want to stop taking him , he loves it and it is great exercise for him as well as socilization with lots of different people and dogs.
is evo grain free? tonight I didnt put in any royan canin hoping he would be hungry enough to eat the wellness - well he is munching away at it now--- I think maybe I will gin=ve him another week on the wellness without any of the rc to see if it really is the wellness caousing the problems. sound ok? I am relly conerned about switching foods all the time as I have heard it is not that good for dogs.
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Is this because of the high protein levels, Barb?
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the high protein itself isnt really a problem. however, along w/ high protein comes higher levels of calcium and phosphorus, which have been implicated in causing problems with the growth of large breed puppies. even the lower protein grain free kibbles have higher levels of these minerals.
imo, i would feed no grainless kibble to my pup until she is 1 1/2 yrs old. i feel better with the calc/phos levels hovering close to 1%.
imo, i would feed no grainless kibble to my pup until she is 1 1/2 yrs old. i feel better with the calc/phos levels hovering close to 1%.
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There are now grain free kibble out there with lower levels of protein. TOTW's Pacific Stream comes to mind--that's 25% protein. I know there are others too. I don't know how old Rafi is but he's between 16 and 20 months probably. Right now his kibble is 32% protein but he doesn't eat much of it (1.5 cups per day).
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paulaa - I have an edge, have a very close friend that owns a natural pet suppy store who was in the veternarian industry for years before she opened her store
Feeding our dogs is an experience that I think is never ending. We learn, and "they" learn new things all the time. We do the best we can with the knowledge we have at any given moment (I shudder to think about what I fed my cats!).
I think Canidae is a great food. Dante did very well on it.
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after months of inconsistent stools w/ my pup on canidae, she was switched to innova lg breed puppy, which worked great. i decided 2 wks ago to give the canidae a try again (since it is still very cost efficient compared to others). her stools are very solid so far and pretty small. i hope this continues, as i would be quite content to just stick w/canidae until she is done growing, then use it in some sort of rotation with a grain free, preferably the wellness core.
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if you wanted to try grain free "taste of the wild" has one called "pacific stream" that is lower in protien and i think your 12 month old would be fine on that. plus the fish is usually a good one if a dog has allergies to certain protiens, etc.
debbie
debbie
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