Kibble and dehydrated food - questions/comments?

[JonP]

Before someone decides to start a group here for kibble or dehydrated food, I thought I would post a discussion to see what type of interest it generates. I also have some questions of my own that I hope someone can help me out with.

[James Dillon]

I fed my dog Science Diet Large Breed Puppy food for the first year of his life and I gradually switched him over to Science Diet Large Breed Adult.  I have had zero problems with either food.

As a veterinarian I think there are a large number of dry dog foods out there that are great choices.  The major brands (science diet, royal canin, iams, etc) all put a ton of research into their foods and the market between them is very competitive so they are always trying to improve their product lines.

I know there are a lot of folks on here who are really adamant about raw feeding so I don't bother putting this out there much anymore, but I do think dry dog food is the best way to do things.  If you are interested in some more info as to why feel free to send me a message.

Jamie

[JonP]

Thank you for the help Jamie! I appreciate it the vet perspective on things. You bring a lot of knowledge to this site, thank you for participating in this discussion!

James Dillon said:

I fed my dog Science Diet Large Breed Puppy food for the first year of his life and I gradually switched him over to Science Diet Large Breed Adult.  I have had zero problems with either food.

As a veterinarian I think there are a large number of dry dog foods out there that are great choices.  The major brands (science diet, royal canin, iams, etc) all put a ton of research into their foods and the market between them is very competitive so they are always trying to improve their product lines.

I know there are a lot of folks on here who are really adamant about raw feeding so I don't bother putting this out there much anymore, but I do think dry dog food is the best way to do things.  If you are interested in some more info as to why feel free to send me a message.

Jamie

[Lisa Tiro]

My vet also feeds his dog a low quality kibble, no offense, and told me when I asked him about feeding RAW that whether dogs eat any kind of kibble, good quality or not so good quality, that they live just as long. I would not dispute that since I have always fed my dogs kibble and they have lived what I consider long lives with the exception of my BB that got AIHA. I have nothing to compare it to. But, the reason he didn't like RAW was cross contamination to humans. He wasn't selling anything. He actually recommended the Cosco dog food, which is an above average kibble made by Diamond Pet Foods. He uses Purina One which he also gets at Cosco. He has a Great Dane. A few weeks ago I started my new Boerboel on RAW only because he wouldn't eat dog food of any kind. Feeding kibble is a lot easier for sure but my boy had runny poops the whole time he was on kibble and now his poops are firm and small and he has a bm once a day if that. That is the best part lol....

[Saskia Vermeulen]

Hi, my boy Chester had heaps of trouble with kibble and had a lot of skin irritations, i changed him to a raw diet and all the symptoms disappeared. I have had to put him on a dry food recently, now I still feed him 1+kg of raw chicken necks a night and Black Hawk Holistic rice and lamb kibble. I'm not sure where u live but this is made in Australia. it is made with human grade products and has no bi-products at all, it also has no wheat products at all as he cant seem to tolerate it, hes been on it now for 5 weeks without a problem, his stools are fine and so is his skin condition. A local shop does have to order it for me every month and its not cheap but he loves it and it works, good luck, hopefully you will find some thing similar.

[JonP]

Lisa,

Thanks for the help. My vet told me the exact same thing! I am not quite sure what to make of that concept. I would have assumed there would be a noticeable difference. I am sure that at this stage there has not been enough research into the various options considering overall life and health. I may switch to raw one day...but that is not in the cards right now. Thanks again for the input!

Lisa Tiro said:

My vet also feeds his dog a low quality kibble, no offense, and told me when I asked him about feeding RAW that whether dogs eat any kind of kibble, good quality or not so good quality, that they live just as long. I would not dispute that since I have always fed my dogs kibble and they have lived what I consider long lives with the exception of my BB that got AIHA. I have nothing to compare it to. But, the reason he didn't like RAW was cross contamination to humans. He wasn't selling anything. He actually recommended the Cosco dog food, which is an above average kibble made by Diamond Pet Foods. He uses Purina One which he also gets at Cosco. He has a Great Dane. A few weeks ago I started my new Boerboel on RAW only because he wouldn't eat dog food of any kind. Feeding kibble is a lot easier for sure but my boy had runny poops the whole time he was on kibble and now his poops are firm and small and he has a bm once a day if that. That is the best part lol....

[JonP]

Saskia,

I will look into the Black Hawk food and see if it is available in my area. I am still open to other options as far as kibble is concerned. Thanks for your help!

Saskia Vermeulen said:

Hi, my boy Chester had heaps of trouble with kibble and had a lot of skin irritations, i changed him to a raw diet and all the symptoms disappeared. I have had to put him on a dry food recently, now I still feed him 1+kg of raw chicken necks a night and Black Hawk Holistic rice and lamb kibble. I'm not sure where u live but this is made in Australia. it is made with human grade products and has no bi-products at all, it also has no wheat products at all as he cant seem to tolerate it, hes been on it now for 5 weeks without a problem, his stools are fine and so is his skin condition. A local shop does have to order it for me every month and its not cheap but he loves it and it works, good luck, hopefully you will find some thing similar.

[Saskia Vermeulen]

Hi Jon, my boy Chester had problems with allergies from a very young age and I worked out it was the kibble, actually it was the wheat and meat by-products in it as they are really bad for dogs and are very poor in quality, so i switched to a total raw diet and everything cleared up, but now he is 3 I have put him back on kibble, aswell as chicken necks again, only reason being that I have finally found a fantastic dry food. Its called Black Hawk holistic, lamb and rice, human grade food with no nasties, and no wheat, its even got emu oil for the good oils, its $100 for 20kg and last me 5 weeks so with the chicken necks it works out about the same as I was spending before. I live in Australia, I'm not sure where you live, this kibble is a fairly new product and has taken of here in a big way, you would probaly have find kind a similar type of kibble in your country, Chester didnt even have loose stools when I changed his diet, its really good. If you goole it you can see what the breakdown is of the kibble, the main thing I found is to get a wheat free kibble that also does not contain any by-products as they put any and everything in pet food from rotten and mouldy wheat husks to diseased meats. Good luck, hope your dog gets better.

 

Saskia

[Gary and Regina Humphrey]

We think we have covered all the wonderful discussions that are on this site, and would like to say thank you Marco for developing this site for us to have a place to go to get educated on our dearly loved 4-legged members of our family.  In 5 weeks, we get our first Boerboel and, as you probably know, we are about to pop with excitement!  We have always had dogs, but never a large (giant) breed dog and this has put us on a search for the best food for him, as well as our little Shih-Tzu we currently have.

 

We have looked into raw feeding and greatly appreciate all the insite that has been given, but feel that, even though that may be the absolute best, it's not going to fit into our lifestyle.  It's kind of like, we know that "organic" would be the best fresh foods that we could buy, but we settle for the regular fruits and veggies in the market.  Also, we are by no means experts on the daily nutritional needs of dogs, are not comfortable making that determination with supplements, etc., and would like to leave it up to the "experts".  That being said, we have found that the term "expert" is used loosely in the dog food industry and we are more interested, at this point, in finding a company that we can truly trust in supplying the absolute best for our baby.  After longs nights of research on several companies, we have narrowed it down to Orijen or Acana, and would like to hear both the good and the bad in way of testomonies and observations to this brand from those who have used it.  Or ideas from anyone who feels there is an even better one out there that we may have missed.

 

We look forward to hearing from you,

Gary and Regina Humphrey

[Lisa Tiro]

Hi Regina,

You are so right. Marco has done a great job and I appreciate it as well. I have never used those 2 brands. I did the same as you and stayed up nights researching different brands. I settled on Precise Holistic Complete Large Breed Puppy. What ever you choose it should be for large breed puppies with less calories so they don't grow too large too fast. And, in my research it should say holistic. However, after having Axel on this food from the time I got him at 18 weeks old he kept having loose stools. The vet said change the food so I bought Iams Large Breed Puppy and it did get better but when I switched him back it came back again. It could have been teething but it was rediculous. I was up all night taking him out every hour. And, the funny thing is it only happened at night, weird. So, what I'm getting at is I was reading about RAW since my last BB and I always felt as you do that it wasn't for us as much as I thought it sounded great and all my family and lifestyle didn't support it. It also sounded time consuming and hard to do or hard to leave someone in charge of feeding him if I was out or not home on time. And, I was afraid as you that he wouldn't be getting everything nutritionally that he needed. ANYWAY, sorry to be so long, he stopped eating the food. He hated it and I started adding soft food in to get him to eat it or I'd add pumpkin because it made his stools firmer and he just wouldn't eat the food anymore and I was now worrying that he wasn't getting proper nutrition and he looked like he wasn't growing at all. SO, at 8 1/2 months I jumped in with both feet and I started him on RAW. I am not telling you this to pressure you, only because I was the exact same way and he pretty much told me I aint eating that crap, I want real food. And that was it. He loves it, it's way easier than I thought and he poops once a day (the best part) a tiny bit. His poop is actually not much bigger than my Chihuahua's lol....My other 2 dogs are still on dry dog food because my Pit Bull is 15 and I'm thinking after my Pit passes that I will put my Chi on RAW as well. It was scary at first and I do give Vitamin C and joint supplement as well as fish oil and he looks great and is growing and is eager now to eat. I haven't really gotten into the organ meats yet as he only started 7 weeks ago so we are taking it slow. So, if the dry food doesn't work out, don't be afraid. Good luck with your new pup. It is very exciting!

~Lisa

[Gary and Regina Humphrey]

Thank you, Lisa, for your insight.  I will definitely research the Precise Holistic and compare with what I have found.  I still haven't completely ruled out raw, but am definitely leaning toward the dry.  I think I'm just really scared to do wrong by him and he ending up having a deficiency due to my ignorance.

 

Regina

 

Lisa Tiro said:

Hi Regina,

You are so right. Marco has done a great job and I appreciate it as well. I have never used those 2 brands. I did the same as you and stayed up nights researching different brands. I settled on Precise Holistic Complete Large Breed Puppy. What ever you choose it should be for large breed puppies with less calories so they don't grow too large too fast. And, in my research it should say holistic. However, after having Axel on this food from the time I got him at 18 weeks old he kept having loose stools. The vet said change the food so I bought Iams Large Breed Puppy and it did get better but when I switched him back it came back again. It could have been teething but it was rediculous. I was up all night taking him out every hour. And, the funny thing is it only happened at night, weird. So, what I'm getting at is I was reading about RAW since my last BB and I always felt as you do that it wasn't for us as much as I thought it sounded great and all my family and lifestyle didn't support it. It also sounded time consuming and hard to do or hard to leave someone in charge of feeding him if I was out or not home on time. And, I was afraid as you that he wouldn't be getting everything nutritionally that he needed. ANYWAY, sorry to be so long, he stopped eating the food. He hated it and I started adding soft food in to get him to eat it or I'd add pumpkin because it made his stools firmer and he just wouldn't eat the food anymore and I was now worrying that he wasn't getting proper nutrition and he looked like he wasn't growing at all. SO, at 8 1/2 months I jumped in with both feet and I started him on RAW. I am not telling you this to pressure you, only because I was the exact same way and he pretty much told me I aint eating that crap, I want real food. And that was it. He loves it, it's way easier than I thought and he poops once a day (the best part) a tiny bit. His poop is actually not much bigger than my Chihuahua's lol....My other 2 dogs are still on dry dog food because my Pit Bull is 15 and I'm thinking after my Pit passes that I will put my Chi on RAW as well. It was scary at first and I do give Vitamin C and joint supplement as well as fish oil and he looks great and is growing and is eager now to eat. I haven't really gotten into the organ meats yet as he only started 7 weeks ago so we are taking it slow. So, if the dry food doesn't work out, don't be afraid. Good luck with your new pup. It is very exciting!

~Lisa

[Lisa Tiro]

No problem Regina. I would still supplement the dry after he gets adjusted to it with buffered Vitamin C and joint supplement and fish oil. The C promotes collagen growth in the joints and helps to prevent HD. There have been some pretty good studies on it. I give my 110 lb. boy 500 mg a day, 1/2 a pill in the morning with his food and 1/2 at night. I also give it to my 15 year old Pit Bull that has arthritis and it has helped her tremendously. Good luck!

~Lisa

P.S.

Don't forget to post pics!

Regina Humphrey said:

Thank you, Lisa, for your insight.  I will definitely research the Precise Holistic and compare with what I have found.  I still haven't completely ruled out raw, but am definitely leaning toward the dry.  I think I'm just really scared to do wrong by him and he ending up having a deficiency due to my ignorance.

 

Regina

 

Lisa Tiro said:

Hi Regina,

You are so right. Marco has done a great job and I appreciate it as well. I have never used those 2 brands. I did the same as you and stayed up nights researching different brands. I settled on Precise Holistic Complete Large Breed Puppy. What ever you choose it should be for large breed puppies with less calories so they don't grow too large too fast. And, in my research it should say holistic. However, after having Axel on this food from the time I got him at 18 weeks old he kept having loose stools. The vet said change the food so I bought Iams Large Breed Puppy and it did get better but when I switched him back it came back again. It could have been teething but it was rediculous. I was up all night taking him out every hour. And, the funny thing is it only happened at night, weird. So, what I'm getting at is I was reading about RAW since my last BB and I always felt as you do that it wasn't for us as much as I thought it sounded great and all my family and lifestyle didn't support it. It also sounded time consuming and hard to do or hard to leave someone in charge of feeding him if I was out or not home on time. And, I was afraid as you that he wouldn't be getting everything nutritionally that he needed. ANYWAY, sorry to be so long, he stopped eating the food. He hated it and I started adding soft food in to get him to eat it or I'd add pumpkin because it made his stools firmer and he just wouldn't eat the food anymore and I was now worrying that he wasn't getting proper nutrition and he looked like he wasn't growing at all. SO, at 8 1/2 months I jumped in with both feet and I started him on RAW. I am not telling you this to pressure you, only because I was the exact same way and he pretty much told me I aint eating that crap, I want real food. And that was it. He loves it, it's way easier than I thought and he poops once a day (the best part) a tiny bit. His poop is actually not much bigger than my Chihuahua's lol....My other 2 dogs are still on dry dog food because my Pit Bull is 15 and I'm thinking after my Pit passes that I will put my Chi on RAW as well. It was scary at first and I do give Vitamin C and joint supplement as well as fish oil and he looks great and is growing and is eager now to eat. I haven't really gotten into the organ meats yet as he only started 7 weeks ago so we are taking it slow. So, if the dry food doesn't work out, don't be afraid. Good luck with your new pup. It is very exciting!

~Lisa

[Russell Zukouski]

Any info on great life buffalo grain and potato free dog food for my 6 month old boy