Food advcie for 7 month old lab

[Halfpass]

Ever since a puppy Burtie has been on Oscars dog food. I had him and my 4 year old lab on the same working dog high energy food as advised by the local rep. Both dogs love it and look fab on it but the 7 month olds tummy has never really adjusted to it. He always has the runs and can clear my house in 2 seconds flat with his bad wind!!

I have voiced my concerns to the local rep on a fw occasions and have been told to presevere. Well I have persevered enough and have decided to change him onto something else.

I went in to my local pet shop and the owner was shocked when I told him what he had been fed since a puppy and suggested that he is on the wrong type of food which is why his tummy can't tolerate it.

I now have him back on a puppy/ junior food which we started yesterday.

Will he have any long terms problems from being fed the incorect type of food from such a young age?

The other thing that suprised me was the quantity that Oscars suggest feeding. It was well over dounble what the new food I have for him suggested!!!

 

[CorvusCorax]

Horses for courses! You will know yourself what works and what doesn't and for your dog, this brand does not.
My dog's breeder uses Royal Canin but I personally didn't think it suited them.

I don't see why this should result in long-term problems, but I am not a vet (and neither is your pet shop owner

) I have seen dogs been fed all sorts of rubbish and gone on to lead long, healthy lives.
When I was a nipper there was no such thing as 'puppy-junior' ranges, anyway!

I would always trust your own instincts with feeding, especially regarding recommended amounts.

We used Arden Grange puppy/junior and then switched to the hypoallergenic range when they got a bit older as B has a number of sensitivities.
Thinking to changing to Skinners at some stage as it is a good deal cheaper.

Raw feeding is another option, KarynK and Katie Houston are the people to ask on here.

 

[Happy Horse]

We have a six month old Lab who was on puppy James Wellbeloved and had the same problems as you with regards to poos and wind.

After much research he is now on adult James Wellbeloved kibble with some Natures Menu meat mixed in for breakfast and dinner and then for lunch he gets either the Natures Menu raw nuggets (10), a raw chicken thigh, an egg, some sardines or some lightly cooked heart and liver. For treats he gets crispy fish skin and charcoal biscuits (Dem Bones) and we have generally tried to cut out as much cereal and muck as possible. He has improved no end on this new diet.

 

[kirstyhen]

Otto was fed on a very high energy Adult Working Dog Food by his breeders, he does have a sensitive tummy now and has to be on hypoallegenic dog food, may have nothing to do with his diet as a puppy though!
He is certainly a big strong healthy dog, the Vets are always commenting on how healthy he is, so it hasn't damaged him that much

Puppy food isn't that different to a High Protein Working Dog Food TBH, both will have protein in the high 20/30s range, so it shouldn't have affected his growth too much.
Now he is 7 months old though you may want to lower the protein slightly anyway so he doesn't grow too fast and do himself damage!

 

[kal40]

Our 6 month old lab is on Royal Canin labrador feed. She looks fantastic on it, really healthy looking with a shiny coat.

OH did a lot of research and decided to got with this. Have to say for Skye he made a good choice.

 

[KarynK]

Take it it was the Active Dog - High Energy? Might have been the corn. Once again with highly processed cooked foods you see unnatural bulking agents to make the food affordable in this case corn, ever see a wolf raiding a corn field, then cooking it?

No a fan of commercial or even cooked dog food, but if you want to feed it and be sure it's the "best" possible for your dog start "readin" the labels closely and asking questions, cus they dont have to put everything on that label, there are all sorts of get out of jail free cards when it comes to pet food!

Maize corn 37%, Chicken 30%, Poultry fat 6%, Beet pulp, Salt, Fructo-oligosaccharides, High nucleotide yeast, Tocopherol extracts of natural origin.

This one gobsmacked me

Adult Dog – Maintenance
Suitable for racing and working dogs over 2 years old not in regular work.

Wheat 78%,

Lamb 13%, Beet pulp, Poultry fat, Salt, Fructo-oligosaccharides, Tocopherol extracts of natural origin.

Don't really need to say anything to that percentage for a carnivore do I !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

[soloabe]

Have you considered feeding Raw?

 

[Blue-bear]

I feed all my guys Skinners (started just my Choc Lab on it) now as its a good price and its hypoallergenic. They all look great and i just wish i started it sooner.

 

[KarynK]

[ QUOTE ]

I have seen dogs been fed all sorts of rubbish and gone on to lead long, healthy lives.


[/ QUOTE ]

This interests me as yes some dogs do live a lengthy life on commercial food, but you have to ask how long they would have lived on a natural diet. Is their longevity in spite of rather than because of?

Just like in humans there are always exceptions, like the lifelong heavy smoker that lives to over 100, the obese person who takes no action yet sees no ill effects and the skinny marathon runner who dies of a heart attack due to cholesterol.

A lot of “modern” conditions in dogs are sometimes rightfully laid at the door of inappropriate breeding, but how many more are attributable to (like the human) a highly processed diet, many times removed from the fresh ingredients and with a myriad of artificial additives many of which are purely aesthetic.

Unfortunately most research into dietary effects requires sponsorship; the only people interested in stumping up the funding for that research are those with a vested interest in gaining from it. Who in their right mind with a whole company based around buying waste meat and cheaper carbohydrate bulking ingredients and making money by cooking it to the extreme and drying it into convenient sack food is going to fund research into the benefits of a raw or even more natural diet?

I ask again how on earth have we come to the point where we are seeing growing numbers of carnivores with diabetes and even cushing’s? These diseases are associated with the use of sugar as an energy source. A carnivore uses muscle meat and fat for that purpose, which is why they can go long periods between meals. We are in effect trying to turn our dogs into horses!

If you think about it, the Giant Panda has taken thousands of years to very poorly adapt to a diet of plant sugars compared to it’s cousins who are still omnivorous. In order to survive on this diet it has to eat a high volume virtually continuously because it’s gut has not changed that much in that period of time.

With the dog we are being told that they can no longer cope with MEAT, they are allergic to chicken, lamb you name it , anything bar the additives or cereals in their diet. But processed dog food has only been around for less than 100 years and a dog has adapted to a meat diet over millions of years.

I am alarmed at the growing numbers of dogs with skin problems, stomach problems and a myriad of allergies to just about everything bar the cooked food. I have seen it in my own dogs with lengthy detox before all the problems stored from a commercial diet works its way out of their system for good.

The only answer for those not wanting to try raw or cook their own diets is at the very least to put pressure on these companies, make them earn their profits by asking questions and if you are not happy with the answer vote with your feet. They could be costing you a lot of money in unnecessary vets fees and shortening the life of your beloved dog it’s up to you to change that.

 

[CorvusCorax]

Oh I am not saying I agree with or encourage it, I have looked on incredulously at a lot of dogs and wondered how the hell they have reached the age they have. 'In spite of', definitely.

We ourselves used to feed a brand called Favour which looked and smelled more like horse food than anything a dog should be eating. We just didn't know any better.

You will be pleased to know that more and more people I know are switching to raw, including a lot of dogs at my club (who are all generally on AG or RC) and at least four police dogs.
In an ideal world my dogs would be fed raw but I live under my mother's roof and she, as a breeder, judge and owner of GSDs for 40 years) has decided this is not viable and I have to abide by her wishes, we fight enough about so many other issues!

(I have read your posts with interest though and hope in future to go down that road)

 

[KarynK]

I know what you mean; my mother is the same and is now paying the price as her JRT has cushings!!!

Sis and I had the poor thing on chicken wings and small lamb bones years ago, but she blamed them for everything and stopped feeding her anything cooked for less than an hour. To be fair she did cook her own but the poor little b*gger has existed on home cooked to death dried up white chicken meat, with the skin removed and condemned cooked roast beef. Her breath stinks like the local tip; she is covered in warts and cysts, she scratches a lot, the vet earns a fortune on cleaning her teeth by giving her a regular anaesthetic, squeezing her anal gland and is now raking it in on the cushings drugs.

I myself was initially resistant to Raw, like many I thought that the feed companies and vets knew what they were talking about and that it was too much trouble. Until my lovely mongrel died of intestinal cancer, that made me read the book, cry a lot and give away the sack of Cancer in the hall!!!

I'm a realist and know that not everyone wants to or is able to feed raw or even home cooked, but there is a lot of purchase power out there that can change the lot for many dogs, hopefully some feed companies will get much better if more people force them to raise their standards!!

Still can’t believe that one above 78% wheat, and for working dogs too poor things what a diet! My two had a lamb rib each tonight, still half frozen as I forgot to take it out in time, it took them 1/2 an hour and now they are sound asleep and quiet for once!

 

[CorvusCorax]

TBH, B is the first dog I have owned that has experienced allergies etc and touch wood they are now under control.
In years gone by the dogs were all on Winalot, and then Favour, as mentioned, and our last bitch was fed on Feedwell.

It would be interesting to see the link between feeding and other problems that GSDs are prone to, including pancreas problems and torsion.

 

[KarynK]

Yes my Sis has just got her first GSD, this is new ground for her as she has always had husky's and these are 2nd and 3rd generation raw fed. But she put the puppy straight onto raw at 7 weeks and so far no signs of problems, though of course she may not have been prone to them.

She did have a problem in that she was a greedy pup and thought that the gravel in the back yard was kibble!!! She did stop trying to gobble all the stones up after a few days and must of wondered why the Husky's wernt eating it!

I wonder if the breed society would be interested in conducting some research, trouble is it's expensive when done to reporting standards, and the good old feed companies wont be interested.

 

[CorvusCorax]

The problem is, there are several breed societies

At least four or five!!!
There WAS an article or a long letter in the Breed Council magazine a few months ago and there were a flurry of pro-and-con type letters, I borrow my copy (I used to write for it and got it free, why change the habit of a lifetime

) so don't have it to hand right now.

I was just thinking about this, this morning, if you'll imagine how it must have been like for my mother's generation, feeding tripe (best. dogfood. ever) and her own homemade raw mince, having to keep a seperate fridge, etc, then along comes a company (or several) with a massive marketing budget, offering a clean, cheapish, time-saving invention in a neat big bag - it must have seemed like all her Christmasses had come at once.

I've been told one of the problems with switching to raw is trying to 'teach' the older dogs how to eat properly, as, through time, they have learned that they can easily bolt processed food, whereas with raw they need to take their time over it?
Is there a problem with having raw days and dry days? I know a few people at our club who do this and I am totally paranoid about torsion.

Also, as mentioned before, the post-BSE laws are so stringent over here, butchers etc aren't really supposed to give you any off-cuts/left overs from the day and soup bones etc are nigh on impossible to get hold of.


Oh, and sorry for post hijack, Halfpass

 

[TarrSteps]

I do wonder too if the original commercial dog foods were as "low grade" as the current models, even in the same brands. My first dog was fed commercial tinned food and I swear it didn't look as processed or smell the same as some of the current stuff I've seen. Is it possible that cheap dog foods now contain less meat and are more processed? After all, many human food producers have gone that way in an effort to keep costs down.

 

[CorvusCorax]

Good point, TS. I have lost count of the amount of brands of OUR food that 'doesn't taste as good as it used to', oh and don't forget trying to sell us stuff smaller packaging for more money than the larger packets used to be....

 

[KarynK]

I suppose pre fridges that the dogs mostly got the scraps and meat that had gone off so it was useful to have a dog around! But yes tinnies must have been a godsend, that’s what I remember mum using, Chum mostly and I remember her stinking the house out cooking green tripe!! You never forget that stink.

My first raw fed was the daughter of the mongrel I lost, I rehomed them both after the couple they were with all their lives split up. I swapped her straight into raw having read Billingshurst’s first book which made so much sense after I lost her mother to cancer. The only problem I had was teaching her how to eat raw food, she was interested but didn’t have a single clue how you opened it! So I started by helping her strip a chicken leg, once she got the idea she was away!

They can happily bolt raw food, my two are no slouches but pale to insignificance by Cruise on of sis’ huskies, two crunches and a whole chicken carcass is gone! No ill effects at all, she is now 13 odd and still doing it. One of mine will bolt his chicken wings down to fast sick em straight back up and then eat them again with no ill effects, dirty little **** has his tea outside!!!!

The only danger mixing the two diets poses as far as I can see would be if you fed kibble followed closely by bones. A healthy dog’s gut on raw works very fast and if the bones caught up with kibble look out!!

The thing is that a dog is also a scavenger and on adverse as we know to eating very skanky things, that why its gut is short and fast, so that things like salmonella cannot take a hold, they are out the business end before they have a chance to multiply. But slow that system down by feeding cooked food and especially carbs that take longer to digest and salmonella and their friends can reek havoc! I would have thought though that after a while you wouldn’t want to feed the dry?

It’s really criminal how much of food animals we throw away or incinerate and all these regulations are stupid, they have relaxed here quite a bit and soup bones are now available in some supermarkets all chopped up about dog sized!!! I fail to see why people cant buy the waste as it will end up in dog food anyway, after it has got very skanky of course!!!

TS I agree original dog food was a lot less highly processed than we see today and was actual chunks of meat all be it condemned from human consumption, I don’t think there was the technology about to cook at such high temperatures for off meat and there certainly weren’t the artificial additives about, nor the synthetic preservatives and the stabilisers that stop the fat seeping out of the food on the shelves!

The cheapest modern dog food probably has no actual meat at all in it, with all the ways they have to hide the nature of ingredients, they quote protein but that could be from chicken feet and beaks and no muscle meat at all. If you then buy cheap pesticide infested wheat, add lots of salt and sugar and you have a palatable addictive food that is VERY cheap to produce. It’s exactly what they have done with ready meals, only we get the meat of battery hens, and dairy cows not their feet and beaks!!!

 

[CorvusCorax]

I agree, the post-BSE laws are a bit too tight here. I remember my dad analysing the back of a sack of Arden Grange we were given with a new puppy (when AG was brand spanking new on the market) and saying 'that's illegal here, it has x type of bonemeal in it' - I was only little and I told him it was OK, we weren't going to be eating it

I also agree about the sheer waste. I did go to our local butcher and did a bit of begging after our female was a bit peaky and was off her food a few months ago, the bag of meat he was going to sling out quite astonishing.

I shall try slipping in a few raw days then, when I am at home and can supervise.....

We never fed tins, always dry, tins have always made me a bit ill

 

[kirstyhen]

I would quite like to try Otto on Raw as I reckon it would probably do him the world of good, I just wouldn't have a clue where to start!
He is also such a gannet when it comes to bones and things it's a bit scary

I think I will have to look into it a bit more.

 

[KarynK]

The first step is a bit scary for you, I was really worried but have fed it now for 11 years and have not had any problems.

I usually start mine on chicken wings, the supermarket ones a good to start with as they are killed very young so their bones are soft (poor b*ggers). They are usually around £1.80 and 1 pack is a meal each for my two, stocky medium height dogs around 15-16 KG (32-35 lb).

If you can befriend your butcher it will be a lot cheaper and a small freezer is great for storing your bargains!!! The only essential equipment is an Axe from the DIY store, it's really useful for deviding portions and for breaking tough bones like chicken spines for old or very young dogs to give them a start!

I feed human grade food, in fact the lamb breasts are for human consumption but no one can be bothered these days!!!

I'll copy and paste a few bits here (save my fingers!)

The simple rule is loose weight = more bone, gain weight = more muscle meat. Just feed by eye and you won't go far wrong, providing you keep up the bone content, which has been lost a bit on some diets called BARF, so I tend to call mine species appropriate so people don't get confused! Just think of chicken wings as an ideal meat to bone ratio.

This is my diet

For each of mine:

1 x Chicken Carcass ( what is left after he has taken off all the meat, so basically the body minus arms and legs with bits of meat left on) or 4-5 Chicken wings form the basis of the diet and I would feed that probably on average 4 days a week. Sometimes I buy a chicken for me, remove and roast the crown and they get the rest. Wings and carcasses are really good as they have a perfect meat to bone ratio of about 80% they are very filling but not fattening. Occasionally they get turkey as well.

1 day a week I will feed mince of some kind a large packet between 2, to this I add a couple of heaped tablespoons of blended raw veg, like spinach plus carrots and anything left in the fridge, fruit as well but in small quantities and blended so as to break down the cellulose and make it available to the dog, like they would find it partially digested in a preys stomach. I usually use an egg as liquid with cold pressed (uncooked) cod liver oil or olive oil. I will also bung in a handful of pumpkin seeds from the health store as this will help remove worms by irritating them, and sometimes a kelp tablet as a supplement. Sometimes I use the dog packet minces frozen from the pet store, but only when desperate as they are not human grade and some even have cereal in so read the label!

I feed lamb ribs 1 each if they don’t have a lot of meat on them, If I buy the whole breast of lamb, they get ½ each once a week of that as it is quite rich and I rotate who gets the really bony bit at the breast and who gets the soft bit.


They have one meal of offal, mine are not very keen on liver and kidneys but love hearts. Sometimes I will lightly brown liver so that they at least get some. They have frozen raw green tripe from the pet store and I rotate that as part of the offal meal.

Then I will feed whatever comes my way from the butcher, pork trotters occasionally as it does make them fart a bit! Rabbit they like, and deer bones and other game if I can get it. The only cooked they get is a tin of pilchards in tomato sauce, sometimes they get a raw fish mixed in from the reduced counter, whitebait are quite good. They will eat salmon heads as well. Ill add a bit of veg and an egg to this meal.

I give eggs as a treat or bits of fruit and veg and the odd biscuit as a treat or Bob Martins beef jerky. They also get lamb spine or leg bones as a treat to keep them quiet and very occasionally a beef knuckle, but as they are inclined to squabble I have to take them away when I’m not about to supervise.

I will buy from supermarkets reduced section and Morrisons now do a lamb bone pack for soup stock, so if I am short I’ll go there. Sometimes I get them oxtail but only when reduced!

At first I used to work it all out over two weeks and had it all scheduled, but these days I am a bit more relaxed and if there is loads of chicken at the top of the freezer they will get that for a while, so now they get a variety over 2-3 weeks and are fine, but I figure seasonal food would be a thing in the wild as well!!! You really need 2 weeks to fit it all in on rotation.

My sister has been feeding this a couple of years longer than me and has written a couple of papers on it here is the link to her website. http://members.aol.com/Brushbow/src/speciesmenu.htm


There is also the book by Ian Billingshurst called Give Your Dog a Bone it is a good start although I don’t agree with all his suggestions and don’t feed dairy or any form of bulk carbs (rice and pasta) . He has written another book that I have not read but apparently he doesn’t mention pasta in that one!


It sounds complicated but it is not at all and now I don't even think, last night they had frozen bones as I forgot and they don't mind a bit!!

 

[kirstyhen]

Thank you, I will sticky this thread!

He is a bit of a tricky dog to feed, his skin flares up occasionally, however the Vet assures me it is the cover he works and not his diet, I'm not so sure as it goes in cycles.

He is a bugger to keep weight on, he is currently being fed 500g of food in three meals, as opposed to the recommended 300g in two meals. He is just non-stop and can be very stressy, so burns food off at a rate of knots.

He suffers from soft stools if he has been running around, the more he runs around the worse they get! If he eats anything that disagrees with his tummy we have to go to rice and chicken, antibiotics and pro-kaolin for at least a week until it clears up, he doesn't just seems to get a runny tum and recover

Which is why I'm thinking of Raw, but like you said, it's just that first step!

(Sorry Halfpass for hijaking your thread!

)