What Kibble are you feeding now?

[Itsapyr]

Since all the complaints about TOTW what is everyone/anyone feeding their dogs now? We had too much trouble finding Acana.
We have tried Spots Stew which both of them are eating up but the kibbles are so little they are all over the house and then we caught Jasper eating Poo. Oh yech, my most hated of dog habits. We have tried Merricks before grain that they also like but again the kibbles are so tiny.

[moondog]

Right now Baron is eating Merrick BG. It was one of the few foods he could eat with his IBD. He looooves it. Im not thrilled with the size of the kibble either but he does ok with it....by ok I mean he inhales it like he does bigger kibble!!

[krb0471]

We switched to Fromm from ToTW (caused hair loss), the kibble is small as well but she loves all the flavors.

[mezmerelda]

Both Indy and Beowulf are on Fromm Pork and Applesauce. I decided a few weeks ago to move Indy from raw back to it. She's still getting a few raw chicken backs and necks a week. There is a noticeable difference (improvement, oddly) in her fur since she's been on it.

[ToBScholarly]

Still on raw here. I am too lazy to pick up sloppy poop.

[Swissies4Me]

We're feeding Pro Pac Adult Mini Chunk. They are small pieces of kibble but Pro Pac also has a regular Adult Chunk with exactly the same ingredients but the kibble pieces are larger. My two have been doing really great on the food and I know that the food does contain quite a bit of corn, but until I have an issue I don't want to mess a good thing up.

[bren]

I'm still feeding TOTW. Tek has runny poo on anything else I've tried, and Morgan's coat/skin is a ton better on it. I plan to research some other types of kibble, but we're sticking with this for now because it's working for them.

[ALDOGMOM]

We're back on Evo Red Meat. I bought a bag of the Evo fish and they liked it but the kibble is the size of cat food.
I think they actually like TOTW better - and I may rotate a bag through now and then - but there is no question that Bogey's coat looks better on Evo.

Birdie doesn't care one way or the other. She would eat dirt if I put it in her bowl.

I don't have a lot of choices here without driving to Mobile.

[muttmenagerie]

Can I ask as a newbie to this board why you moved from raw to kibble? I know that people do it for a variety of reasons...

[melissawow]

We just switched from TOTW to EVO Small Bites - poultry formulas of both. We loved TOTW but I can't get past the ethoxyquin issue. Trixie is enjoying the EVO and the poop situation seems to be working out (we did a cold-turkey switch one week ago - I don't transition when I'm having a toxin freak out).

[mezmerelda]

Sure. There are a few reasons. This may take a while.

We started raw feeding years ago when we had only the dearly-departed Beagle (Alex), and the low-rider/basset (Beowulf) because of Alex's crappy allergies. Once we got Gryffin almost 7 years ago, we moved him to it at around 1. Beowulf moved off of full raw to dehydrated raw (Honest Kitchen) about 2 years ago because he is lazy and picky. Then he moved to kibble 1.5 years ago and had been doing great on it. Indy was on kibble and raw until she was about 1, then we moved her to raw. Alex died, and we had 2 on raw, 1 on kibble. Gryffin passed away a month ago from hemangiosarcoma. So we had one on raw, one on kibble. Indy can eat just about anything and not have issues. (Except for Canidae when they changed their formula - jerks.) Other than smelly poop from food that has fish as the main protein source. Even with a fairly balanced diet on raw, she looked better on kibble. Someone (who will remain nameless) has not been as supportive of raw over the last 6 months as when we had Alex who needed it. So we made the switch back. She's not fully kibble fed or raw fed. It's a combo of both. It's nice to feed both dogs the same thing. Beowulf, by the way, seems to do MUCH better on kibble than raw, which is very weird.

My guess is that we'll switch back to raw at some point, but in an odd way, I feel kind of burned out with the whole raw feeding process. Maybe even let down, even though there's no real reason for it.

[muttmenagerie]

I understand that when a type of diet is all hyped up and you are not necessarily seeing the results as promised you can get discouraged. I (of course) have no ill will towards kibble but truly believe that fresh food is healthier for all of the animals on this planet That said, I would much rather see a dog eating a properly balanced dry diet than an improper raw... If you are not, please consider adding fresh veggies, berries, eggs, meats to their diet (up to 20% of the total volume) as a supplement to the kibble. And if tummies allow switch up the kind of kibble you are feeding every 3 months or so.

More curiosity... Were you doing a home made raw or a commercial brand? There are many theories about homemade and there are many differences in the commercial brands. And just as an aside, I think that the Honest Kitchen's foods are great!

[mezmerelda]

Personally, I don't believe that adding veggies and berries are necessary in a dogs diet. That being said, I don't think that they are harmful, either. When I started feeding raw about 9 years ago, I did add veggies to the diet, but saw no improvement. Indy will still definitely get RMBs every week, which will hopefully keep her teeth in decent shape. They will start getting recreational raw bones again when the weather isn't complete poo. I'm not sure Beowulf will ever get RMBs again because he is lazy. It's a miracle that I can get him to chew anything. I think the major thing that appealed to him about the HK food is that he could just lick it. Weird, weird dog.

We did home made raw. We used a mix of RMBs, organ meat, etc. Commercial raw was too expensive for us. At one point, we had 3 dogs on it (when we only had 3) and it was freakishly expensive. Granted, we had a 30lb beagle, a 60lb basset, and a 140lb Swissy.

[Itsapyr]

Janey loves raw and did really well on it but Jasper never took to it. In fact he got down right nasty about it. He would guard it but not eat it unless someone looked at it then he would growl and snarf it down and then tear into Janey. He is kind of nutz.

[ALDOGMOM]

I know plenty of people who feed raw and think it has improved their dogs over all health.
I don't like to handle raw meat or organs..and I don't like to go to the grocery store...even to buy food for us...LOL..

A high quality kibble is just much easier for me.

[Swissies4Me]

I don't like to handle raw meat or organs..and I don't like to go to the grocery store...even to buy food for us...LOL..

haha I'm with you 100% on that. I'd much rather go to the dog store than the grocery store. And as for the raw meat in addition to not liking to touch it, I worry about bacteria so I'd be disinfecting constantly if I fed raw. I have given Duke recreational bones outside and now that Ruger is older she'll get some too.

[Ericka]

Java's still getting ground raw (we use mypetcarnivore.com now), Dolce gets 1/2 kibble and 1/2 ground raw. Anyone looking for an affordable high quality kibble look into Earthborn Holistics.

I'm still a big fan of raw, but not so much of the raw nazis. Though I have to say, it's really no more difficult than kibble, and in 7 years I've never had a problem with getting sick from germs.

When Mick was around, feeding him and Java ground raw was ridiculously expensive, I probably spent at least $600 a month!

[mezmerelda]

Holy cow!

Yeah, never had any germ issues with 9 years of raw in our house either. And while we would always wash our hands after serving, I can't say we were ever overly careful about cleaning up feeding areas. But we have no kids, so nobody is crawling around on the ground other than the dogs in our house.

[muttmenagerie]

Generally, the major problem with homemade and some commercial raw foods that dogs experience is too much fat and not enough minerals. When the carbs are reduced the fat needs to go up for energy requirements but the added fat inhibits mineral absorption. Trace minerals are needed for many things like immune function, nerves, and skin...

[Ericka]

Generally, the major problem with homemade and some commercial raw foods that dogs experience is too much fat and not enough minerals. When the carbs are reduced the fat needs to go up for energy requirements but the added fat inhibits mineral absorption. Trace minerals are needed for many things like immune function, nerves, and skin...

How is that possible when a dog's digestive system is designed to digest primarily meat?

I have heard that dairy calcium will block the absorption of fat, that soy may block the absorption of minerals, but never that fat will block the absorption of minerals in a dog's diet. Do you have a source you could pass on to me regarding that claim?

On the other side of the coin, carbs increase inflammation which can wreak havoc on any dog with arthritic or other inflammatory conditions. Cancer cells utilize carbs for fuel and compete for the body for amino acids. Carbs will also cause blood sugar curves and aggravate possible diabetic conditions. Lastly, there are studies looking into the effect of carbs on childrens' bad behavior, I have to wonder if there isn't a link between some behavior issues in dogs for the same reason.