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Diets of The Oldest Dogs in The World

February 14th, 2012 | Posted by Monica in Home Made Diets For Dogs - (Comments Off)

People with belief systems about what the healthiest diet might be can point to many facts when they debate what to feed their dogs. The only problem is that our memories are shorter than we think. For instance, some people who’ve chosen to live a vegan or vegetarian lifestyle themselves will point to Bramble who lived to be 27 years old as an example. What did Bramble eat? According to some reports. it was rice, lentils and vegetables (maybe some supplements, but I haven’t seen mention of that), and according to others, eggs were part of the diet. Either way, we can say that if the owner was factual in her reporting, Bramble lived most of her life as a vegetarian or vegan. She was a rescue, and nobody seems to have come forward to say what she ate prior to finding her forever home. While 27 is an incredible age for dog, Bramble is not the longest lived dog in the world. That honor goes to  Bluey, an Australian Cattle Dog who lived to be 29 years 5 months old. So, what did Bluey eat? Kangaroo (as one might expect since he lived in Australia) and emu.

 

Here we have two opposites – a vegetarian (at minimum) and a carnivorous diet, yet few could argue that both Bramble and Bluey led exceptionally long lives. People feeding a meat and bone diet without vegetables will be shouting for joy about Bluey, of course. Vegans who feed their dog the way they feed themselves will be happy as well, and usually point to Bramble. I, personally, cheer for both dogs, but the truth is that as critical as diet is, few people seem to have considered genetics and general lifestyle (minus the diet). Neither do many consider that what we feed our dogs is more than an ideology. Both dogs ate fresh foods which I consider to be important, and both dogs are, unfortunately, in the record books for a reason. The same reason that so much attention is paid to big lottery winners. It may not be unheard of, but it’s very rare. We tend to think with our gut a lot of the time. Feelings rule us more so than logic. If I’m a vegan and want to feed my dog that way, I might buy a vegan kibble or feed a vegan diet to my dog because my ideology has been patted on the back by reading about Bramble. If I believe that dogs are carnivores who can only thrive on meat and bones, I can point to Bluey.

In my world, quality of life trumps longevity. There’s no question that I’d do anything humanly possible to ensure longevity, but the truth is that we don’t have that kind of power. We have examples from world records, gut feelings, and our own ideological beliefs, but there’s only one way to know which diet might be best for a certain dog. We’d have to feed one way, wait for the dog to die, and bring him/her back to life, so we could feed a different way and compare the results. Genetics would be identical, so we could rule out the one thing that’s likely to be the biggest component of the mystery. But that’s science-fiction, so I vote for doing more by feeding a fresh-food diet with supplements as needed, and worrying less. When the goal is quality of life, stress only holds us back, and in turn, stresses our dogs out. Still, both Bramble and Bluey are inspirational!

 

Home-Made Diets For Dogs Q and A

February 7th, 2012 | Posted by Monica in Home Made Diets For Dogs - (Comments Off)

Here are some of the most common questions I received last week:

Q: What is elemental calcium?

A: Every calcium source (egg shells, calcium citrate, etc) includes a percentage of pure calcium (the stuff that’s going to be absorbed). “Elemental” refers to the amount of real calcium – the amount that counts.

Q: Different sites give different amounts of calcium per egg shell. What’s the truth?

A: I’ve sent egg shells to a lab for analysis and checked with universities teaching poultry studies, and the bottom line is that it depends on the egg shell we’re talking about. The theory is that 1 large egg shell provides 2,000 mg of elemental (there’s that word again) calcium, but the truth is that it can vary. Some provide 1,800 mg of elemental calcium and others as much as 2,100 mg. Some of this depends on what the chicken ate and how she lives. Egg laying chickens that receive direct sunlight and are free to range tend to produce the eggs that have a greater amount of calcium in the shells, but the exact amount isn’t carved in stone.

Q: Can I use beef  liver as the source of vitamin D?

A: You’d have to feed an awful lot of it. There are only about 16 IU of vitamin D in 3 1/2 oz of beef liver. Not nearly enough for even a 15 pound dog. But there are about 9.75 mg of copper which is large (much too much) amount. So, you wouldn’t want to use beef liver as the sole source of vitamin D, but it can certainly be part of a healthy diet.

Q: Friends in the U.S. keep warning me about hormones in chicken meat. Do chickens in Canada include hormones?

A: No, and neither do chickens that are grown in the U.S. Neither are they allowed in hogs, turkey and other poultry. Cattle and sheep that are not raised organically are, unfortunately, another matter.

Q: Are Omega 3 eggs worth the price?

A: Yes, in a way. That is, they do contain more omega 3 because the chicken feed can include flax seeds, but depending on where you look for information, you’ll find that the difference in omega 3 content can range anywhere from respectable to barely worth mentioning. Best bet: organic eggs from chickens with access to the outdoors (usually fenced in) where their natural feed includes bugs, worms and grass (sprouted grain in the cold of winter). There aren’t any antibiotics given to these chickens, whereas regular omega 3 eggs can come from chickens that haven’t lived much of a life and have been given antibiotics as well. The organic eggs that I’ve had analyzed had respectable amounts of omega 3 as compared to regular eggs.

Q: My dog’s diet doesn’t need a lot of vitamin B supplementation, but it needs some. Can I give him a tablet once a week?

A: Best bet: give the right amount daily. B vitamins are water soluble, so your dog is excreting the excess, but can be deficient on the days when the diet isn’t providing enough of a certain B vitamin.  The roles of B vitamins are critical and vast. There’s no body function I can think of that doesn’t include B vitamins, so I really favor feeding them daily.

 

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Shredded Jicama Salad

January 25th, 2012 | Posted by Monica in Recipes For People - (Comments Off)

This is such a mild winter (knocking wood!) that the spring bug has bitten me early and I want to start gardening. It’s not going to happen in January, obviously! My taste buds think it’s spring though, so I decided to listen to the cravings for what would usually be a spring or summer salad eaten outside in the backyard with a glass of white wine while listening to chirpy birds in the background. The songbird sounds were replaced by Tori’s tail swishing against my leg, and I’m working, so no wine for me! But the salad tasted like summer.

Jicama is a vegetable used quite often throughout Latin America. It has the consistency of a white radish, but is pretty bland which makes it great as a fresh bedding for other veggies or fruits. There’s a powerhouse of potassium in Jicama.

This makes a hefty lunch for two in which case, calories are approx. 510 per serving. Usually, this would serve four if it’s eaten prior to a meal, but frankly, I find it very satisfying by itself, so the breakdown below is based on this serving two hungry people.

Great beta carotene content (1,402 mcg), and lutein (763 mcg – think eye health), good in folate (173 mcg), super in vitamin C (328 mg) and vitamin K (151 mcg). Potassium: 1,646 mg! Iron: 5.53 mg (roughly 30% of RDA), and provides 12 mg of zinc which isn’t enough, but certainly better than many other veggie combinations.

2 medium sized jicama, peeled and shredded (I use a food processor)

1/2 cucumber, peeled and diced

1/2 sweet red pepper, diced

1/2 yellow pepper, diced

2 scallions (green onions), chopped

1/2 orange, peeled, segments cut into four pieces each

1/4 cup chopped parley

1/2 avocado, cubed

1/8 tsp cayenne pepper (more or less to suit your taste – we like spice)

salt to taste

juice of 1 lime

2 TBS cold pressed, extra virgin olive oil

Place everything in one bowl. Toss well and let stand for 20 minutes before serving.

This has only 22 grams of fat, by the way. Not bad given the additions of olive oil and avocado, and really, it would be even less per serving if we hadn’t been such piggies and eaten it all up at one sitting.

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Which Supplement Does My Dog Need?

January 24th, 2012 | Posted by Monica in Supplements - (Comments Off)

If there’s one question that comes up over and over again, this is the one. It’s second only to “which commercial diet is best”, but my in-box gets pretty full with the former. Here’s the thing: “Best” is all about what the supplement is attempting to address, how safe it is for a dog, and the purity of it as well. So, what exactly are you using the supplement for? To address joint problems, digestive problems, balance a home-made diet, or are you adding supplements as a proactive measure?

First thing first. Your dog needs a balanced diet and how you go about doing that is a matter of belief system. For some, it means commercial foods and only commercial foods (no “people food”). In these cases, add supplemental taurine if the food doesn’t include it, and you might need to add a joint supportive supplement (glucosamine, chondroitin and MSM, for example) if the dog has osteoarthritis, and it’s probably a good idea to add wild salmon oil and a bit of  vitamin E as well. Will this prevent arthritis? Probably not, but it may slow down the onset. Nobody knows for sure. My experience suggests that it does, but you’d need double-blind placebo studies over the lifetimes of many dogs before you could say one way or the other. Even then, there would remain the question about how much influence genetics had over the outcome – but yes, my own experience with client’s dogs over these many years prompts me to suggest that if it’s affordable, you might be helping your dog even before old age sets in.

If your feeding choice is a home-made cooked or raw diet that meets the National Research Council (NRC) recommended allowances, you’ll need to fill in nutrient gaps with vitamin and/or mineral supplements where food alone doesn’t do the deed. Other than that, the choice of additional/beneficial supplements are several, but not as many as flood the marketplace. Wild salmon oil if the diet isn’t based on fatty fish, joint supportive supplements (again), digestive enzymes if your dog has some gastrointestinal problem or is older (thereby less efficient at digesting some foods), acidophilus for these same dogs, and CoQ10 if you’re trying to help cognition, kidneys or the heart. I’m for all of them as might be beneficial, but there are plenty more supplements on the market, and in my opinion, most aren’t worthwhile. Basically, the bigger the claim, the less likely I am to believe it. I always start by providing as much nutrition as possible from the foods a dog can eat. Supplements can and do have a place, but people go overboard with them sometimes.

And then we have herbs. A plethora of them, and often given to dogs without medical supervision – big mistake. Not only are there herb to medication interactions and herb to herb interactions, but not all herbs are safe for dogs. Here’s a scary example:

Suspected caffeine and ephedrine toxicosis resulting from ingestion of an herbal supplement containing guarana and ma huang in dogs: 47 cases  (1997-1999)

Records of dogs that had ingested an herbal supplement containing Ma Huang and Guarana between July 1997 and October 1999 were retrieved from the National Poison Control Center database.

Results: Most dogs (80%) developed clinical signs of toxicosis within 8 hours of ingestion, and clinical signs persisted for up to 48 hours. Hyperactivity, tremors, seizures, and behavior changes were reported in 83% of dogs: other signs included vomiting (47%), tachycardia (30%), and hyperthermia (28%). Seventeen percent of dogs died.

Conclusion and Clinical Relevance: Accidental ingestion of herbal supplements primarily Guarana and Ma Huang in dogs can lead to a potentially lethal condition that may require detoxification supportive treatment for several days. Most dogs recovered with supportive treatment.

Source: Journal, American Veterinary Association)

Now, you might think your choice of herb is safe and it may very well be, but are you sure? Check with your veterinarian and always keep in mind that herbs are medicines. Nothing more and nothing less.

“Which supplement does my dog need” can’t be answered well unless the person you’re asking knows the diet you’re feeding and what your dog’s health status is. Even in the case of healthy dogs, a healthy dose of caution is a good idea because the canine athlete is one type of animal and the couch potato is another. Supplement regimes should be tailored to suit the individual.

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CoQ10 and Calcium Studies

January 17th, 2012 | Posted by Monica in For People - (Comments Off)

We met a very interesting woman while waiting for an appointment at the vet speciality clinic. She’s a doctor (for people) – a kidney specialist.  She’s heavily focused on supplemental CoQ10 and did many years of lab research before taking it to patients. Our conversation included the dose of CoQ10 to use and whether or not the dry version of the supplement was as beneficial as the one in oil. I wrote about my observations in an earlier post about CoQ10 – and guess what? I wasn’t off the mark. The dry is being used successfully, but more than that, the marketing hype turns out to be just that – hype. Just take the dry version with a fattier meal. Interesting.

The conversation moved from that to calcium for people. I’ve been a big milk drinker and I love cheese, so why do I have osteopenia? It’s something that’s been bugging me ever since the diagnosis and yes I know – being female, hormonal changes, yadda yadda…but it just didn’t seem right. After all, milk is supposed to build strong bones, right? Maybe. Maybe not. I think I fell for too many milk commercials. For example, why is it that there’s more osteoporosis in people who drink a lot of cow’s milk than in countries like India where people don’t? Is milk the problem? Is higher meat consumption the issue? I asked myself these questions because the body uses calcium to buffer acidity, so is it possible that a higher protein diet (which creates more acidity) causing calcium to be leached out of bones?

The doctor was nodding and smiling as I gave her my thoughts. She’s just placed her elderly mom on a more alkalising diet.

Granted, studies regarding milk and osteoporosis need to be thought through before jumping to conclusions. The amount of sunlight (vitamin D) one receives, exercise – there are several factors to consider. But I’m still hung up on this acidity thing. I’ve never been a big meat eater. Much more fish than meat and in fact, I was a vegetarian for years before my mom passed way and I started cooking for my father (too time consuming to make so many different meals), but now I’m back to not eating meat at all (I don’t judge anyone who eats meat and I have some good recipes to share, so this isn’t a political statement and my fish consumption is way down. I’ve backed off milk and cheese, although I’m still consuming a little of both and probably shouldn’t. No matter what the milk board may say, I seriously doubt that humans are the only animal on earth to need to suckle other animals in order to have strong bones. Maybe I’m my own experiment and maybe it’ll backfire, but my radar says it won’t. I think that by continuing the supplements I do take (especially wild salmon oil which includes naturally occurring vitamin D) and eating a less acidifying diet, I can slow down the bone loss even if I can’t reverse it…but wouldn’t it be a thrill to reverse it even a little and through nutrition alone?

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Can Diet Be Related to Skin Problems in Dogs?

January 10th, 2012 | Posted by Monica in Skin - (Comments Off)

If I had to pick one thing that drives me batty about home-prepared diets, it’s the willy-nilly feeding promoted by certain book authors and chat groups. Don’t get me wrong. Feeding a varied diet can work well, but when it doesn’t, it’s usually just when you’re feeling pretty cocky about it. The dog can start to break down. And I do mean break down! Feed a home-prepared diet that meets the recommended allowances for dogs (per the NRC), and this simply doesn’t happen. Here are some scenarios of how and why the willy-nilly method might look great as well as the how and why of the break down – followed by a story to explain my little rant:

Say you feed a chicken based diet. It’s low in zinc, but high in fat, so the dog’s skin looks pretty good. Next month, you feed a lot of beef, so the diet provides more zinc than before and the skin still looks great. Now, you feed pork, turkey, and so forth. Overall, the diet is deficient in zinc and unless you’ve been feeding some beef liver or a large amount of heart, it can be low in copper as well . In addition, B vitamins are low overall. Better some days, pretty poor on other days. Other than vitamin B-12 which circulates in the body for about one month, excess B vitamins are excreted in urine. So, if the dog did happen to have some excess Bs one day, s/he isn’t going to have them the next day, much less over time. All of the above (and much more!) are critical to skin health.

The reason that skin can look good and the dog might feel fine even when a diet is deficient is the same as it is for people. The body has mineral reserves (in the bones and liver, for example) and it draws on those reserves when diet doesn’t provide what’s needed. Not so bad, right? Especially for a dog that was previously fed a commercial diet to meet AAFCO guidelines because those diets are fortified. So, the dog has good mineral reserves, you switch to a home-prepared diet that lacks critical minerals and the dog looks fantastic. Even better than before! Yes, but that’s because the fresh food component can be wonderful and the body’s reserves are being drawn upon. If the dog is old enough, you may never see a problem because the dog passes away due to old age, so the mineral reserves were good enough to hide a problem. If the dog is younger, chances are the problem(s) will surface over time in the same way that some people think the diet will balance over time. Mineral reserves become less and less and the dog starts to have trouble. Once those reserves are gone, the dog is in very, very big trouble.

I received an email yesterday from someone who lost her eleven month old dog. This was a normal puppy with all the promise in the world. A happy, frisky boy with so much life ahead of him…and then it was over. He started having flaky skin, so the owner added nice oils to the diet. Then he broke a toe nail. Veterinary testing  could find nothing wrong. It was suggested that perhaps he needed to have his nails clipped more often or was running too hard on a surface that allowed him to slide. The dog began to yelp for no apparent reason. He had a seizure which he came out of nicely if such an occurrence can ever be considered “nice”. And then, out of the blue, he was simply walking through his backyard when he fell over and screamed. Turns out the femur had shattered. Further investigation showed ricketts and the rest is history. The veterinarian suspects that the pain was too much and the pup went into cardiac arrest. The diet, by the way, was based on a rotation of foods as was advised by people with good intentions on a chat list. I analyzed the diet today. It was deficient in B vitamins save for B3, deficient in vitamins D and E, magnesium, iron, zinc, manganese, potassium and iodine. The ratio of calcium to phosphorus was way off the mark.

Horrible as this was, I don’t want to leave you on a sad note because several months later, the person has a new dog and she knows better now. Rather than taking everything she hears and reads as gospel, she’s turned into a client, and it’s with encouragement and permission that I’ve shared the story. This isn’t about trying to make anyone fearful, so much as thoughtful about the roles of vitamins and minerals in general. Home-prepared diets (raw or cooked) can be fantastic (as my dog would tell you), but you can’t address what you don’t know, so here’s the deal:

An unbalanced diet can be the cause of less serious issues like itchy or flaky skin, but it can get worse if diet is at play and that’s my point. The first step is to see the vet, obviously. Nutritional causes of disease aren’t always recognized and healthy skin needs all vitamins, minerals, protein, fat and water to stay health. The roles of vitamins and minerals are vast and some are more specific to the skin. Keep in mind that even those that don’t seem to be, can be related to proper digestion, hormone regulation and metabolism which, in turn, matters to skin health.

The Roles of Vitamins and Minerals (from the K9Kitchen and Optimal Nutrition books):

Vitamin A: immune system function, fetal development, prevents night blindness, aids in formation of bones, antioxidant

B1 (thiamine): brain function, digestion, energy, appetite, carbohydrate metabolims

B2 (riboflavin): enzyme functions, metabolism of fats, proteins, carbohydrates, healthy skin

B3 (niacinamide): enzyme functions, healthy skin, function of nervous system

B5 (pantothenic acid): energy metabolism, fat, protein and carbohydrate metabolism

B6 (pyridoxine): hormone regulation, taurine and carnitine synthesis, activation of  genes, immune response, glucose generation

B-12 (cobalamin): cell formation, supports nerve structure, enzyme function

Biotin: healthy skin, utilization of other B vitamins

Choline: neurotransmitter

Folic Acid: amino acid metabolism, proper function of red blood cells

Vitamin C (not a requirement for healthy dogs): antioxidant, enhances iron absorption, issue repair and growth

Vitamin D: bone mineralization, muscle contraction, proper absorption of calcium and phosphorus

Vitamin E: antioxidant, cell membrane integrity

Vitamin K (not a requirement unless certain circumstances arise i.e. long term use of antibiotics): normal blood coagulation

Calcium: constituent of teeth and bones, muscle function, transmission of nerve impulses

Phosphorus: constituent of teeth and bones, energy production, DNA and RNA structure

Potassium: osmotic balance, muscle contraction, transmission of nerve impulses

Magnesium: mineral structure of teeth and bones, enzyme functions, nerve cell and muscle membrane stability

Iron: production of hemoglobin, oxygenation of red blood cells, energy metabolism

Zinc: would healing, protein synthesis, skin health, cell replication

Copper: bone formation, pigmentation, immune functions, iron metabolism, blood cell formation

Manganese: neurological function, bone development, enzyme functions

Iodine: normal function of thyroid gland

Sodium: transmission of nerve impulses, regulation of osmotic balance

 

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Your Dog’s Urine pH

January 5th, 2012 | Posted by Monica in Urinary tract - (Comments Off)

Many of the dogs I work with have urine pH that’s too high or too low. In most cases, the urine has crystals in it and in some, the dog develops urinary tract stones. I wrote a post about the different types of stones and their formation here, and received a number of questions from readers that I want to address now. The most common was about the great swing in urine pH over the course of the day. Say you check first thing in the morning and find that pH is 5.0, check 2 hours after a meal and find it’s 9.0. Which one should you go by when you’re trying to get the pH at a nice and steady 6.5 which is an ideal number? There’s a measurable alkaline tide that you should consider. It goes like this:

While the stomach is always producing some acid to keep the pH in the stomach around 2-ish, after a meal there is a flood of hydrochloric acid produced by the parietal cells. In the chemical reaction they use to make that acid, a flood of sodium bicarbonate (base) is produced. That base or alkali has to go somewhere and it goes out into the blood stream. Well, the bloodstream has to stay around pH 7.2 for health and safety, so that extra alkali gets taken out of the blood by the kidneys and goes into the urine. So right after a meal, you’ll get a rise in pH in the bloodstream that’s pretty temporary and then a rise in urine pH soon after. The urine pH increase lasts longer and about 2 – 4 hours after a meal is perfect timing for that.

While fluctuations in pH in urine are normal over a day, the average pH of the urine over 24 hours is more important, and so is keeping the pet well hydrated. Sometimes, 24 hour urine collections are done for dogs or cats to find out the average pH over a day (kind of a pain to do) along with average specific gravity for hydration.  It’s important to not react to a single pH reading in a 24-cycle.

Chances are that the urine pH first thing in the morning (before a meal) is the predominant reading for that dog, but as explained above it’s not as simple as that, so I encourage my clients to check throughout the day to get an average.

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Baked Chicken Fingers & Mango Salsa

January 3rd, 2012 | Posted by Monica in Recipes For People - (Comments Off)

My guess is that just about everyone has a recipe for this, but mine might be a bit different. At least, that’s what I’ve been told. Different in a good way, apparently, because no matter how much of them I make, the platter manages to become empty in no time. This serves 2-3 people, but making more is quick and gives me some to put in the freezer…or so I always hope, but it never works out that way.

These are low in fat and the panko crumbs in combination with wheat germ makes them nice and crunchy. I’ve served them plain, with a dipping sauce or mango salsa (recipe below)

2-3 chicken breasts, skinless, boneless, sliced into 1″strips

1 egg white, beaten

1/2 cup panko bread crumbs (Japanese bread crumbs)

1/2 cup wheat germ

1 TBS black sesame seeds

1/2 tsp garlic powder

1/2 tsp onion powder

1/2 tsp sweet paprika

1/2 tsp dried rosemary

dash cayenne pepper

salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste

Preheat oven to 400 degrees.

On waxed paper, combine all dry ingredients and mix well.

Dip each piece of chicken in egg white and roll in dry mixture.

Place pieces of chicken on a non-stick cookie sheet that’s been sprayed with Pam. Bake for 15 minutes, turn each piece and bake for another 10 minutes.

Mango Salsa

1 ripe mango, peeled and diced

1/4 red onion, finely chopped

1/2 yellow pepper, diced

1 TBS chopped parsley

1 small tomato, seeded and diced

1/4  tsp red chili flakes (less if you prefer a mild flavor)

juice of 1 lime

Combine all of the above and let stand at least 30 minutes or put in fridge for 1-2 hours. Flavors “marry” and intensify as the salsa sits.

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Canine Athletes: The Ouch We May Not See

December 27th, 2011 | Posted by Monica in Canine Athletes - (Comments Off)

My roster includes a lot of canine athletes. A lot. And did I say a lot? The reason most of them end up with me is because owners want a great diet for their dogs, but the emphasis is on stamina and duration and the right diet is pretty darn good at getting a dog to improve on both. Some people scoff about it and claim that all you need is a well-balanced diet because all dogs require the same thing.  The dogs I’ve worked with have shown dramatic improvement, so I disagree with those statements. Once you understand at which point the dog seems too tired or loses speed, you can tweak the diet and the timing (emphasis on timing) of that diet accordingly. Even so, there’s only so much you can tweak. I’m not sure that most people really appreciate just how hard these dogs work or what they go through because they think that quick moves and hurdles are natural for dogs. Yes, they’re trained to do specific moves in a specific sequence, but the general expectation is that the dog can and will do it with grace and ease, and sometimes these animals get pushed beyond what we can see clearly. I’ve known about the obvious injuries, but also knew the rest of the story. There just didn’t seem to be a way to show it – until now. A friend of mine found the perfect video and I really want you to see this. We’re just not able to focus on the details when we look at dogs doing their work and I think it’s critical that we take this opportunity to see it for what it is. Some is great fun, and some…not so much. Here’s the video.

What you’ve just seen is the reality of being a dog. Prey drive and a desire to please and be rewarded can make a dog put up with an awful lot. I’m not suggesting that working dogs shouldn’t work. Most dogs love, love, love working!  Those that need a job and don’t have one can have a miserable life and make their owner’s life miserable, too – which is why I don’t have a Border Collie despite this being one of my favorite breeds (I can’t provide what they need to have a great life). I’m just saying that once we understand more, we can do more. If we look only at the videos that show a perfect performance and miss the “out takes”, we’re not seeing what we can do to help our dogs. So, if you’ve doubted my suggestions of feeding Joint Complex, antioxidants (in foods and supplements as necessary) and wild salmon oil (anti-inflammatory properties) and if you haven’t read the Dietary Fuelling of Performance Dogs booklet or ebooklet, the video above should help to explain why I hope you’ll consider doing more. I’m passionate about making life as right as possible for our dogs and when we ask them to perform, it’s only fair to give them as much support as we can.

Home-Made Dog Diets That Look Balanced

December 20th, 2011 | Posted by Monica in Recipes For Dogs - (Comments Off)

There are heaven-only-knows how many free canine diet recipes on the internet and a whole lot of others made available on chat groups. Most aren’t balanced (check out the recipes for dogs on this blog if you’re looking for a balanced one), but a lot of people don’t know it. It’s bad enough when the only source of calcium is something like cheddar cheese which provides more phosphorus than calcium, so it doesn’t balance a thing, but my bigger concern is for sick dogs, especially those with kidney failure. Here’s why:

A generic recipe tells you to feed X amounts of foods and supplements, but any food provides only so many calories. For some dogs, that food mixture might be enough to last 10 days or more,  and for others it might last much less. It’s not just about the weight of the dog. Even two dogs of the same size, weight and gender given the same amount of exercise can have vastly different caloric requirements. The problem is that the more food you feed, the more phosphorus is being ingested and phosphorus is the single most important nutrient to provide less of when kidneys are compromised. So, even though a generic diet might indeed be low in phosphorus, it doesn’t necessarily stay that way if you need to feed more of it. Best bet: have a diet formulated for your dog because everything needs to be considered. Caloric requirement, overall balance and low phosphorus with the right calcium to phosphorus ratio for the stage of kidney failure. Generic diets just don’t cut it and certainly can’t compete with anything that’s been formulated for the needs of one particular dog.

I had someone tell me that their healthy, eight year old dog who’s been eating a terribly unbalanced diet is just fine. He probably is, but he won’t stay that way. None of us do. I’ve never heard of any person or animal dying of health, so obviously, diseases strike at some point. If you hope to be able to figure out what kind of dietary manipulation is needed in order to address a disease, you first have to know the nutrient profile of the original diet. If the original one is unbalanced, chances are slim that you’ll be able to define a dietary cause of disease in the first place. I’ve never been able to understand why being reactive is necessary when dog owners can be proactive instead.

A few tips for people who insist on feeding recipes found on the internet:

1. Ensure that there’s a defined source of calcium. Raw meaty bones may or may not balance a diet, but certainly, for cooked diets, there must be a defined source like calcium carbonate, citrate, lactate, etc.  Fresh food without added calcium provides only about 10% of a healthy dog’s calcium requirement.

2. A recipe that gives the option of using red meat, poultry or fish without changing the amounts of supplements won’t be balanced. For instance, feed red meat and you’re feeding more iron, copper and B vitamins, feed poultry and you’re feeding much less, feed fish and you’re usually feeding even less. If that recipe doesn’t take this into account, you’re probably best to find another site.

3. Look for a source of iodine. Kelp or iodized table salt are the best sources, but kelp isn’t created equal. There can be vast differences in iodine content between brands, so if the recipe doesn’t specify a brand, it should be a heads up.

4. A recipe that calls for percentages of foods rather than weights should be questioned. Is it a percentage of weight? Volume? Calories? And if the recipe calls for a percentage of raw meaty bones without specifying which ones, you should be thinking hard. Turkey necks, for example, provide a whopping amount of calcium whereas chicken wings don’t. It may or may not balance over time. Don’t be too quick to believe that one.