Canidae ALS

We got Lace some samples from naturally pet but she didn’t eat it.like w/natural balance dry/can food & any dry/can food w/limited ingredients.i’d switch her over to 100% grain free if she ate it as well as her Halo’s!Her stool is excellent on TOTW even w/can food.Halo’s is low in grains…eats it close to a daily basis..medically it helps a lot…both Halo/s & TOTW has good variety ingredients which she’s faithful to…So far we tried Science Diet,IAMS,Beneful,Chicken Soup for the pet lover’s soul,prarie,instinct,stella & chewy,solid gold just a wee bit,wellness,canidae,halo’s(current),earthborn(current),totw(current),nature’s best(refused after once),natural balance(refuses can/dry),merricks(will eat sometimes,loves the can food),primal raw,thk ..when we are in pearl city i plan on trying a few different flavors from blue buffalo to see if she’ll eat it..

Looking back at Lacey’s first year:Health and all

Name:Lacey Princess Maltipoo Akamine
Current Weight at one year old:7.11 pounds according to vet records,7.6 according to home weight
Birth Date:March 13 2009
Born:Kailua,HI
Breed:Maltese/Toy Poodle
Mom:Poodle
Dad:Maltese
Adopted:july 17 2009
Age of adoption:16 weeks old
Found on:Kijiji.com
Price:$600
Name of Vet:Dr John Kaya
Vet Hospital:VCA Animal Hospital aka VCA University Hospital
Weight at first vet visit:4.5 pounds
Dog Food:Science Diet & IAMS,Beneful Prepared Meals till December 2009
Puppy Pad Training:9 weeks
Health Issues:Yeast infection in ear,worms,UTI,Spaying(February 2010)
First Heat:November 2009
First Treats:Nutro Dog Biscuits,Pupperoni,The Goodlife Recipe treats
First Walk:November 2009
Shortest Walk:<<<than 5 minutes
Longest Walk:62 minutes on her birthday
First Time Out: December 2009
First Thanksgiving:Thanksgiving 2009:Family Dinner
First Christmas:Christmas 2009:A new top,Waggin Train
Brands of dog food we tried:Solid Gold Just a Wee Bit,Chicken Soup for the Pet lover's Soul,Wellness Super5Mix Small Breed/Super5Mix Complete Health Chicken,Halo's Spot's Stew
Current Dry Food Brands:Solid Gold Just a Wee Bit,Halo's Spot's Stew(Wholesome Chicken & Wild Salmon flavors),Earthborn Holistic Primitive Natural
Brands of Can Food we tried:Natural Balance,NV Instinct & Prairie can food,Wellness Can Food then lost interest,Halo's Spot's Stew Can Food,Merricks
Current Brands of Can Food:Merricks
First introduced to Raw(Freeze Dried):January 2010
Started accepting Freeze Dried Raw:Feburary 2010
Brands we tried:Stella & Chewy till APril 2010 then we'll be switching to Nature's variety Freeze Dried
First Freeze Dried Raw Treat:Primal Pet Turkey Liver(A birthday present)
Organic Treats she's tried:Trader Joe's,Waggin' Train,No Grainers
First Boarding Facilities we considered:Di Ventus Dog Hotel & Spa
First Boarding Facilities we looked at:The Ohana Doggie Day Care,Pets in the city
First Starts understanding people conversations:7-8 months old
First Command:SIT
Commands she knows:sit,stay,don't move,time out,sit & stay,shake paw/hand,"eat",hi5,shake your tail,down aka sit,lay down,kiss,learning roll over,"wait",inside,outside,table manners at the table
Uses Common Sense while walking:About 8-9 months old
Checks for cars like a human(right,left,right,left,center,then walk)about 10 months-1 year old
Goes outside for afternoon poop:December 2009-learned by example of aunty's dogs
Vaccinations:Distemper,Parvo,Lepto
First Carrier:casual Canine
First Crate:Pet Mate Kennel Cab
Characteristics:A definite mix of Maltese/Toy Poodle.Brains of the poodle.Looks of a maltese.eyes are poodle.Loves to play.Loves to sample food
Types of food she tried:Mexican,Italian,Japanese,Chinese
Favorite Fast Food:KFC chicken skin
Shops we shop at:Naturally Pet,Halo’s Purely for Pets,The Pet Spot,Kalihi Pet Store
Misc:Also tried Hartz Oinkies
Able to climb steps:10-11 months old
First Shampoo;Sergent’s Puppy Shampoo
Current Shampoo:Halo’s Cloud Nine Herbal Shampoo/Earthbath Shampoo
Grooming:Cardinal Pet Gold Metal Pets Unicoat Professional Spray

Lacey’s choices of dry food and her reactions to all 4 brands

We tried Lacey on Wellness Super5Mix Small Breed,Solid Gold Just a Wee Bit,Chicken Soup for the Pet Lover’s Soul,Halo’s,Science Diet & IAMS.
On Science Diet & IAMS we gave her that because we had gotten the IAMS when we got her from Kailua along with her puppy food and the Science Diet we got that when we first took her for her first check up with Dr Kaya.she was doing well on it but wanted IAMS more.At the time looking back now she was itching more and had more medical issues.
One of the first organic/holistic dry food I had her sample was Solid Gold I believe was the very first one and from the beginning she loved it!Her reaction was almost instantly.As the days went by giving her Solid Gold her itching slowly got better.The next one we tried was Wellness Super5Mix Small Breed and her reaction to that one was also pretty quick but the result was soft bowels.Yet on the canned food her bowels were slightly better & the Wellness Treats.So Wellness was out but she enjoys the canned food and treats from Wellness!I use Wellness on the side for her.
The next was Chicken Soup for the Pet Lover’s Soul.It took her a while to warm up but at the beginning she loved it.About a day after I gave her Chicken Soup for the Pet Lover’s Soul she wasn’t too thrilled to eat Chicken Soup.Sometimes she won’t even look at it,turn her face away or won’t even open up her mouth.Good thing it was only a sample.Now we feed it to our neighbor’s dog.
The next one was Halo’s.Lacey took a while to warm up to this one..a little longer than with Chicken Soup..But she ate it and actually knew when I was trying to trick her into Chicken Soup.She’d rather have Halo’s.Halo’s has sweet potatoes in it but was surprised when I saw her bowel was good and firm not even the slight of softness to it!I think it’s the amount of sweet potatoes the companies put in the dry food that can be too much for her tummy.
So her main foods are Solid Gold Just a Wee Bit,Halo’s Wholesome Chicken Recipe, Wellness Canned Food/Treats,Beneful along with some table food & home cooked treats.I still give her some by products but definatly not to the same extent before where it was mostly commercial dog food.Most of her dog food and treats are higher quality with a few treats that still have by products.Only a few exceptions.

Lacey’s Chicken Soup for the Dog Lover’s Soul Progress

The other day she had soft bowel movement but today(Sunday) she had almost 1/8 cup of Chicken Soup with no Solid Gold mixed and her bowels were firm and good color.When I give Lacey new food I never mix 3/4 cup of her present food + 1/4 new food.I always give it to her directly of the new food.The way I see it,the new food either disagrees with her system or it doesn’t.When it doesn’t I can usually tell right away but to be sure I always give it about a week.

Chicken Soup for the Pet Lover’s Soul

I emailed one of the DVM’s on staff for the Chicken Soup for the Pet Lover’s Soul to see if ethoxyquin is used.We’ll see what type of response comes back before I give her any more of Chicken Soup for the Pet Lover’s Soul though.
Update:I got an email back from one of the DVM’s at Chicken Soup and here’s their response:Thank you for your inquiry.

Chicken Soup for the Pet Lover’s Soul does not add ethoxyquin to any of the formulas.

Fish meal is required by law to be preserved with ethoxyquin. Ethoxyquin is most effective at preventing rancidity in the highly volatile fish meal. Rancidity in ingredients can lead to severe illness.

Most of the ethoxyquin is destroyed in the cooking process, requiring other preservatives to be used. Tests for ethoxyquin are run routinely on Chicken Soup for the Pet Lover’s Soul products. The results are typically less than 2ppm. This is equivalent to 0.0002% or 2 ten-thousandth’s of a percent. This is a true trace level that many laboratories are unable to detect. The amount allowed, and considered to be safe, by the FDA is 75ppm.

Fish meal is an important ingredient that provides quality amino acids and omega-3 fatty acids. These nutrients are important for all aspects of a healthy life, including great skin and coat, control of inflammation and a strong immune system.

Holistic/Organic Dry Dog Food Warming up comparisions

Today we got the Chicken Soup for the Pet Lover’s Soul sample.When I first gave it to her she warmed up to it instantly.She’ll actually paw at me to get it.In fact Chicken Soup for the Pet Lover’s Soul is about the same as Solid Gold.She’ll only refuse it if she’s full.Wellness was good too but she didn’t warm up to the food as quick.Science Diet & IAMS she’d refuse it altogether even if she’s hungry.BUT,what I didn’t know and I did know about Diamond Recalls was that Diamond requires all of their pet food companies to perserve fish meal with Ethoxyquin which can cause dogs to get cancer.Regretfully and thankfully these were only samples from the companies and it’s good I checked it out before we got the bag of Chicken Soup as I certainly don’t want Lacey to die early because of a “dishonest” choice of food I gave her that caused her to be ill & take her life from her so no more Diamond Pet Food Brands including Artemis which I also looked into but we didn’t sample it thankfully.
Update:December 7 2009:As an update on Diamond using Ethoxyquin please see the update above this last entry to see what Chicken Soup said.Intially I took it as that Chicken Soup did use this,Ethoxyquin,because on a forum on dogster one animal owner mentioned that Diamond requires all brands to use Ethoxyquin but from the email and the website they don’t.I feel reassured knowing that I made a safe decision for Lacey.