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..
Tag Archives: Science Diet
Lacey can tell the difference between junk treats vs good treats
It’s only been a few months since Lacey has been on mostly organic food with no fillers in her food or treats.Tonight we were looking for treats/chew bones for her & the ones we usually get Hartz,Pigskin Oinkies she lost interest in so we got her a “cheap” Purina chew bone.When I got home as always she’s so happy to get a treat or whenever I bring her home something.The chew bone I got her was somewhat healthy but not the best.She took it and ate it for a while(maybe 10-20 minutes) before she lost interest in it altogether.It’s like she can tell the junk from the good..
Tonight my mom was comparing pictures from her Science Diet/IAMS/Beneful Prepared Meal Days & her recent Halo’s pictures(after she started in December)..Placing the two pictures side by side you can see how dull her coat was on Science Diet/IAMS/Beneful Prepared Meals compared to her Halo’s pictures that her fur has more shine to it and it’s much fuller compared to her 4 month old picture.Really what you feed your dog truly makes a difference…Really amazing to see what a difference the food you feed your dog can make in just a very short time…
Lacey tries Solid Gold Just a Wee Bit…one last & final attempt….
We still had the bag of Solid Gold Just a Wee Bit & decided to give it one more try to see if medical issues still comes up.If it does,we’ll take her off of it completely and toss the rest out in the garbage.Dr Kaya said it could’ve been hormones that was causing the medical issues.Sometimes in some dogs spaying could help.She did get spayed so I am willing to give it one more attempt.One good thing I remember last year when we first started organic dog food,Solid Gold was one of the first ones we tried that she ate..During that one month we tried it,the protein was Bison & her itching was less than on Science Diet & IAMS.Not sure but she may be allergic to chicken.We’ll be trying SG Just a Wee Bit for a few months in addition to her Halo’s Spot’s Stew Wholesome Chicken & Halo’s Spot’s Stew Wild Salmon to see if any medical issues come up while on SG just a wee bit.See next post for more info.
Lacey’s recovery is going very well…..
Lacey’s recovery from her spaying is going very well so far…She has started to eat some raw & has eaten her Halo’s.She’s been “begging” for walks,going out/on a car ride to go get pizza hut for dinner which she did amazingly on(very calm,relaxed,laying down,enjoying herself w/a smile on her face,looking around and not breathing heavily).In the morning she was prancing around somewhat but still “very still” or what I call her “frozen stand”and not move a muscle except she’d move her face & stay in one spot for minutes at a time.We decided to give Lacey some pain medicine after I asked her “are you in pain?” she responded with looking away from me and drooped her head to the side as if she was somewhat embarrassed to tell me “yes,I am sore.”.I took the response as yes,I am in pain & we gave her some pain medicine that Dr Kaya had given her to take on the day she was discharged from her spaying.In the evening,she made a miraculous turn around in her behavior…Before we knew she was being quite a rascal,prancing around,”digging for gold” inside the house,lapping up water more,ate some Halo’s after I gave her 4-6 pieces of solid gold just a wee bit I switched it to the Halo’s which she gulped it up & took from the carpet,running around the house with endless amount of energy,wanting to go walking,ate some meat off the floor while we ate dinner,playing with her toys & looking for Halo’s food & raw food in her bottles..Her incision is healing very quickly..97% of the incision is healed and moreorless closed up.I would have thought it would take about a week to close up but it has been less than 4 days since her spaying and already 97% of the incision is healed!If Halo’s ever comes out with another flavor besides Salmon we’ll be more than happy to try it out on Lacey!As far as we are concerned Halo’s makes the best products when it comes to dry food for dogs.When it comes to Halo’s canned food that’s a different story but the dry food is the best which I believe has helped heal Lacey quicker than Science Diet,quicker than IAMS, & quicker than Solid Gold Just a Wee Bit.She’s also doing more tricks.
Lacey’s health 2009(Commercial Dry Food)
In July 2009:We were told she was wormed and all but it turned out when we went to see Dr Kaya that she had roundworms and hookworms..On July 21,2009:On a scale of 1-4 she has 4+ hookworms,3+ roundworms.Initially she was given heartguard but it was such a struggle we asked Dr Kaya if there is something else we can try which we are still using today(Revolution for dogs).So she was on meds but she didn’t want to eat and was really sluggish so we called up Dr Kaya and he told us to try Pyrantel.Pyrantel worked better.Reason for the switch of meds:1-The medicine disagreed with her or 2-The medicine is working but because of the number of worms she has in her it might make her feeling sick BUT she has to eat or drink.It’s very important or she will get hyperglycemia.
October 2009:Lacey was switched from Hill’s Science Diet to Solid Gold Just a Wee Bit
December 2009:Still eating Solid Gold Just a Wee Bit along with the start of Halo’s.December 28 2009:We found out that Lacey had a bad UTI.
Back to the drawing board for dry and canned foods
The other day I had a problem getting Lacey to eat her food and though others may say it could be table food I doubt that it has anything to do with the fact of refusing to eat her dry food.My honest thought was she was getting tired of the same thing over and over again.I gave her some of Halo’s Salmon canned food and after she got used to it she ate it.She even ate the Earthborn this morning!One owner advised that Halo’s meat content is very low due to most of the water is taken out of the chicken before it is extruded so really Halo is mostly made of pea protein and grains which could be the reason it’s mostly sold at Whole Foods.Right now I will let her stay on Halo’s for the time being but it sounds like she needs more meat content than what Halo offers & she needs more variety of canned food and dry food.So I will be doing more searching and ordering samples to see what we can find for her.However she’s not going back to the cheap stuff like Science Diet,Alpo,Pedigree etc.I am defiantly not open to that.
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.
Lacey’s switch of water & her dog food
As of yesterday November 18,2009,Lacey has been drinking bottled water.I went online in search of a easy way to stop her tearing stains under,around her eyes and mouth area.One of the things I have come up with besides using medicine such as angel eyes is that most water such as tap from the faucet is in most areas have a high php.Being from Hawaii the sea water does have high mineral in it.I switched her to bottled water since yesterday and the results have been amazing!In the past 48 hours she hasn’t had any stains around her eyes!Who knew that small things make a big difference!Lacey is also striving on Organic Dog Food.While she does eat it more at ease than Science Diet she still likes a variety of food.We’re waiting on samples from Halo & Wellness to see what other brand she likes.Thing is when we first got her we had her on IAMS and then we took her to the vet they gave us Science Diet and from then we started mixing it together.So now,she likes a variety of dry foods.Lacey also has more pep to play.Before she was more on the lazy side and only played up to about 15 minutes.After she went organic she can now play up to 25 minutes!She loves to play more so than before.Fur is shinier.What a change!
Reference:angel eyes:http://angelseyesfordogs.com/
Reference:water:http://gettheredout.com/Tear_Stain_Causes.html
Also could be the cause of dried beet pulp in commercial dog food
PS.Organic dog food does not have dried beet pulp
Organic Dog Food Samples & Earthborn Dog Food Trial Package
Today we requested to get samples of Halos & Wellness for Lacey.We also got Lacey a brand called Earthborn which is supposed to be grain free and Holistic..Thing about this brand is while it may be “recommended” I don’t see a lot of reviews on the products or testimonials on their website.Lacey also took longer to warm up to this brand where as the SG(Solid Gold) was a fairly quick response to the first attempt!
I always look at her responses and how fast she warms up to the food.We have some SG left and I am saving it to compare with the next two brands to see which one she warms up to quicker(wellness or halos.The Earthborn one you are feeding almost as much as you would with Science Diet.For a 5-20 pound dog you are looking at 1 cup to 1 1/4 cup of dog food.On Science Diet she was taking anywhere from 1/8 cup to 1/3 cup of dog food.So to me while it may be holistic,not highly review nor recommended by many dog owners you are feeding more as you would with any commercial dog food,I wouldn’t encourage Lacey to eat it every day.In fact,I’ll just leave it out and let her eat when she’s hungry or I just may temporarily place her back on commercial dog food if i see she doesn’t eat for as many as 3 days of the Earthborn dog food.
Lacey’s serving size for Solid Gold:Just a wee bit
Tonight I measured and calculated how much Lacey needs for her Solid Gold dog food.It turns out that Lacey actually is taking in less from what it was with commercial dog food.I gave her 1/8 cup which is what she ate when she was on Science Diet & IAMS.Science Diet & IAMS was 1/8 cup to 1/4 cup.After she finished her Solid Gold I calculated it and she now eats 1 Tablespoon + 1 tsp=20 ml.It’s less by 10 ml which means her food will last us a while.I am guessing it’s probably going to be the same with her second organic food.This is off the subject but even when she took a bath I noticed that she was a lot calmer and still compared to when she was on commercial dog food.Could it be a coincidence?We’ll see next week.
