What to feed the pooch? 

 

Food is a serious question for all of us, since it does make the difference between life and death.
So, what do we feed the dogs? I can only speak from experience...and I've had a LOT of experiences in this department with my pooches.

Let's start from the beginning. We got Zuzi first. Our first dog EVER. As with everything you try for the first time there were a few hiccups along the way. We started off by feeding her kibbles like everyone else. First hiccup, she had very bad digestion issues. What does that look like? A LOT of cleaning up! It's what happens when your dog has "the runs" ALL the time (yes, literally). And it's furry; very, very, very furry.

That's a VERY furry dog!

So like any normal human beings we tried to stop the onslaught. We started feeding her rice with the kibbles and that seemed to work for a while. It wasn't perfect but it was better. We added cheese after a while and ham. She responded by starting to pick out the ham from the bowl and leave everything else. No one who has seen my dog eat recently would believe that she would be content with just a slice of ham (thin slices) per meal. But she absolutely ignored everything else. We would sit with her for 15-20 min trying to make her eat. The cheese helped. We would put the kibbles, rice, cheese and ham together in the microwave and heat it up so the cheese melted and stuck all the ingredients together. She did attempt to just eat the outside stuff and leave the kibbles but she wasn't very successful. Once in a while we attempted to switch the brand and flavor of kibbles and that seemed to work better for a while (couple of days) but this problem always returned. We figured she's just fussy and spoiled. When she started bleeding a every couple of weeks we got really worried.

We went to the vet to try to figure out what the issue is... Why is she having so many digestion issues?? They gave us some canned food to keep her on a diet for a while and then we went back to business as usual. Problem came back. We went back. Over the next few years we were in and out of the vet's office every couple of months at least.

When Zuzi was about 2 years she started limping. It went away after a while but then it came back again. By the time she was 5 years old it was chronic. It also seemed to affect more then one leg. As in it would shift around. Today was the front right, tomorrow left. After a while it seemed to affect the back legs. We went to the vet. They told us to just not strain her with too much exercise (we used to love letting her come with us on bike rides. She loved it! But afterwards...the limp was way worse). In time, they told us, she would heal. But she never did; from 2 to 5years it didn't heal. She was also starting to have teeth problems on top of this. So we visited the vet a LOT!

 She started gaining more and more weight. By 5 years she was close to 19kg (she's now closer to 12kg). The vet told us that she needs to lose weight. We agreed, but how do you exercise a dog that cannot walk??? She wouldn't walk to the end of the street and back. Literally our walks were 5 min. Then we would go home and she'd just lie down and sleep. She'd only get up to bark once in a while.

When Zuzi was around 5 years old, we got Czari (we fed him the same as her in the beginning). We figured another dog would help her be more active. So we started going out more to the dog parks. It was great for her! So much fun. Czari was very social and happy there, so it helped her be less shy. The limp didn't go away though. As Czari grew we got to go out more and more with both of them. So the fact that she couldn't walk properly was beginning to be more and more of an issue. We went to the vet again. They recommended a specialist, did some X-rays, and some other fancy procedures. They gave us some really strong pain medication. If used for a long time, it had the potential to do internal damage to the organs. So it worked great for a while but after that, when we tried to take her off it, she'd start limping again. The specialist helped. She gave us a plant based pain medication that had no long term consequences. But they could not figure out what was wrong with her legs. So hundreds of dollars later we were at an impasse. Out of options and still with no actual answer.

As fate would have it, this was also the time when people were very interested in healthy eating! Naturally this translated to their canine companions as well. We ran across the "raw diet". As in feed your dogs raw meat, as nature intended. It sounded good enough and after some serious research we decided to give it a try. They loved it!!! Zuzi who was refusing to eat previously, was now like a wild animal. She devoured it! Czari loved it too. The next day we noticed a major difference with Zuzi: her digestion issues were gone! Completely. In a couple weeks her teeth were better: whiter, less tartar, her breath smelled better.

The limp was still there however, and after we reached the impasse with the vets we decided to stop going to the vet. We had a medication that worked to take the edge off of the pain and allowed her to run and that wouldn't kill her any time soon. It seemed like this was the best we could do. Without surgery they couldn't figure out what was wrong with her. We drew the line at surgery.

Time passed. Czari was growing up and I had them on a very strict exercise program to deal with his energy level. About 3 hours a day of running and climbing in natural parks, and/ or the dog park (in all weather conditions). Zuzi received her medication every day and she was good to go. In fact she was the happiest we've ever seen her. We continued with the raw food diet for the duration of the summer and fall (about 5 months). For Czari we supplemented the food with protein powders, since he was going to be a big boy and we wanted him to have all the calcium and protein he needs to be healthy. We gave Zuzi some too because it was said to help with muscles and bones so what did we have to loose?

Note: We used whey protein. In Romania this protein is naturally found in the juices that are left over when people make cheeses. They feed it to all the puppies while they're growing up. Its their main source of protein. So we knew it wouldn't hurt the dogs. Here, in Canada, it is mainly used by body-builders and comes in powder form but essentially it is the same ingredient. We picked the one with no additives, flavors, etc. :).

I cannot tell you the exact moment when I realized Zuzi's limp was gone. Or that she was at a perfect weight. I do not know for sure. I know that after a while I started forgetting to give her the medicine. When she was still running around normally it occurred to me she doesn't need it anymore. We took her to the vet to weigh her at some point and they congratulated us.

Carpathian shepherd puppy (5 months), Keeshond female with summer hair cut

Winter came and we decided to switch to kibbles again because it was too difficult to clean up afterwards. We fed them outside to avoid the "contamination" everyone kept warning us about. It wasn't too bad because we discovered a different kibbles brand with around 80% meat content, instead of grains.

Winter here lasts a long time. It was around 9 months before we were able to switch back to the actual raw diet. During this time both Czari and Zuzi's teeth became yellow. Her tartar was actually so bad they recommend we have her teeth cleaned professionally at their office which cost hundreds of dollars.  Czari started getting ear infections. He had 3 within 8-9 months. The vet told us it's because he has floppy ears (a very popular explanation).

Madame taking a break

Beware the "curse" of the Floppy Ears!!!

By this time I wasn't so eager to believe my vet anymore. You see, I told them that during the summer we switched foods and how well my dogs are doing on the new diet. All the positive benefits I noticed. How much they love it. To my surprise they didn't seem excited for us. Mostly they said that it great BUT...and then followed a list of stuff to watch out for. It is natural for vets to warn you about potential side effects...BUT, I didn't hear that warning when I was feeding them kibbles, or cans or anything else. And the fact that they still had no idea what was wrong with Zuzi had shaken my faith in their expertise.

Just because people, or vets, aren't ill intentioned bad people doesn't meat they're right. Or that they know everything.

In the spring I switched them to raw food again. It's been a year since then and I fed them raw during the winter. I mop and clean afterwards with the awesome Swiffer! :D It is truly amazing how many options we have now a days. I mean, I don't see myself giving up steak just because it makes a mess :P. So, why should it be a problem to give my dogs meat? When you think about it, all this discomfort around raw food, really makes no sense,  It's been a year since then. I visited the vet twice only. Once for vaccines. The other for an injury in Czari's paw which was a fisco so great that it deserves its own story. The weight is good. The teeth are white, the tartar went away when I fed them bones. The limp went away when she dropped the weight. She's a new dog. Czari hasn't had ANY ear infections since. Yes, his ears are still floppy.

Ears still floppy... ;)

Shiny coat, happy healthy pooch

It would be a lie to say that I am not upset with the vets. I am. In fact I am VERY upset. Why? Because people look to them for expertise. I believe it was their duty and responsibility to get informed if they didn't know or weren't sure how different types of food affect dogs. I don't believe it's ok for people to trust their word, or their integrity, if at the end of the day they don't actually care about the animals, and only care about passing along the products and services they want to sell. There are exceptions of course. But for 5 years we were told the same thing over and over again, every time we asked how to change Zuzi's diet. Try this other kibble we sell in the lobby.

 I have to wonder...why? Sadly, the only thing that comes to mind is profit. Companies pay a lot of money to influence what information gets passed along. It's not so much ill intention, as it is lack of responsibility and integrity. I paid a lot of money for them to tell me they don't know what's wrong. And some outright told me they don't know a lot about feeding raw food. Why is that? If this is part of their field...why don't they know? Who pays for the studies that tell them that kibbles are safe and have benefits?? Raw food can be dangerous? Do we not handle raw food all the time for ourselves? Why can't we do it for the dogs too?

Like I said, you have to wonder why? All I know is: I haven't visited a vet for health problems in my dogs for over a year. So, looking past all the theories and ideologies and excuses...what is the result? Because result don't lie...and I don't profit from presenting my results. And I certainly didn't know any of this when I started; I didn't set out to prove anything or gain anything. (Unless of course someone is so impressed by my struggle they feel like giving us free food! :D Anyone?? Even if you say yes, I still can't be held accountable for having an agenda when I started this little experiment. So we're good ;)...)

The raw food diet does cost a little more then kibbles. But, I spent so much money on the vet and so many hours going crazy that I don't know why my dog is falling apart...I'm ok with this extra cost.  Everything has a cost. We cannot escape paying...in some way or another.

I'd rather invest in keeping them healthy then invest in watching them fall apart slowly. That's what the wrong food does...it rots them from the inside out.

But truly the most convincing thing you can watch it this:

Before raw food

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XbgsXWsV878

Today, after raw food was introduced


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jCazYieHYOA

 It's the best advertisement for any dog diet I've personally ever seen. Just my dog, Zuzi, before and after the diet change; on my silly cell phone camera. The first video, I took to show my vet what I mean by "she can't walk". The second one, we were having fun and I like capturing moments so I can watch them later :). Yes, exercise helped too. But again, hard to do when they have no energy because they can't digest the food you're giving them. You can find the pros of feeding meat on any website, which is why I won't bother listing them here. Can they survive on inappropriate food? Yes. So can we. But why do it if you have the option not to?

The latest thing I came across is Vegetarian/ Vegan diets for dogs. But someone else already summed up that issue better then I ever could: http://healthypets.mercola.com/sites/healthypets/archive/2012/01/19/vegetarianism-for-pets.aspx

This is just my story. And no I'm never feeding my DOG vegetarian. But one day I may own a COW and then I can feed all the veggies I want :). I'm pretty sure all my dogs pointy (and now awesomely white) teeth = carnivore. I may not be sure of much...but this seems pretty self-explanatory :P.

And then we sailed off into the sunset! ~ Just kidding :)