Channels

In regards to learning about dog nutrition anything by Dr Karen Becker is highly regarded in the nutrition community! Kibble itself hasn’t been around super long but was made for convenience sake, and in the end, our dogs are and cats are consuming too much starches and resulting in preventable issues like diabetes, hyperthyroidism, kidney disease, etc.

In looking at kibble, baked is always better than extruded (think making a pot roast in the microwave versus a slow roast crockpot), but the protein should always outweigh the carb content. If the carb content exceeds the proteins, we risk severely compromising our pets’ ability to digest and overwhelm their organs.

Chicken itself is often the cause of intolerance symptoms, as true allergies are pretty rare. But more often than chicken is what the chicken ate, especially in lower quality foods.

Our animals in the wild naturally don’t have these issues that are so frequently cropping up today. What poses as allergies is most often Leaky Gut Syndrome in which the stomach lining is allowing undigested food to pass through microscopic holes and causing the body to attack it like an allergic reaction. In truth, if we can heal and seal the stomach lining by reducing the inflammation and adding thing s with colostrum and/or collagen, we can slowly improve their gut health. I like to add and rotate supplements with my two to boost their immune system as well, including raw bee pollen, turkey tail mushroom, bone broth (primal is my favorite for this!), organic coconut oil, and raw goat milk.

If you go to make your own food, be aware that raw human food is made and cleaned differently than raw commercial dog food. Human food is under the assumption we’ll cook it and rid the last amount of bacteria that may be on it. Many reputable commercial raw dog food companies like Primal, Answers, Stella and Chewy, Northwest Naturals will do HPP (high pressure processing) where they use super cold water to eliminate any possible remaining bacteria especially in poultry, and then do a test and hold with a third party company. You’ll also want to be sure you’re meeting all of your dog’s and cat’s nutritional requirements, namely with cats since they can’t produce their own taurine and require their diets to be at minimum 87% protein heavy.

Additionally, protein rotation is super important once you’ve figured out what causes the least inflammation response in your pet to prevent further intolerance build up in protein sources.

With better food, not only do you feed less but they poop less! So my advice is to first work on healing the gut. Avoid trying anything too new while you’re doing the process of elimination. And once the body is on better foods, the toxins and yeast will start to leave the body, often manifesting in some skin odor, ear infections, or diarrhea. Wait it out and you’ll get through it.