Monday, November 12, 2012

Dog Food


Our dog food situation has been very irritating lately.  I really miss the days when I fed 100% raw.  For ten years, all of my hounds did great on it, but now we have an odd mix of hounds.  Reagan does not do well on raw food. Period. End of story.  She clearly does awesome on commercial dog food.  Riley does awesome on half and half, but not as well on 100% raw.  Stacker (13 years old) seems to have diarrhea every other day now so we are playing around with what works for him.  Plus it easier to get calories into him with kibble than it is with chicken backs and other raw food items.  Seven, Allie (12 year old), and Maddie seem to be less complicated and have done well on everything I have offered, thank goodness.
We had been very happy with Acana Ranchlands and Acana Grasslands, but something has happened to the distribution and it is a difficult food to find now.... and top it off with feeding 6 dogs and it is downright ridiculous to keep yourself supplied when shops will only sell you one bag at a time.

Not sure what experience others have had, but I find my greyhounds do best on a grain free, red meat, dog foods.  I have not been successful with the poultry or fish varieties of food, but it seems that there are unlimited varieties of these foods to choose from.  I also prefer that the red meat foods tend to be higher calorie and I can feed less of it.
We tried Fromm Beef and Vegetable and it was the food that made Maddie so thirsty and stools were not great on everyone else.  Then we tried Orijen Regional Red which was stupid because it is made by the same company as Acana so it was not long before it was in short supply.

So back to the drawing board. I hate switching and trying new foods with 6 dogs.  If any one has a readily available, grain free, red meat, and made in the USA (Acana is from Canada and I am trying to avoid future distribution issues) that your greyhounds have done well on... let me know.  Thanks.