I am big fan of cooking for my dog. I used to make big pots of food and freeze the portions. Lately she has been eating what I eat, I set a portion aside in her bowl (which sits on the table while I eat my dinner and then is put on the floor for her). I have to say that I do think I'm eating healthier because of concerns for her "diet". We are both a bit overweight, but conscious of it and exercising (i.e, going on long walks) as much as possible.
Grain free food
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@branch It’s tough with dog food. You can spend days researching, reading reviews and looking at ingredients. Then choose what is the best looking food, only to find it recalled a year later because of one thing or another.
I figure best to go with the one I trust best and add my own fresh cooked supplements in moderation. I also feed two dry foods mixed and wet cans in rotation.
One thing I do is to buy the food three months ahead of using it. I figure by that time, if there is a recall, at least I haven’t fed it to them yet.
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Hello,
I brought my Basenji home as a young pup and had him on a raw diet. I've never given him kibble and he is doing excellent. I purchase from my local grocery store, everything from chicken, pork, lamb, duck, turkey etc. I also throw in fresh sardines and anchovies from time to time. He handles it all, along with the raw bones. I also throw a little quick oats in from time to time, along with a few veggies here and there. He is eight months old on the 27th and looks great. There is never a worry about any sort of recall..........do your research.
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@branch said in Grain free food:
recall on Formm dog food for high amounts of Vit D?
Why is Vit D an issue?
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@glenn-jalivay2 I do something similar.
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@elbrant said in Grain free food:
@branch said in Grain free food:
recall on Formm dog food for high amounts of Vit D?
Why is Vit D an issue?
It's toxic at high levels, can cause kidney failure/death.
"In order to get along with a Basenji, you have to be at least half as smart as the dog!"
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@elbrant It’s toxic in high doses. The advice was that if you had fed the dog only on the wet can food, to discontinue feeding and they returned / refunded. Over the next six months a whole bunch of foods were recalled because of high vitamin D levels.
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I don't believe the issue was grain free per se. More that the foods contained a large proportion of peas, lentils, legume seeds or potatoes, which allowed them to be labelled "grain free". I posted this article from the NY Times which gives the best summary I've seen: https://www.nytimes.com/2019/06/29/us/dog-food-heart-disease-fda.html
Your food seems high quality with a a lot of good ingredients -- lamb, fish, etc.-- but it also has the potentially offending ingredients. My initial reaction would be to switch just because that's easy to do and there isn't a big downside. However, given the age and the fact he hasn't had any problems -- the heart issues were with young dogs -- if he likes the food not worrying about it would be a reasonable decision.I'd probably stick with what was working, lots of pups don't make it to twelve, but you could look for an alternative and not be wrong.
No matter what you do give him a hug!
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@eeeefarm said in Grain free food:
It's toxic at high levels, can cause kidney failure/death.
This article on the FDA website, Vitamin D Toxicity in Dogs seems to suggest that you need to watch for indications that your dog is sick and seek medical care. It also includes a frightening list of commercial dog foods that have been recalled for high Vit D content.
Ok, so.... what would be considered a "high dose" for the average B?
And how does natural sunlight play into this? -
@elbrant said in Grain free food:
@eeeefarm said in Grain free food:
It's toxic at high levels, can cause kidney failure/death.
This article on the FDA website, Vitamin D Toxicity in Dogs seems to suggest that you need to watch for indications that your dog is sick and seek medical care. It also includes a frightening list of commercial dog foods that have been recalled for high Vit D content.
Ok, so.... what would be considered a "high dose" for the average B?
And how does natural sunlight play into this?"Requirements for vitamin D are dependent on dietary concentrations of calcium and phosphorus, the dietary calcium:phosphorus ratio, physiological stage of development and perhaps sex and breed........ For dogs and cats (and presumably other carnivores), vitamin D must be obtained from dietary sources due to the inability of these species to synthesize and utilize vitamin D from precursors in the skin."
You can read a lot more in the article, but basically it depends on the composition of the food. Higher levels are needed if calcium/phosphorus is not properly balanced.
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@eeeefarm said in Grain free food:
must be obtained from dietary sources due to the inability of these species to synthesize and utilize vitamin D from precursors in the skin
oh wow... I was making the assumption that they could absorb vit D through sunlight (just like us).Thank you! Learned something new!
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I learned something new, too, as I had to research it. I thought it might be the case since many/most dogs have protective fur and don't seem to sunburn like we do. Horses, OTOH, will sunburn if they have pink skin, and they do make vitamin D as we do.
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@prncmuhd said in Grain free food:
Top Dog Accessories 2019
Shame on you! If you had half a brain, you would have discussed legitimate issues with grain free food and then offered a link to a good option. Spam is never the way to get people to buy your products.
