What’s the best food to feed my retired greyhound?
Posted by James on January 14, 2013 · 7 Comments
Question by Charlotte: What’s the best food to feed my retired greyhound?
The adoption centre had him on royal canin dry food. I’m not sure whether to change to a wet food or stick to dry food. I want to buy healthy dog food, I’m just not sure which brand. Any recommendations?
Best answer:
Answer by Sandi
purina
Know better? Leave your own answer in the comments!
B.A.R.F.
Only Natural Pet
Addiction
Stella & Chewy’s
Nature’s Variety
ZiwiPeak
Dr. Harvey’s
Honest Kitchen
Primal Pet
Merrick
Orijen
I like that you have “done your homework” on the breed and the dog you get will be very lucky. It is best if you look for a “natural” dog food like Innova, Canidae, Merrick, with human grade ingredients – you may have to go to an independent retailer – the sites will give you a store locator on their site where you can find where their food is sold. Wellness and Blue Buffalo are very good foods that you are now able to find at Petco and Petsmart – maybe there will be more to follow.
I feed Canidae ALS with my dogs because you get a 44 lb bag for 49.99 but it lasts a month feeding 2 dogs and since it is an All Life Stages – you can feed puppies thru seniors – is pretty economic, and it is considered a good natural food. There have been complaints yes due to the change in ingredients – they put barley and millet in it and increased the meat protein and this was like changing dog foods to those that had fed the old formula – it caused digestive upset. Mine started the Canidae after the new formula came out so I have had no issues and my dogs are doing well on it.
But right now – do not feed Nutro. I fed Nutro Natural Choice for years with no incident as it used to be a good food but recently my dogs started getting sick on it – right about the time it was bought out by Pedigree Mars. Which had a recall on their Pedigree formulas as well as other brands they produce for salmonella – I think it affected Nutro as well and no one is saying anything or something else is going on there. I had a 9 year old Bluetick that had thyroid problems and was taking meds and maintaining a healthy weight and over a 2 week period she lost a lot of weight. Other than that she was eating normally and going outside normally so we thought maybe her meds needed to be tweaked – the day she was supposed to go to the vet, she passed away. The vet said it was renal failure, and even though it could be a coincidence – I believe the Nutro was a culprit, especially after reading the consumer affairs posts. My other two dogs lost some weight and were throwing up and eating grass so I discontinued the Nutro as soon as I could – I still did the gradual switch even though I was worried about them getting any sicker. Since being on the Canidae they are doing good with no digestive issues anymore like they were having with Nutro. The only issue we have is that my Bluetick looks a little tubby on it – but he might just have a slow metabolism and need more exercise. I may try the grain-free Canidae when it comes out if upping his exercise doesn’t help.
Good luck on choosing a food – hope I helped.
Source(s):
http://www.canidae.com/dogs/all_life_sta…
http://www.naturapet.com/
http://www.wellnesspetfood.com
http://www.bluebuff.com/
What ever the rescue people are feeding is probably what you want to stick with.
If you want to change, look into Innova, California Natural, Wellness and Canidae.
Read labels. Skip foods with corn, wheat, soy, milk, animal digest, by-products and anything you can’t pronounce.
Stick to dry food, it has been proven that wet food is bad for your dog (digestive system, and teeth) and should only be used with dogs with a sensitive stomach or a puppy. The best dog food brand is Eukanuba, but it is expensive. That’s what I feed my dogs (small dogs) and they love it. But as a big dog, it could be outrageously expensive, so just try “BLUE” dog food. It has everything your dog needs in it, and all the stuff bad for your dog cut out of it 🙂 Hope I helped.
Stick with the adoption center’s food; you can’t get much better than that. I NEVER feed canned food.
Papaw
If she is doing well on what she is eating now, don’t change it. Greys are deep chested dogs, meaning they can be prone to bloat – and one of the risk factors for that is change – in environment, food, you name it. Let her settle in, and dont change anything you don’t need to.
There’s nothing wrong with Royal Canin – and the proof is at the back end of your dog. They can have stress diarrhea, even on food they are doing well on to begin with – and you can really get into trouble messing around with a Grey’s diet.
Wet food contains a lot of gunk, and will more than likely cause diarrhea. Basically, if it ain’t broke, don;t fix it – if she starts having any skin itching or hair loss that isn’t seasonal (shedding – I’m sure she’s spayed), then look into whether she could have a food allergy. But that is not really likely with a retired greyhound, given how they are fed on the track.
The bottom line – don’t touch anything if it’s working. That is the golden rule with any rescue dog!
NO ONE’s opinion matters about the quality of any food, so long as your dog is doing well on it, period.
First of all how old is he? Secondly I’d not touch Royal Canin with a 10 foot pole after the experience I had with my most recent buy in puppy. He was 4 months, almost, when we got him and had been reared on this. He had all kinds of growth problems as a result (confirmed by my vet, and after x-rays) because what he was on was way too high in protein, for him (32%). I have never reared any of my puppies of the same breed, on this level of protein, for starters. We brought him back from the brink, but not before he’d suffered structural problems to his front.
There is, in the UK, a good food made especially for Greys and I recommend you have a look round for something similar, if you are not in the UK.
By all means keep him on a dry complete (tinned food is high in WATER in any case). I’ll leave it to others where you are to recommend, but try to find something around 22 – 24% protein, if he’s adult. And even lower if he’s over about 5 years.
Add In general terms I would agree that if what he’s on works, why switch (and if you do, do it gradually) However as stated, RC is not a food I could remotely recommend. Quite the opposite. However, as you’ve already seen, we all have our views on what’s best!! As for the deep chested- risk of bloat thing, yes this is relevant, so feed his daily amount in two smaller feeds, morning and evening – and avoid anything with soya.