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Alright so I feel vaguely guilty about feeding food that is this inexpensive to my dog but as it stands I have had the best success with Dad's Bite Sized Meal Here is what they say is in it quote:
I have no idea what this really means, all I know is her coat is nice and thick and she has some rib touchability but is not super fat, she is a japanese akita weighing in at about 80 pounds. I tried some other ones but out of everything including much more expensive stuff this is her favorite thing that she will readily eat (it has nice small kibbles and I think before I got her somebody let her chew on beef bones or similar which created some tooth wear, so every larger kibble she will have some difficulty eating) and she actually takes properly solid poops every time, no runny business. I also usually mix in a couple tablespoons of warmed up chicken broth made by boiling chicken bones after I roast a chicken once every like week and a half to two weeks. Please tell me if I'm doing something secretly terrible because all the major metrics from looking at your dog seem to check out, it just has me worried. Shugojin fucked around with this message at 04:41 on Nov 21, 2016 |
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Nov 21, 2016 04:39
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Shugojin posted:Please tell me if I'm doing something secretly terrible because all the major metrics from looking at your dog seem to check out, it just has me worried. Are you interested in possibly switching foods or do you just want to feel better about what you are already feeding? If you're interested in suggestions for a different food, it may help to know which brands or flavors didn't work for you and why (wouldn't eat it, upset stomach, etc.) It may also help to know how much you're feeding now.
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Nov 21, 2016 05:14
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Well more I would like to know if something is terrible and switching would be advisable. I want to stay with this because it has the best acceptance, her weight is stable, and she's very comfortable and not constantly looking for more food. I just wonder if something terrible is with it because it's only like 13 for a 20 pound bag  Right now she gets a rounded cup twice a day plus a tbsp or two of broth. The only three brands I remember for certain are: Royal canin puppy. This was at the shelter and her poop was very soft so it didn't help with anal glands coming out. Royal canin adult: this was too big/hard for her and she would pull her lips back when eating it and frequently drop kibbles. Weird hippy food (nature's logic, I think?): I tried this when I was curious to see if a smaller kibble would help. She ate a couple bowls without physical discomfort and then just went to snubbing it like a cat. Poop wasn't very good either. I had the vet anesthetize her and check out her teeth. There is more wear than a dog her age should really have but fortunately no cracks or chips.
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Nov 21, 2016 14:21
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I, personally, feel better about feeding my pets something with meat as the first ingredients. I don't have anything to add over what's in the OP. The important part is your dog eats it and does well on it. Now if you do want to explore other options, it looks like those other brands are chicken based and your dog might just like beef flavored kibble the best. There is probably a food that has small kibble and beef as the first ingredient that she might do even better on. I don't have any suggestions because my dog seems perfectly happy with her big chicken kibbles. I'd reread the OP and look up some options and then decide if your going to stick with what you've got or try something else.
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Nov 21, 2016 16:05
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Anybody feed their cat Fromm Four-Star Nutritionals? Saw it when I was picking up some Nature's Variety and I don't recall seeing it before.
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Nov 22, 2016 21:49
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Anyone have any experience with Performatrin Ultra Grain-Free? I've been feeding the puppy formula to my dog since we brought him home at 8 weeks and he seems to be doing well on it, not to mention he likes the taste enough that I can even use the kibble as training treats for working on standard behavior stuff. However, we just rescued another pup (she's around 6 months) who was being fed Pedigree Small Dog. Since we're obviously going to wean her off of that crap, I've been starting to mix in a bit of the Performatrin. However, she has twice vomited now after eating the mix. I've been extremely careful about the ratio; there's probably 10-15 pieces of Performatrin kibble in her whole cup of Pedigree. The Performatrin is pretty high quality judging from the ingredient list, should I maybe introduce a mid grade food in between the Pedigree and the Performatrin?
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Nov 22, 2016 23:35
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Lareine posted:Anybody feed their cat Fromm Four-Star Nutritionals? Saw it when I was picking up some Nature's Variety and I don't recall seeing it before. It's got rice in it. That puts me off. I'm torn between trying this Wysong Epigen 90 and Young Again Zero since they both are super low carb. I hate having to ship it to me just to try it out with the cats.
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Nov 23, 2016 00:39
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Lareine posted:Anybody feed their cat Fromm Four-Star Nutritionals? Saw it when I was picking up some Nature's Variety and I don't recall seeing it before. It's pretty good, when you make sure you get the grain-free varieties. Could be higher protein IMO but they have some nicer flavors that most brands don't do, like beef. My cat likes their rabbit one, the Hasen Duckenpfeffer. Skip the A La Veg ones, those are the rice ones. I think it's a bit overpriced but it's pretty popular.
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Nov 23, 2016 06:02
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GoodBee posted:I'm going to bring this question over from the dog thread. I adopted a 1.5 year old rescue hound (maybe a Plott Hound) a little over a month ago. She weighed 47 lbs and the vet is thinking she should probably weigh a bit over 50, maybe 55. I'm feeding her the Blue Buffalo Wilderness Large Breed Healthy Weight formula. She's getting 3 and 1/3 cups of food a day plus we're still on treats when working on her training. Not an answer to your question but have you considered switching her to the regular large breed in wilderness or do you want to use up the bag you have, or is the extra fiber% something you like? It really may just take time to build weight up from what she was being fed at the shelter too, but again i know that isnt what youre asking.
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Nov 23, 2016 08:42
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ANUSTART posted:Not an answer to your question but have you considered switching her to the regular large breed in wilderness or do you want to use up the bag you have, or is the extra fiber% something you like? It really may just take time to build weight up from what she was being fed at the shelter too, but again i know that isnt what youre asking. I have no reason not to switch over to the regular large breed. I honestly didn't see it at the pet store but it's probably there. My current bag is almost gone and I haven't opened the second bag. Do you think these two formulas are close enough that I could transition over a couple of days? I think I will do this.
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Nov 23, 2016 13:53
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beergod posted:Any food recommendations for a 12-week growing Great Dane male? We've been feeding him Royal Canin large breed puppy food. Sorry it took me so long! There's a lot of great puppy foods out there. I like Fromm Gold Coast Large Breed Puppy, Taste of the Wild does a pretty decent puppy but it's not size-specific, or Earthborn which is like TotW but I think superior, and plants trees for recycling your bags or some poo poo. Canidae has a grain-free one that's also quite nice. Wellness has a good large breed puppy as well, but they don't have a frequent buyer program (nor does Taste of the Wild) and it's not grain-free, although I find many dogs do just fine on a high-quality grain inclusive diet. If you wanna go for some really top notch poo poo, I'd go for Orijen/Acana as they're probably one of the best kibbles on the market. If you live in New England, RAWZ is another good bet, but for both of these brands you'll pay a decent amount. Orijen, though, has a frequent buyer, and RAWZ donates all profits to charity, so you can feel all warm and fuzzy. What I recommend is that you check out your local pet store to see if they have samples of anything you could take home and try. If I had to choose one from the above (balancing price and quality), it would probably be Fromm. Fromm is a family-owned company out of Wisconsin that's been around for over 100 years, they have a very flexible frequent buyer program, it's really not as expensive as a lot of stuff out there and they don't "co-pack" with other brands, meaning their facilities are Fromm and Fromm alone. This really decreases the chance of contamination from other food sources, to the point that their only recall ever was for an elevated level of vitamin D in a couple of their canned varieties. Many, many pet food companies don't even come close to this level of dependability. Culex is right in that their formulas can be a little grain-heavy, which is why I recommended the grain-free kinds, but again some dogs do awesome with reasonable amounts of high quality grains so it's up to you. I took a look at the Royal Canin and it's very disappointing. All by-products, corn, and tons and tons of low-quality grains. It even has "powdered cellulose" which is, I poo poo you not, straight-up sawdust. I would really, really avoid this food-it's also CRAZY expensive for what you're getting. Shugojin posted:Well more I would like to know if something is terrible and switching would be advisable. I want to stay with this because it has the best acceptance, her weight is stable, and she's very comfortable and not constantly looking for more food. I just wonder if something terrible is with it because it's only like 13 for a 20 pound bag I would feel, uh, comfortable calling that food "terrible" but I do understand she's currently doing okay on it. As soon as I see artificial colors in a pet food I write it off because good god, the dog doesn't give a poo poo. That's on top of all the corn, non-specific ingredients ("Animal" fat, for instance), etc. It is indeed AAFCO certified, but that covers only "will keep dog alive." Pretty much every pet food out there has an AAFCO cert, but it doesn't denote a quality food. Some dogs do well enough on foods like this for a while, but you will see the effects through time - bad teeth, bad breath, dry or itchy skin, sad poops, and so on. I highly recommend you visit your local pet store and ask if they have any samples, or have any return/exchange policies. Some places (like where I work) will let you return an opened bag of food (it's the food company's guarantee, they lose nothing) or exchange it. We donate what's left so it's kind of a win-win. I also recommend - since she seems picky - to think about trying a brand with multiple formulas that are fairly similar, i.e. Taste of the Wild, Earthborn, Fromm, or even a limited ingredient diet like Zignature or Natural Balance. If you can come back with a list of the following, I might be able to be more helpful: 1. Age and breed of pupper, as well as any known health issues 2. Preferences you may have noticed - likes fish, hates venison, or "cannot eat this or rear end explodes" 3. What you can afford for a "large" bag of food (or whatever size you'll be buying) 4. If things like a frequent buyer program, organic/natural, or other random things are important to you I hope this helps!
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Nov 24, 2016 00:32
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GoodBee posted:I have no reason not to switch over to the regular large breed. I honestly didn't see it at the pet store but it's probably there. Days late but you can, yep. how is it working so far?
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Nov 27, 2016 07:19
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ANUSTART posted:Days late but you can, yep. how is it working so far? Just fine as far as I can tell. She did have soft poops the day after Thanksgiving but my brother had given her a couple of pepperoni.
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Nov 27, 2016 16:25
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So I just found out about EVO and a lot of other Natura products being discontinued and now I can't source my cats food locally. My only reasonable options are PetSmart and PetSupermarket. Can anyone suggest a reasonable replacement? My cats were eating and seemingly really enjoying the Turkey/Chicken (I think, purple bag) but I don't think they are super picky.
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Nov 29, 2016 02:16
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I switched my cats' dry food over to Wellness Core original formula: http://brands.wellnesspetfood.com/core/cats/dry-formula-original It's grain free, pretty high in protein, and at a comparable price point. They'll eat it, but they don't love it the way they loved EVO. They did seem to prefer it most out of all the other brands I tried.
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Nov 29, 2016 06:00
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AuntBuck posted:I switched my cats' dry food over to Wellness Core original formula: My cats are also on the Wellness Core dry as a supplemental food to wet feedings. They seem to like it enough that every few days one of them will eat some dry before wet.
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Nov 29, 2016 12:46
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One of my cats has very smelly gas. Going to try switching the main protein in her food from chicken to beef, assuming she doesn't mind. She loves the stuff she's eating now, but when she farts I have to evacuate the room. Any tips or success stories?
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Nov 29, 2016 15:54
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Flying Leatherman posted:One of my cats has very smelly gas. Going to try switching the main protein in her food from chicken to beef, assuming she doesn't mind. She loves the stuff she's eating now, but when she farts I have to evacuate the room. What brand/product is she eating now?
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Nov 29, 2016 16:08
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Flying Leatherman posted:One of my cats has very smelly gas. Going to try switching the main protein in her food from chicken to beef, assuming she doesn't mind. She loves the stuff she's eating now, but when she farts I have to evacuate the room. I had the same problem. Switching to all fish food (dry) helped a lot. When she poops the smell still follows her around for 5 minute or so but the HORRIFIC DOOM FARTS have subsided. They smelled like a pile of burning tires and poo. She happily eats the orijen fish but it aint cheap. ~$30 for 5lbs.
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Nov 29, 2016 16:21
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hogmartin posted:What brand/product is she eating now? Wellness chicken and herring. Figured I could try the beef and lobster, which is the same price. She also gets kibble, but one thing at a time, right?
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Nov 29, 2016 16:49
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ANUSTART posted:Days late but you can, yep. how is it working so far? Spoke too soon. I ran out of the Healthy Weight yesterday and my dog had liquid shits last night. She didn't poop this morning so she's spending the day in her crate. I'll see how she's doing this evening and maybe give her a little canned pumpkin?
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Nov 29, 2016 17:15
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This is purely anecdotal to these forums but a lot of people have reported their dogs not really doing well on blue buffalo for some reason. Their dogs had dame kind of issues you're having now. If she was doing fine on it before and I missed it ignore me, I just wanted to throw that out there if it's been a problem since you switched.
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Nov 30, 2016 22:14
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Yeah, she was doing fine on the Large Breed Healthy Weight and I switched her to the regular Large Breed. She had a brief bout of the shits but seems to be doing fine yesterday and today. I was almost out of the Healthy Weight so I probably transferred too quickly. I was hoping to not have a problem since same brand, same protein. I went with the Blue Buffalo since my cats have been eating the cat version for years and they are doing well. Local dog park hive mind seems to be going Blue Buffalo Wilderness for some reason too.
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Nov 30, 2016 22:32
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One of my two cats has developed some urinary issues. They've been eating Orijen 6 fish along with the occasional can of some Weruva brand of wet food. The vet is going to want her to go on a urinary tract food which I'm obviously going to do. The vet hasn't gotten back to me yet, but I asked them about feeding the cat that needs it cans of the appropriate wet food while leaving their normal food for both of them to munch on so that I don't have to try to separate them to feed them on a schedule that will be difficult to do do since my work schedule is an abnormal one. Is that something that will work or am I going to have to try to set up feeding times so that one can eat normal food while the other only eats prescription food? Also, are there any high quality prescription foods? Anything I get is going to need to be fish since my cats both have some issues with foods with non-fish products in them.
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Dec 1, 2016 21:51
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fknlo posted:Also, are there any high quality prescription foods? Anything I get is going to need to be fish since my cats both have some issues with foods with non-fish products in them. I have never seen any. Your choices are go with a prescription food or find a vet that's up on the current research or willing to read whatever you find and work out a feeding plan. Basically, the prescription foods have been tested and approved to treat a condition. There may be additional research suggesting that certain qualities of food are better for cats with certain conditions. Personal anecdote, I took in an elderly cat with renal failure who wanted nothing to do with prescription foods. My vet said the most important things were 1. He not starve to death so we had to find something he would eat. 2. He get plenty of water, so I mixed water in with his wet food. And 3 was try to find a food that was easier on his kidneys. We found some suggestions for ingredients/contents that followed some research but nothing that had as much data as prescription foods. I also learned to give him fluids at home. He lived about a year and a half after I took him in and died at 16. I think he was pretty comfortable but who knows how much longer he might have lived on prescription food. I think most prescription foods are corn and chicken based. If your cat really can't deal with that at all, talk to your vet or find a different one willing to monitor your situation on a different diet. There are a bunch of possible problems cats can have that can be treated with diet and I have no idea what kind of research is out there. Good luck.
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Dec 3, 2016 05:30
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GoodBee posted:Spoke too soon. I ran out of the Healthy Weight yesterday and my dog had liquid shits last night. She didn't poop this morning so she's spending the day in her crate. I'll see how she's doing this evening and maybe give her a little canned pumpkin? Nooo  Glad she has gotten better but I was told you could switch within BB as long as it was in the same type (not from regular to wilderess but from flavors within regular, etc). Maybe my dog is just hardy? Sorry she got so sick from it I feel horrible.Meanwhile I finally found a place near me that stocks Taste of the Wild dry for cats at a decent price and am thinking of switching her to it, since she doesnt seem to like Wellness Core or BB Wilderness anymore. Theyre a pretty good food/producer, right? Finicky Cats ! ! ! Love it!
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Dec 6, 2016 11:29
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ANUSTART posted:Nooo I was going to do it anyway. She's over it now. Maybe she has a sensitive stomach. She seems to be doing better on the regular large breed wilderness and she was fine on the Healthy Weight. I think I may have over fed her a couple of times. She doesn't mind.
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Dec 6, 2016 14:32
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ANUSTART posted:Meanwhile I finally found a place near me that stocks Taste of the Wild dry for cats at a decent price and am thinking of switching her to it, since she doesnt seem to like Wellness Core or BB Wilderness anymore. Theyre a pretty good food/producer, right? Finicky Cats ! ! ! Love it! I have been feeding our cats Taste of the Wild Rocky Mountain for roughly two years. Now the cats all have different backgrounds, but they all like this food. We have three young cats that grew up on it, when we fostered them as kittens. Their coats are lovely. And the boy of the litter is still very svelte. He grazes, but begs first thing in the morning. Then we have all adult cats ranging from 4 to 10 years old that all love it too. One that we adopted was already scrawny, and he hasn't put on extra weight. We rescued a starved cat off the street, he is our portly one (I think he'd overeat any food we'd offer him due to neuroses). Now that we have one diabetic cat, we've been having to schedule feeding to hide food from the other cat. I do not attribute his diabetes to this food. But he still loves that food. To avoid temptation we are transitioning off of this to something like EVO or Wysong Epigen 90 for all these cats so the he can graze again too. Kramdar fucked around with this message at 22:35 on Dec 6, 2016 |
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Dec 6, 2016 22:03
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For anyone curious, Taste of the Wild for cats is actually pretty good, however DO NOT get the Canyon River type if you can help it. It's way lower in protein, by like 10%. Everyone just thinks it's actually a different flavor, when in reality it's an entirely different and lower-quality formula.
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Dec 7, 2016 02:43
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I'm currently feeding my two cats nature's variety instinct, but it's expensive! I saw that blue Buffalo wilderness is almost half the price but still seems to be really good. My girlfriend insist that bb has tons of recalls, but so hasn't nature's variety. I guess my question is blue Buffalo is good right? Or is there something similarly priced just as good. Edit: kitty pic! 
CraigSlice fucked around with this message at 05:39 on Dec 11, 2016 |
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Dec 11, 2016 04:00
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Cuties!  Wellness Core's Original Turkey is really good and about the same as BB price wise. Not sure if they have lots of recall or anything though.
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Dec 11, 2016 09:16
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I'm also in the Wellness camp, reasonable price for excellent food. I took a look at Blue when I was first trying to decide what I should try feeding my cats and your girlfriend is right, they had a long string of recalls for a bunch of product lines over the years and that put me off it.
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Dec 11, 2016 21:51
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BB has also been sued over false advertising and inaccurate ingredient lists, i.e. foods contained byproducts that weren't listed on the label. Wellness has an excellent track record and owns all the manufacturing plants they use. Easily the better choice imo.
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Dec 11, 2016 23:35
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I looked at wellness and saw there is wellness core and wellness complete. Either one of those would be good right, my cats prefer pate food type and I believe the wellness complete is that. $31 for 12 12.5oz cans seems well priced
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Dec 12, 2016 03:00
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CraigSlice posted:I looked at wellness and saw there is wellness core and wellness complete. Either one of those would be good right, my cats prefer pate food type and I believe the wellness complete is that. $31 for 12 12.5oz cans seems well priced I feed Wellness Core dry food and Wellness shreds in the packets. Core dry has better ingredients than the complete dry and the cost isn't much more so I recommend going with that if your going to do any dry feeding. For wet foods the complete is fine if cost is a prohibitive factor and the 12 oz cans are a super good bargain.
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Dec 12, 2016 06:00
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My cat is being a picky idiot (aka: cat). Chicken gives her horrible gas, she likes anything fish based, and shuns rabbit. The other kicker is grain free so far gives her runny poops. The only time she had normal poops was when I borrowed a bag of blue buffalo indoor from a friend whose cat didn't eat it. I'd like to stay away form blue buffalo due to their history. Taste of the wild chicken she at and stunk up the place, Evo and Orijen fish she liked. Wellness core rabbit she'll barely touch. So in short, is there a good quality fish based (zero poultry) with grain dry food out there?
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Dec 22, 2016 06:42
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Can gluten make a dog fat? I've heard its one of the worst things you could do to yourself ( worse than cigarettes according to my friend whos a doctor) and dogs are alot like humans
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Dec 27, 2016 02:05
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DildenAnders posted:Can gluten make a dog fat? I've heard its one of the worst things you could do to yourself ( worse than cigarettes according to my friend whos a doctor) and dogs are alot like humans I hope you don't use your friend as your doctor.
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Dec 27, 2016 02:37
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Bananaquiter posted:I hope you don't use your friend as your doctor. Well, no shes not techincally a doctor, but she knows a lot about homeopathy and that sort of thing and shes really opened my eyes about all the bad stuff we put in our bodies. But yeah shes not my "doctor", my doctor is pretty much any health clinic that doesnt cost money.
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Dec 27, 2016 07:57
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DildenAnders posted:
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Dec 27, 2016 08:35
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