Food

I'm having doubts these days about the food I've been feeding Team Menace. It is a well-known very clever put together brand, but I caught them contradicting themselves on  their .com web page. By promoting a new product which is in step with the latest research, they invalidate most of their other senior and adult products. New information reveals (and it makes a lot of sense) that senior dogs need more protein and not less to combat muscular atrophy. The reasoning for the less protein was that it causes kidney problems in older dogs who's bodies can no longer break it down well enough. Turns out it is the highly processed protein in dry food that is the problem.

I noticed that in the recent months my pups weren't as strong as what they should be, Horton and Butter developed warts that should not have happened if their immune systems were in order. This happened after they were put on a senior light food. They did not lose the weight they picked up on the normal senior dog food.
Bofa started skipping breakfast. I could see that he was trying to avoid eating the dry food until it was the absolute last thing left in the bowl.
Nougat has not scratched this much since I figured out that she was allergic to the metal in her fancy tag. She had been wearing the plastic kind since then and was okay for a year until recently. (Mrs Fudge also made her a beautiful collar with no metal in it.)

Is our brand cutting corners in the current economic climate?

So off to the vet I went and picked two test packets of food from the opposite shelf, not a too expensive brand, but one at least backed by a well known superb brand that I've been avoiding since they classified Bassets as a medium sized dog.

Nougat loved the duck and rice allergen free sample and Bofa ate like a Basset with an appetite. Stupid me. I might just as well have sent Mr. Easily Distracted Horton to go and do the shopping. Protein was not even mentioned as a first ingredient in either of those two sample packets.

There are 5 and even 6 star brands out there in the world but you'll find none of it locally. The local companies import only a fraction of it and only what is rated as 3 star foods.

There are many many people advocating raw diets these days but the lines are very blurred. Reading, observation, instinct and common sense is needed here. It is still super tricky and it will be best if I can figure it out before the Bassets have aged another year.

So after that short explanation above, what I really want to say is that I'm attempting to supplement their food with real food, veg and meat and so forth. Yes, I cook for the Bassets but heat up frozen pizza for myself because of time constraints. They love it. I'll nail it soon. Give me six months or less.

something's cooking...