dry dog food - protein question?

Submitted by kibby5 on January 29, 2012 - 8:21am

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Dear all,

Sorry I havent been around much lately, but I have still been lurking .. happy bday to all those , and I am sorry to all those who are hurting too.. also I do love all the bully pics!

So my kibby, now all alone since best friend Gabby passed away, seems to have gotten a lot older , faster.. or maybe I just didn't notice it before. She got a little more timid now and is slowly and hopefully regaining her confidence back. I am still considering getting another dog, but now since kibby is clearly heading into her senior years, maybe not - so I can be sure that I will have enough time to take care of my aging bully. She will be 8 in April.

Once again, I am on the hunt for good senior dry food. Now that I did the allergy test, it has come back with the results that she is allergic to beef, barely, pork, yeast, wheat, tomatoes, green beans, sweet potatoes! If anyone wants to see what the results look like, I would be happy to email you a copy (it is kinda neato!). It also included a list of brands/types foods that kibby is safe to eat. In that list, it only had two senior dog kibble brands - acana senior and california natural chicken and rice senior. Acana is more fancy and has alot of ingrediants, supposedly fresh meats, veg, fruits,and herbs and fancy stuff.. but 33% protein. Californina , literally has like chicken, rice, and like 3 or 4 other ingrediants, then with added vitamins and minerals and then 28% protein. The dog food that kibby has been on natures variety salmon and brown rice had 26% protein and she is doing good on it, but barley happens to be like the fourth ingrediant listed on there, so I am hoping that this is what will explain her development of the super dark ear wax and reddish tears within the past 8 months or so. She has been on it for at least 1.5 yrs. She is about 55 pds, getting arthritus, and has occassional phlegmy mornings, otherwise pretty healthy.

So my questions are these:

1. anybody use either of these brands? any complaints?

2. does the higher protein really matter? I usually do add a tablespoon of wet food on top of the dry on every meal. Kibby is prone to UTI's and will get diarehea if something upsets her tummy.

3. I am leaning toward the acana because the ingrediant list seems so much better, like I would rather have Kibby eat real ingrediants to get her nutirents then a bunch of added ones right? , or am I a sucker for marketing??

THANKS for listening and any responses!

__________________

sincerely, christine

Both are good foods

Submitted by Jacinda and the... on January 29, 2012 - 11:32am.

I found the Acana to be a little "richer" and more prone to upset the tummy than the California Natural.

Also, I believe the Senior foods are a marketing gimmick and senior dogs just need a good all stages formula with less than 30% protein. I'm currently feeding my dogs including the two seniors and the baby the California Natural Venison.

Tell us more about the

Submitted by Vern-Rory-Teresa on January 29, 2012 - 3:24pm.

Tell us more about the allergy test - sorry if you posted about this before and I missed it. Who performed it (vet, allergist, vet/allergist), how was it performed, how long did it take to get the results, how much did it cost?

It would be nice to know what are allergy triggers.

Thanks!!!

sure, here are her allergy tests...

Submitted by kibby5 on January 30, 2012 - 2:59am.

I think costs about $200 for the regular panel (testing includes basics, like chicken, turkey, beef, wheat, etc).. and then it was an additonal $90 for the speciality foods panel (like fruits, salmon, rabbit, etc) .. all they did was take some of kibbys blood and then they mailed it to a lab. kibby never really had serious allergy issues , other then extra yucky ears and some redness around her eyes, a little bit licking of the paws. She was always more allergic to outdoor pollens and things, which makes her eyes swell and make her phlegmy, which she takes a claritin a day for. I was tired of trying to figure out what she could and couldn't eat... so i figured rather then spending time, trial and error on dog foods, then I would just finally do the tests. The tests of course have no guarantees because it could always be a combination of foods that trigger her allergies or it could be outside elements that do it to, this is what her vet warned me about.

Anyways, I suppose that they run her blood with each of these different foods and see which ones cause a reaction, and then it is scored on a scale, and anything over 175 was considered positive that she would have a reaction to. Since Kibby didnt have too many high scores, they lowered her threshold score to 150, which then gave me the results that I have now. Not sure if I can upload a pdf on this forum, so I am going to try to cut,copy, paste it on here...

Food Panel (Traditional Diet)

Food Panel (Specialty Diet)

(*) Indicates foods that should be avoided.

CLASS SCORE S C O R I N G K E Y TEST SCORE

Negative

Borderline

Borderline-Positive

Positive

Highly Positive

N =

BL =

BL-P =

P =

HP =

<=150

151 TO 174

175 TO 199

200 TO 400

>400

2124

FAX

CA-16130-1C 2124

11/30/2011 11/21/2011

Bulldog 7 yr

Test Score

*[FBY] Barley 177 BL-P

[FBE] Beef 170 BL

[FBT] Beets 157 BL

[FCR] Carrot 123 N

[FCK] Chicken 149 N

[FCN] Corn 142 N

[FMK] Cow's Milk 120 N

[FDK] Duck 136 N

[FEG] Egg 125 N

[FFM] Fish Mix 120 N

[FLB] Lamb 125 N

[FOT] Oats 130 N

[FPE] Peanut 164 BL

*[FPK] Pork 181 BL-P

[FPO] Potato 137 N

[FRI] Rice 149 N

[FSB] Soy Beans 142 N

[FSW] Sweet Potato 163 BL

[FTK] Turkey 140 N

[FVN] Venison 142 N

[FWH] Wheat 163 BL

[FSC] Yeast 154 BL

Test Score

[FAP] Apple 136 N

[FBA] Banana 165 BL

[FBM] Berry Mix 127 N

[FGB] Green Bean 162 BL

[FGP] Green Peas 149 N

[FRB] Rabbit 155 BL

[FSL] Salmon 127 N

*[FSM] Shellfish Mix 219 P

[FSP] Spinach 169 BL

[FSQ] Squash (Pumpkin) 147 N

*[FTM] Tomato 189 BL-P

20111130111451

Dear Pet Owner:

The Traditional Diet Food Allergy Screen tests for sensitivity to 21 major food ingredients

commonly found in commercial pet foods. The results indicate whether the animal has identifiable

levels of IgE antibodies to antigens in these foods. Whether the presence of these antibodies

contributes to the expression of clinical symptoms is not certain, however it may be prudent to

consider a change in diet.

The food allergy screen conducted on your pet shows that this animal exhibited sensitivity to the

following ingredients:

Traditional Diet

Barley, Beef, Beets, Peanut, Pork, Sweet Potato, Wheat, Yeast

Specialty Diet

Banana, Green Bean, Rabbit, Shellfish Mix, Spinach, Tomato

As you may know we usually don't recommend avoidance of food ingredients until an allergen scores

over 175. However since this patient had so few scores above 175, we have lowered that to 150 for

you. This results in a shorter and more precise recommendation list.

The best remedy for food sensitivity is avoidance. Bio-Medical Services works closely with the

leading pet food manufacturers to maintain a database of over 2,500 premium and prescription pet

food diets and treats.

Based on the results of your pet's food allergy test, our computer has

searched our database to generate a list of acceptable diets, both canned and dry foods, which

your pet can eat.

Included in this list are also tolerable treats, and a list of the vendors who

sell these products.

Dietary recommendations from this list should be considered along with other special nutritional

needs that may be required for your pet, and should be approved by your veterinarian. When

appropriate diet modifications are made, our veterinarians report a 90% success rate in

alleviating food allergy symptoms.

__________________

sincerely, christine

forgot to add...

Submitted by kibby5 on January 30, 2012 - 3:02am.

I also forgot to mention that the second part of this included a list, (like 6 pages) of all dry , wet, treats, supplemental dog foods/brands that do not contain any of these ingrediants that she is allergic too, certainly beats me reading every label, because you know as a psycho bully mother, I totally would!

you would be surprised of how many dog foods contain tomatoes,wheat, and barley! Let me know if you have any more questions!

__________________

sincerely, christine

Thanks Christine!The results

Submitted by Vern-Rory-Teresa on January 30, 2012 - 12:18pm.

Thanks Christine!

The results are really interesting....I think next time we visit our vet I'll inquire about having this done on Vern. He's only had one major allergic reaction and I'm not totally sure what caused it - I suspect it was his glucosamine & chondroitin supplement. Interesting to see that Kibby had a reaction to beef and shellfish- the two things that most G&C supplements are derived from.

I really appreciate the info! Smooches to Kibby

Teresa

oh my gosh... i totally didnt think about that...

Submitted by kibby5 on January 31, 2012 - 6:57am.

thanks for the warning.. the results also gave a couple of supplementals like cosequin and something else that should could take... i better go look at that senior dog food label again... i know it only mentioned glucosamine and chondrotin , but it didnt give ingrediants for it? hhmmmmmmmm

__________________

sincerely, christine