Hi,

I just posted a message about colitis on the health board, which mentioned how I am thinking about changing my 7 month old Dobermann's diet. I was just wondering why there are such huge differences in protein levels between foods. For example, nutro is anywhere from 22-30% but naturediet is only 10%.

At the moment the food he's on is 29% protein. Wouldn't the difference between 10 and 29 make a big difference to how he grows/develops?

Why is the gap so big? Is is to do with whether the food is dry or wet..? Am I looking at this in totally the wrong way? :-D

Thoroughly confused :-o

Hi there,

You actually have to calculate the value based on the actual protein. These threads should explain it to you :)

http://www.champdogsforum.co.uk/cgi-bin/board/topic_show.pl?pid=385854
http://www.champdogsforum.co.uk/cgi-bin/board/topic_show.pl?pid=295202
http://www.champdogsforum.co.uk/cgi-bin/board/topic_show.pl?pid=203238

HTH

Hi,

Thanks for those - plenty for me to read up on! Hopefully it will all become clear :D

Hi Zarah

I would not change his food until you get his stomach problems sorted out as different conditions require different foods.  However, many things contain protein - it is the quality rather than the quantity that counts.

Please let us know how he gets on

Hi Kerioak,

We won't change his food until we have a clearer idea of what's going on with him. I just wish there was a quick fix for him, anything to try and help him, but I know that it's not going to be quite as simple as that.

At the moment we are on day 4 of switching him back over to nutro from the prescription diet, and tonight he produced a much nicer poo! The prescription food is a special intestinal food, although last time when he was on it his poos didn't go back to normal until we'd been reintroducing nutro for a few days either. It's very odd. The special food seems to calm down his intestines and the blood and mucus stops, but the poos still aren't normal until we start bringing the nutro back in. 

I'll keep you informed of course.

You can compare the protein levels in wet food with dry food unless and until you remove the moisture content.

In actual fact once you have removed the moisture content from Naturediet you will find it has an average protein content of 45%.........

Thanks, I've just noticed some protein levels calculations on one of the links provided above so I'll look into it!

I read somewhere that the protein content in one of the cheaper dried flake type foods was actually chicken poo ....... That was a few years ago though, maybe things have changed since then.

Argh - nice!

I really have to laugh when I see some of these posts! Chicken Poo! Best laugh in years! Seriously though, you don't really believe it do you? Let's face it, Chicken Poo would be far harder to obtain in quantity than good wholesome food!

Regards, John

We use a manure called 6X - which is, I gather, the litter (including the poo :D ) from deep litter chickens - but I don't feed it to the dogs, even though it's fantastic on the garden :D :D

Daisy

Feeding chicken poop to dogs! It IS hilarious isn't it John!  Almost as screamingly funny as feeding dead chickens to cows.............

Chicken manure is the easiest thing in the world to obtain; it is regularly used in muck spreading; the stench is diabolical!

............ and don't dogs love it?  I cleaned out my chicken houses yesterday and did not hide the results well enough as they are now spread all over the garden.  Rio (major op on Friday and supposed to be on liquid food only) keeps managing to grab a mouthful that I have not seen so I am spending most of my time outside emptying his mouth and yes, he is on a lead!

I can't use the pelleted chicken manure on any parts of the garden that the dogs have access to!

Er, John.  No it is not difficult to obtain if you know the right people and it has been put into dog food as well, I can't remember the term used, it was not chicken derivatives but was something similar

All I can say is, Lets get rid of the Chinese whispers. Name and shame. Does anyone KNOW of a dog food manufacture who puts Chicken excrement in their food? I don't want the "I heard that some do" Lets have a name then we will all know which manufacturers to give a miss.

Regards, John

Dunno about that John, I buy tubs of chicken poo to use as a fertilizer in my garden!   If you think about all the battery hens kept for eggs or as meat - there's plenty of chicken poo available.  And most dogs seem to find it quite tastey too    :-)

Stacey

Anna loves Deer poo Stacey but that's a different matter. It's been said on here by a person ". . . . read somewhere that the protein content in one of the cheaper dried flake type foods was actually chicken poo"

I'm interested to know which food this would be. Gossip is worthless, it's verifiable facts I want to read.

Regards, John

Hi John,

I agree with you.  I think most of the outrageous stuff "read on the Web" about what goes into pet foods and animal testing is rubbish planted by nutters.  On the other hand, the publicity generated  by the "nutters" I believe has caused some of the major manufacturers to improve the way in which they use animals for testing animal foods. 

Stacey

Hi Zarah

I am not suggesting you change his diet at the moment but have you looked into feeding raw (do a search on the web on BARF or Raw Feeding).  Or better still see if you can get hold of a book called "Grow Your Pup With Bones" by Ian Billinghurst as this also has some health information in it (some goes over the top in my opinion but a lot makes sense)

I feed my five Dobes on this and also switched a returnee straight onto it from kibble when he arrived unexpectedly a couple of months ago with no food or diet sheet.  He had no problems with it apart from carrying the first piece around for half an hour or so before he realised he could eat it :-)

Hi Kerioak,

The idea of raw feeding has crossed my mind. I really wouldn't know where to begin, although I know that is probably partly just an excuse (:-D) as the information is out there if I seriously wanted to consider it. Is it easy to make sure that they are getting the correct level of nutrition?

Chicken poo is used as protein sometimes. On a kibbutz I worked on they fed it straight from their chicken houses to their dairy cattle.
Amos

When I kept chickens the dogs loved the chicken poo. The chickens used to peck at the dog poo. I began to wonder if I ever need buy animal food again! :D

Just as we do not have to be fed a scientifically produced processed food neither do most animals; it is just more convenient for us to open a bag and scoop a mug or so out into a bowl twice a day.

However feeding raw does not suit everyone and you DO need to read up so that you are quite confident that you understand your dog's nutritional needs and where to obtain them.

I do not have a problem in keeping my dogs fit and well on raw but there is a lot of choice out there and something to suit both the individual dog and its owner! :)

I do know which food it was.  I am not just scaremongering.  That particular food was very popular only a few years ago.  Because it was so cheap and the dogs loved it, I used it as a mixer instead of a complete food - until I read that.  I can't remember where now - but I am pretty sure it was in one of the dog papers. 

I am not suggesting that dog food manufacturers should put chicken excrement in their dog food.    However, chicken poo [rabbit poo etc] is actually quite nutritious for dogs and dogs would eat intestinal contents and excrement in the wild.

As can be seen from some of the above posts many dogs find herbivore and other excrement very nice to eat.

It provides predigested vegetable matter containing vitamins and minerals and also provided probiotics [useful and healthy gut flora].

My dogs eat all sorts of dung that they find.   There is only one danger and that is possibly from the dung of horses etc that have recently been wormed, although personally I have never had a problem with it.

Wendy