Hi

We have a 10 week old greyhound puppy who has had diarhoea on and off since we got her 3 weeks ago. She is a family pet and will not be raced. When she came to us she was fed on greyhound dry mix and cooked beef mince. She picked out the mince and left the mix so she wasn't getting a complete diet. The vet told me to change to a complete dry food only. She had Hills Science plan for a week and then stopped eating it altogether and had a bit of diarhoea, was off colour, weeing a lot. The vet did tests and didn't find much wrong with her and told me to continue with the complete food (we had given her rice and chicken for 24 hours to stop the runs). As she wasn't eating the hills food we tried tinned food and mixer (I know probably the worst thing we could do!) again she was fine for about 5 day and got the runs very badly and went completely off colour. In additon to the runs she also had dry itchy skin and started growling. We have gone back to the rice and chicked and I am supplementing it with vetzyme tablets. Her condition has improved dramatically but I know this probably isn't a good solution in the long run. I gave her one meal of chicken mixed with puppy meal and she had the runs again. I now think she has a wheat allergy and have not given her any biscuits or treats or anything that may have wheat in.

I know that we need to find a better solution than just chicken and rice. I don't know what to do next. I can find little information about feeding greyhounds as puppies because most are only kept as pets after being retired from racing. The mince she is currenty getting comes from the pet shop and was recommended as part of a natural diet. I like the idea of natural feeding but would like a convenient option.

Does any one have any ideas?

Hi -

If you want to try a more natural diet but want the convenience of a prepared one try AMP's frozen Natures Menu - it is a mix of whole chicken, heart, liver, tripe, green and root vegetables all minced and frozen. No grains and designed to be a complete food. Have a look at their website - http://www.prizechoice.co.uk/. You want the Natures Menu Frozen Original Blend (they have actually discontinued a couple of the others but the original is a good mix). They do home delivery if you order at least £35 worth - so as long as you have some freezer space it is really convenient. And they have always been very helpful as well.

Good luck
Janet

Please check out the wafcol diet www.wafcol.co.uk the food i feed my GSD on is Hypoallergenic for gentle digestion i mix mine with prize choice minced white fish and once you get to the adult stage you can get the wafcol range which is Free from wheat gluten, barley, rye & oats i think this covers the whole range. My pup is on Wafcol and to date (she is now 18 weeks) we have had no runs on this food, she is putting weight on lovely and her coat is gorgeous.
Can i just add that prize choice will let you order minced white fish from them even though it is not listed, all you have to do is ring them and place and order and it comes delivered to you frozen, the then ring you once a month to ask if you require more foos, well they have for me anyway prolly cause i ordered 5 cases :-D
Hope this all helps you.
P.S. and as Janet said the are very helpful and freindly

Cordelia

No - they ring me each week too! :) I suspect they do everyone who orders home deliveries.
But they do have excellent customer service!

Wafcol also do a Salmon and Potato which I have used before for a dog who had an allergy to grain. Nutro and James Welbeloved are also good for sensitive digestions.

Janet

Yes my adult GSD has Salmon and Potato then the next time with give her Fish and Corn. We did put her JWB but she lost a lot of weigh in one month i think it was aroun 2kg so the vet advised us to take her off of it and put her on to science pland Tuna and Rice but then she developed an allergy to that she lost all the fur from her left hind leg and slowley chewed it to bits lots of tabs and injection and cream and muzzling her whilst we were out (the cage type) she got better and aloe vera in between to stop the itching.
Glad to here the ring you aswell :-) must be something they do to everyone then:-D

Or maybe we are their two best customers?! :D

Some dogs seem to be allergic to any meat including lamb and chicken. Wafcol is great for the fish alternatives. Glad to hear your girl is better.

Janet

Thanks she is doing great apart from leaving half of her coat on my floor, buit that will be back soon ready for the winter, pup is great on it too.
:-D

The other thing to do is to feed a complete like Burns. If you contact them they will send you samples of food, I use Burns Active with my two younger Large Munsterlanders as I prefer a higher fat content complete food.

Thank you everyone

I've got both Wafcol and Burns to send me food samples. I also looked at the Prize Choice website. The mince we currently give her is from AMP and is supplied to my local pet shop. I didn't really think of giving her one with the veg already mixed in - its definitely an option. I also got more information off the internet about natural feeding. But I am a bit anxious that I won't get it right. I just have this feeling that the natural feeding way will suit Phoebe better than a commercial food.

I've been looking at some of the other about natural feeding threads I am confused about whether it would be okay to give a complete food like Wafcol or Burns for breakfast and than a meat meal for evening. What do you think? My parents springer spaniels have always been on a complete food and we've never had any feeding problems with them so this is new to me.

I contacted Wafcol for a sample and never recieved it that was about two months back i would suggest you ring them for the sample.
Your pup is currently 10 weeks and has to be fed 4 meals a day so you have to look at the daily amount of complete food and split it into 4 then take a tiny bit more off you you are adding any meat products of fishe to it.
My own pup is 4 months now (18 weeks) and gets 3 meals a day, then normally on a sunday she gets loads of veg with her dinner as i always over cook on the veg :-D

James Well-beloved is also Wheat/Corn and Gluten free so may be worth looking at if you don't want to go for a natural diet.

Wendy

How about Autarky? They do a puppy food that is wheat gluten free.
My lurcher Sky has a wheat allergy, and loses her fur, gets very itchy and red (bleeding from scratching too) and gets pretty nasty diarrhoea. I've tried Wafcol, JW, and other gluten free brands, and the only one which has worked is Autarky.
It's also half the price of Burns, and still a high quality food :)
Lisa
xx
http://www.autarky-foods.com/

Hi

Just a quick update - it does seem to have been the wheat causing the problems. Vet thinks it might be temporary. Shes been fine with the Burns and James Well-beloved they haven't upset her at all but she just doesn't like dry food. Shes eats only a very small amount and leaves the rest as soon as shes not starving hungry anymore. I've tried making it mushy with warm water (all different consistencies!) and adding grated cheese, mince and alsorts to make it more tempting. Nothing works.

The people from prize choice sent me some info about natural feeding a few days ago (a very concise summary of 'give your dog a bone' book) and I gave her the meat and veg raw yesterday using their instructions for proportions. It dissappeared so quick I don't think it touched the sides on the way down!! Shes had the same for breakfast. It was a lot easier and did not take as much time as I thought it would. So... natural feeding it is then! We are also working on ways of doing it surprisingly cheaply.

I'm also looking for instant (packet not frozen) alternatives like Naturediet and the prize choice natures menu as an alternative for those days when we are away from home or I need to feed her in a hurry.

I'm going to but a book about BARF but in the meantime is there anything that I need to bear in mind for barf for puppies? Also does anyone recommend good wheat free treats?

Sorrel,

The tripe sticks make excellent treats. Either in their whole length or cut up to smaller bits for a bite size treat. They are a little expensive when you just buy a packet ( £1+) but I get a huge box delivered ever couple of months and my freind and I share it. They ( Red Castles in Dundee) also provide us with our tripe etc

We also use a juicer, we had a cheaper one but then bought the one from Cable so when we juice ( including veggies) , we have the juice but the pulp then is put in ice cube trays and we use these as treats also. My lot love them I mean love them.

The Give your dog a bone and natural nutrition for cats and dogs is the best Barf Books when starting out. I have about 7 of them now but still think for understanding the concept and what you are trying to acheive these are the simplest books. Good parts on grains etc. Books can be bought from http://www.caninenaturalcures.co.uk/books.html

Here is a link for a company In England http://www.laughingdogfood.co.uk/naturalchoice.htm who stock quite a bit of natural diets, the natural wholebake biscuit is excellent , a few of my doggy freinds who have dogs with problems use this along with their natural diet.

Hope things continune to improve for you.. Fingers crossed.

Pam

Hi,
I have two adult greys who are fed raw.
there is a yahoo groups specifically for naturally fed greyhounds that you might be interested in http://groups.yahoo.com/group/NaturallyGrey/
Hope your little girl is continuing to improve.

Karen