How Do My Dogs Eat? – Spoiled Dog Food…

OK, so I’ll make today’s post quick.

I got a great question from a reader. And it’s about a subject near and dear to me. My dogs

Here’s the question:

Hi Sean. Another Pac NW’er here! Haven’t been able to make one of the meet ups yet, but hope to soon. Anyway, I wanted to ask you about what you are feeding your dog. Right now, I’ve got my little guy on chicken (with fat), rice, and organic veggies. I add in the Missing Link supplement as well. Treats are cooked chicken livers, as well as chicken jerky and sometimes raw beef. What has been best for your pup?

Thanks for the input! Have fun at the hike this weekend.

Krys

Thanks Krys for the great question!

So how do I feed my dogs?

The reason why this is such a great question (from my perspective) is because I have two dogs. A Cocka-Poo and a Lhasa-Poo, they’re both half poodle, one is half Cocker Spaniel, and one is half Lhasa Apso.

This is Lucky:

And this is Clover:

Lucky and Clover are very spoiled dogs, and we like to keep it that way
But Clover is a rescue, she was kept in a kennel for 1.5 years of her life. She was first in a puppy mill, then was bought by a developmentally delayed woman who would not ever let her out of her kennel.

Then her landlord finally found out about her being mistreated and had an animal rescue group come in and was then transferred to a “foster home. ”

We then got her from the “foster home” and she’s now part of our family. But she has a bit of issues as a result of her upbringing.

One of the major ones is extreme allergies.

Her allergies are so bad that she would literally scratch off her own fur on her face, around her eyes, her “arm pits,” her paws, etc. She was a big patchy, scabby mess for a long while.

The vet said she’s the worst case they’ve seen.

We tried lots of different medications, and tried the prescription diet food, etc. The only thing that did work was a drug called “Atopica.”

That stuff is EXPENSIVE! It’s like $75 to $150 a month, depending on your dosage.  (Clover was doing closer to $150.)

It was working, and still does work… but I didn’t like giving her medication all the time, and I didn’t like paying the bill…
So one day, the “light bulb” went off in my head, and I thought “Hey why don’t we stop feeding her grain, try and get more good fat into her diet?”

And just like that… bam!

I haven’t given her Atopica in about a month and a half, and she’s doing just as well as she did when she was taking it.

So here’s what we feed her now.

It’s Wellness brand, and it’s the grain free stuff. We have 3 different kinds so we can switch it up.

Here’s closer pics:

In addition to the plain ‘ol dog food, we pour Coconut oil, or Walnut oil on top of their food too to increase their fat consumption.

We also noticed a huge benefit to Clover getting over her allergies and feeling much better when we switched out her “Doggy Treats.”

We get this stuff now. (It’s also grain free.)

And instead of rawhide bones, we go to the farmers market and get local grass fed beef “Doggy Bones.” It’s actually less expensive, and way way better for them.

And… well that’s about it.

The dogs eat (basically) the same way as myself and Lindsey do… but they eat dog food, and dog treats, and doggy bones.

But we just make sure to get the “right” stuff.

The result?

Happier dogs, saved money, and less medication.

Sounds good to me!

How do you feed your dogs?