[Tara M]

Hello all. I have an 8 year old spayed female pitbull with consistent recurrent UTI’s. X-rays are always negative. She’s on cranberry supplements as well as multiple immune support supplements. She eats Taste of the Wild Grain-Free Salmon recipe dog food (she also has allergies and salmon was recommended for thi). A friend who is very into the dog show world mentioned today that she thinks the fish-based dog food is what is causing my dog’s UTI’s and that I should change it to one of the more novel proteins such as kangaroo. Has anyone else heard of fish-based dog foods causing UTI issues? I can’t find anything about it anywhere online but she says that everyone in the breeding/dog show world will NOT feed their dogs primarily fish-based diets for this reason.

[anonymous]

I am not aware of any such thing. In fact, one of my dogs does best on fish based kibble as a base
She is a senior with environmental allergies and has never had a uti.
For best results discuss with a veterinarian that has examined your dog and knows the dogs history, not the internet.

Per the search engine.
/forums/topic/bladder-stones-in-6-year-old-female-pug/#post-113166

[haleycookie]

I’ve heard of this before, not sure of the validity of it, but the first issue I see is she’s not getting any wet food as far as you mentioned. I know with utis in cats it is common for an all dry fed cat to get them often. Adding in at least half wet can sometimes completely get rid of the issue so I would recommend doing that to make sure she’s always hydrated and changing to a poultry/red meat based food your dog can tolerate.

[Tara M]

I should have been more detailed. Her kibble has always been mixed with water for adequate hydration and we have recently added some canned to it as well. I have discussed with my vet and he has not heard anything of that nature. We have done all we can for her from his perspective and i would just like to explore this to see if anyone else has had the same experience. If there’s any validity to it at all, I’m willing to try switching foods.

[Susan]

Hi Tara,
TOTW is a high Legume diet, I’ve been seeing alot of dogs on f/b groups & on DFA, dogs that were eating Zignature who were feed a high legume diet they keep having UTI’s…
Look for a Potato, Sweet Potato, Oats, Rice food that has NO Lentils or Chickpeas…

Also stop feeding any fish pet foods as fish is the worse dog food for Heavy Metals, Toxins & Contaminates.. The TOTW Pacific Stream has been in the top 10 worse dry foods high in heavy meatals for the last 1 & 1/2 yrs…. 299 dry dog foods are tested every 3 months & TOTW Salmon & TOTW High Prairie formula’s have both stayed in the bad top 10 dry dog foods…
Change her food to a different brand, feed more of a wet diet then dry diet…
Can you cook or feed a raw diet instead of a dry diet?? wet diet would be heaps better then a dry diet even when you add water its still a dry process diet full of toxins….

Have you tried D-mannose??
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/27424995

D-Mannose has been known to disrupt the ability of e-coli bacteria from sticking to the urinary tract. It is derived from mannose, which is a sugar molecule (binding). Some have reported combining cranberry with a dosage of D-Mannose and have seen great improvements in their dogs’ urinary tract conditions.

Also Vitamin C has been known to help stengthen immune system & help with Urinary tratc problems..

Vitamin C for Prevention of Chronic Urinary Tract Infections in Dogs

[Tara M]

Thanks for all the advice. I’m going to change very over to Merrick and a different protein source.

[Robin K]

Tara, although it’s been a number of years I’m curious to know what you ended up discovering with your dog’s frequent uti. I also have a pitbull and recently tried switching her to salmon dog food (due to suspicions that she was sensitive to chicken, which is common apparently). During the week we started to slowly switch her food she started soiling in the house, which she never ever does, so we suspected there was a medical reason behind it. We immediately have stopped giving the salmon, to see if that helps, but it’s too soon to know. Anyways, any update you may have would be greatly appreciated.

[Kathleen C]

My dog can’t eat chicken so I need to change him to something else, like Wellness Whitefish and sweet potato. Why is it rated 3.5 instead of higher like most Wellness products? I do not like feeding my dog anything lower than 4.5 but would like to see if I can switch Jack away from the weird food the vet has him on because of the chicken problem. He does not have a urinary tract infection as far as I know. Thank you.

[Kathleen C]

Did Mike bring the rating down for the Wellness Whitefish dog food because of the fear of DCM? I had the feeling from what he’s said before about the worry that he didn’t. Because he didn’t rate that food I can’t tell by looking at Chewy, just by reading the reviews.

[Kathleen C]

Lilia M: It’s your understanding then that your dog was allergic to the white fish and that caused the problems? After just 2 days of trying to switch my dog to salmon based food his stool became much softer again; not very, like diarrhea, but maybe a worry. I gave up on the salmon. I hate the idea of Royal Canin, but worry about stomach problems. A friend suggested going to a beef or lamb food to stay away from chicken, however all those have chicken in them too. Dog food is a quagmire of stupidity. If chicken is main source of allergies to large percentage of dogs why does dog food have so much chicken in it? I don’t think even the Dog Food Advisor can answer that. I’m finished with trying to switch this dog away from RC. I should be happy something works.

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