[Sabrina H]

His stool is fine on the foods I can find that have 5-6% fiber. It’s kept anal gland issues away for a few years now. Including large breed food would give us more options.

Vet opinions vary. One vet insisted he come in every 2 weeks for the rest of his life to have his glands expressed even though higher fiber in his food fixed the problem. Other vets in the same office acknowledged that higher fiber fixed the problem and didn’t think he should come in unless he’s scooting, chewing, or smells fishy. The vets in the area we live in now think anything that’s not Science Diet or Royal Canin is horrible and toxic, so their solution to just about everything is to put the pet on Science Diet. They don’t even like to discuss options that don’t involve Science Diet.

[Sabrina H]

Instinct LID has peas as the second ingredient so I’m avoiding it. ProPac Ultimates has potatoes and legumes as ingredients # 2, 3, 4, 6, which explains why it has such an affordable price.
Earthborn Holistic Venture is one I want to try if it ever goes on sale. It’s low in potatoes/legumes but it’s also over my price limit by $0.22-0.50/day.

I discovered Jack’s Premium and Muenster brands today which look pretty good. Jack’s Premium is at the top of my price range but I won’t have to supplement fiber so it balances out.

[Sabrina H]

Health Extension is towards the top of the list because I don’t have to add fiber to it. I hope he does well on it! I got a bag of Instinct on sale (I’m adding Firm Up because the fiber is low) and he’s not doing all that great on it. He loves it but his butt is irritated. I’m going to have to switch between cheaper brands, like American Journey, and the $1/day stuff. Oh, how I wish he could eat grains. I mean he technically could but I would be cleaning up mucousy cow patties and his coat would be a disaster.

I know Petcurean Go! Fit and Free is pretty high in protein and he probably doesn’t need something like that regularly, so I was thinking of making that his summer food. There are only about 2 months here when the weather is nice enough for us to be running around outside constantly and he always eats significantly more during those months. Does that sound like a decent idea?

With the DCM stuff I want to go back to rotating between brands. I stopped because I was trying so hard to figure out all his issues and as soon as I found Zignature I took a break from the dog food research. How often should I rotate? One 20-something pound bag usually lasts him 2 months.

[Sabrina H]

I saw yet another vet and she insisted it was environmental allergies. She wasn’t at all concerned with the ear problem since there’s nothing visibly wrong and he’s had it for so long, and she didn’t seem to care much about the itchiness simply because he didn’t scratch during the vet appointment. I strongly dislike this vet. I took my cat to her and disliked her so much that I went to another clinic in a completely different town, yet somehow she ended up being there too. She wouldn’t even entertain the idea of it being a food allergy and just told me to try Benedryl. The Benedryl did seem to help the ear issue and switching his food to Zignature Turkey (my local feed store has a great price!) helped the anal gland problem. Even though it’s 6% fiber, this food doesn’t cause him issues like the 5.5% fiber foods did. He’s still itchy though! I’m thinking maybe pork is a problem. It seems like he gets aggressively itchy any time he has pork, and meat from domestic pigs makes him itchier than wild boar.

[Sabrina H]

There is no form of specialist at all anywhere near my area (we would have to travel well over 200 miles to get to one and my car might not make it), and having just spent a small fortune and most of my savings on my senior cat money is tight. Both pets needed to have issues at the same time apparently. I recently moved and I’m having a hard time finding a decent vet up here. Some think all food except Royal Canin and Science Diet are terrible, others don’t seem to care about the pet and only want the money, and a couple of them seem like they slept through vet school.

With Taste of the Wild, his skin was best on High Praire, his anal glands were in the best shape (until recently) on Southwest Canyon. Pine Forest caused him to be incredibly gassy and his feces were never well-formed. Pacific Stream really had no redeeming qualities.
He was eating Southwest Canyon but the last bag I bought was High Praire to see if getting rid of the boar would help any. It’s only been a couple weeks but it does seem like his neck is itching less, though he’s still itching the base of his tail.

I don’t remember quite all that I tried with 4Health. I know he started on the regular (not grain free) formula and I think I stuck mostly with the chicken option before switching to the salmon and potato in an effort to help his skin, then to the grain free ones. Grain-free does definitely help his condition.

Beneful, unsurprisingly, left him with the worst dandruff and his feces weren’t formed at all, ever. They were just…mush.

I give as few baths as possible. The frequency depends on whether or not he finds something stinky to roll in, like baby opossums passed out in the backyard or duck poop that the neighbor sprays over the fence. If he doesn’t find anything gross to roll in he gets a bath every 2 months with a moisturizing shampoo, usually with aloe/oatmeal in it. I’ve tried bathing less as well as bathing more and it doesn’t have much effect. A lack of baths for longer than 2 months does seem to make him itchier, probably because he’s dirty.

In terms of fish oil, I’ve tried a couple different kinds. One was wild Alaskan salmon oil and the other was just omega-3 and didn’t specify anything other than fish from Norway. He was on each one for a few months and neither did anything. I refuse to give up apparently so I have a third kind to try when I’m done with the omega-3, which is another brand of wild Alaskan salmon oil.

With the experience I’ve had with the vets here thus far, they’ll almost certainly tell me to put him on Science Diet to make all his problems disappear and leave it at that.

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