Food for Thought

Not a shocking revelation to anyone who knows me, but I'm a bit of a control freak.  Maybe all mothers are.  But also maybe that's why I am more of a dog person than a cat person.  Cats control you.  You are in total charge of dogs.  But with great power, comes great responsibility as famously stated by Sheldon Cooper.

My poor dogs over the years have been completely beholden to my choice of treats for them, their toys, and - most importantly - their food.  And I have to confess, I didn't always make the best choices.  I got my first dog, a Brittany named Brittany (I shudder now to think how incredibly clever I was to name her that) when I was too young, dumb and poor to do right by her.  I can't tell you I remember what I fed her, but I guarantee you it wasn't the best.  I can tell you for sure when I was up to eight, I was buying food I thought was decent, but even when my vet pointed out that I was wrong, I stuck with it because the dogs were acclimated to it and it's what I thought we could afford.

But here I am years later with only three dogs and a decent income and I want to do what's best for them.  And for all their lives until recently I thought I was by feeding them Nutro.  I had gone to that brand when Ripley was a pup, and thought - as their ad suggests - I was feeding them clean.  Then two things happened: I started to obsess over Sirius' potty habits on the morning walks.  At first I was just curious at how consistent a dog's habits are.  But I became a little troubled by it - if you're squeamish, look away - but he poops three times on a walk.  Every day.  First one's fine.  Second time is a little more runny and the final time is pretty liquid.  Those second two started to bother me. 

Then, with that rolling around the back of my brain, I went to look up something about Nutro Ultra online to respond to an inquiry about what we all use to feed our collies in one of the collie Facebook groups, and I was greeted by a wealth of criticisms from users and professional reviewers alike.  I was horrified that I had been feeding my pets an expensive food I thought was excellent and here were all these people saying horrible things about it.  So I read all the other comments from collie owners, some professional breeders and some who have shown and own champion collies.  And a couple of brand names kept popping up: Canidae and 4Health.  So I found a site that has detailed reviews of a wealth of different foods and checked them both out, then checked on how readily available either of them were and decided to try Canidae.  Now, in fairness, while Canidae was rated on the site with 4.5 stars, Nutro is rated at 4 stars.  So, as violently as I reacted and as fast as I pulled the trigger that we were going to switch, I think in a calmer moment, I was being a little bit of a worrisome mom and overreacting.  But, there you have it: that's what I did.

Thus began the very long process of gradually switching over - the measuring out of foods to mix them in, slowly tipping the scale from mostly Nutro to mostly Canidae and now, finally, our first bag of strictly Canidae All Life Stages Multi-Formula Chicken, Turkey, Lamb and Fish Meals.  As I explained to the husband, who was just swept along the river of my passion, these dogs are our family and they deserve the best I can give them.

Well, here's the problem.  Did I do the right thing?  Because, while we were in the mixing stage, Sirius' walking poops were a bit better, but now we're right back to where we started, and now we have to add Rooney's flatulence to the mix.  And I mean - whoa!  What gave me great pause about it was when I was brushing Rooney and Geddy yesterday; they both became gassy, probably because I was rubbing against their tummies.  It was all I could do to stay in the room, let alone finish the job.  I mean you could sell that aroma as a biological weapon of mass destruction.

So, what causes flatulence in dogs? Low quality food is the chief culprit.

Sigh. 

I guess I'll wait it out for bit and see if it's just a temporary reaction before I overreact again and start a long, arduous process of switching back.

But, if there is a moral to this story, it's this: you'll hear people say sometimes, when talking about something that is all-encompassing that it's "terrible".  See the Terrible Power of...  Behold the Terrible Wonder of...  It is somewhat terrible to have such total control over the well-being of living creatures, and realizing if you make a mistake in judgment those beings suffer for it.  I imagine zoo employees feel that ten-fold. 

Yet, also it's this tried and true saying:

If it ain't broke, don't fix it.

Here's to the health and well-being of all our fur babies!