A good time to plug variety in the diet.:wink:

Variety, to me, means not being redundant with any one food item. Just another way of combating deficiency or excess.

 Quote: Michael_Wise

A good time to plug variety in the diet.:wink:

Variety, to me, means not being redundant with any one food item. Just another way of combating deficiency or excess.

You got that right!

May I add that in addition to everything to be said for covering nutritional bases with variety (even those we don't know about!), giving variety allows you to give variety. That is, a dog who gets variety all the time is not going to have an upset stomach when something new is added, much unlike dogs who are fed the same food every meal, every day.

I stick notes on the fridge sometimes to remind myself that even though I rely heavily on poultry RMBs, the rest of the meals can and should be as varied as I can make them.

So feeding the eggs cooked negates the problem with the biotin deficiency?

I can't feed Nico raw eggs due to the gas it produces but I do feed her quite a lot lightly scrambled or soft boiled eggs.

I'm with Connie about erring on the side of caution. I don't believe (at least haven't read about it) biotin *toxicity* to be an easy/common thing to occur. But biotin deficiency could happen.

Each dog is different, just like us. Another person with my exact age & body size can eat the exact same diet with exact same activities as mine could end up with toxicity or deficiency of something and vice versa.

Since we know avidin can inhibit intestinal microbial synthesis of biotin but don't know the exact biotin & avidin levels of particula eggs (my eggs are very different from anybody else's unless we get them from the same farm), it's just safe(r) to soft boil them rather than take a chance and see if the dog ends up with biotin deficiency. It doesn't take a high heat to deactivate avidin.

Michael's reply coupled with Connie's made me feel like in an infomercial..


good stuff though, I've been feeding raw eggs almost everyday to my two dogs - ill try the cooked eggs (and/or discarding the white) more often than not. I like eggs because it makes for a good morning snack (I feed once a day - we are always out on the weekend and feeding twice a day is a pain - plus they are not so food driven on two meals a day)

and back to the main program...

Edited by Mike Bellemare (08/27/2009 12:27 PM)
Edit reason: typo

 Quote: Jennifer Lee

So feeding the eggs cooked negates the problem with the biotin deficiency?

Yes.

Avidin
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Avidin
This article notes that, "One molecule of avidin binds up to four of biotin."

Biotin
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biotin

This article indicates that to induce a biotin deficiency, you would need to consume over 20 eggs a day. That number is probably for a human. Scale it back by weight for a Shepherd and you would need to feed 10-12 eggs/day to see biotin deficiency symtoms. FWIW, the effects probably start occuring at lower levels.

Pregnancy also raises the risk of biotin deficincy in humans. Probably for dogs too. I also suspect older dogs would also be more susceptable to biotin deficiency.

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/2602924
Biotin Deficiency in Dogs Reviews the treatment of poor coat with biotin suppliments at the rate of 5 mg biotin/10 kg per day. About 60% were substantially improved. Another 30% would improved.

Bottom line is an egg a day probably won't harm a dog on an otherwise healthy (raw) diet. Cooking the eggs eliminates that risk. Since most of us not living on a farm would feed the cheaper, factory farm eggs, cooking also eliminates the risks of salmonella from those eggs.

 Quote: Charlie Snyder

... This article indicates that to induce a biotin deficiency, you would need to consume over 20 eggs a day. That number is probably for a human. Scale it back by weight for a Shepherd and you would need to feed 10-12 eggs/day to see biotin deficiency symtoms. FWIW, the effects probably start occuring at lower levels. ...

These are the numbers/suggestions I was going by until I happened on an article revising these estimates. I'll have to dig it up again, as soon as I remember where I saved it.

I will look for it this afternoon.

I did a more complete reading of the research article abstract. It tends to imply that Shepherds may be more susceptable to biotin deficiencies.

It noted that ...

 Quote:

All breeds responded but to a variable extent: e.g. in Poodles the response was lower (no response in 6 out of 11 cases) than in Alsatians, (German Shepherds) , where all improved and 14 out of 29 were completely cured. The results confirm the favourable effect of biotin for treatment of fur and skin conditions in dogs.

Looks like I need to add 'Scramble One Case of Eggs' to my monthly food prep.

 Quote: Charlie Snyder

... Looks like I need to add 'Scramble One Case of Eggs' to my monthly food prep.

I don't even do that much. I steam or simmer for 4 minutes and then drop it into the dish from high enough to make it break open, and I leave on and encourage the dog to eat about 1/5 of the shell (except for one, who licks the shell as clean as an operating table but never deigns to actually eat any of it).