Quote: Kelly Byrd

 Quote: phaedra rieff

Well, February IS dental month in the vet world, so next Wednesday, my lunch will be provided by Ken from Medi-cal. He's going wow us again with the wonders of corn. Again, I will ask for proof, and again he will tell me that a vet from the company will get back to me.

Is your clinic giving discounts on Dentals? We aren't. Then again, we do 4-5 dentals per week, so we really don't have time for much more when you add our in our surgery schedule and the fact we only have 2 techs, 1 assistant, and 1 dr.

Have fun being wow'ed. I guessssss.... Get lots of sleep the night before, so you don't nap during his presentation!

Hey Kel!

YAY! I'm really lucky - my vet gives discount coupons for Christmas every year that are good for 3 months (although they've extended it at times for me cuz they love me )

This year it's been increased to $60 which will definitely be a big help since she has to have all of her lab work done for her Phenobarb, too.

That being said, I'm pretty sure their clinic isn't nearly as busy as yours is so I'm sure that makes a BIG difference

My 10y/o border collie has been fed Pro Plan all her life. No skin, ear, eye, organ, etc. problems. Beautiful coat and teeth. She is still very much as alive and kicking as she was when she was a pup. She was given all her shots according to the vets protocol too .

Maybe my dog is just genetically superior to all of yalls dogs

That could be.... But when the first 10 ingredients are ....
Chicken
Brewers rice
Whole grain wheat
Poultry by-product meal
Corn gluten meal
Whole grain corn
Animal fat preserved with mixed-tocopherols
Corn germ meal
Fish meal
Animal digest

I'm not willing to take the risk on my genetically compromised Dutch Shepherd's health. Here is the first 13 of one of the kibbles I feed.
Orijen
Fresh boneless chicken
Chicken meal
Fresh boneless salmon
Turkey meal
Herring meal
Russet potato (I'm not terribly crazy about this being #6, but the rest is good stuff)
Peas
Sweet potato
Fresh boneless turkey
Fresh whole eggs
Fresh chicken liver
Fresh boneless lake whitefish
Fresh boneless walleye


Or TOTW
Duck
Duck meal
Chicken meal
Egg product
Sweet potatoes
Peas
Chicken fat
Potatoes
Roasted quail
Roasted duck
Smoked turkey

The recent addition of ingredients imported from overseas is a really disturbing trend, led me to ditch the kibble in favor of raw. In past, all my dogs ate Dog Chow.

Is the ingredient "animal digest" what I think it is?

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

If I had know 10 years ago that Pro Plan could potentially compromise the health of my baby girl, then I wouldn't risk it either. But, I don't know that Pro Plan compromises my dogs health.

"Digest" used to include dogs put to sleep. A fair percent were too sick to save at most clinics, so they were PTS, frozen, then ....
we stored the bodies in a huge chest freezer and every so often a company came and picked them up.
Pretty icky, right? That's what's sprayed on the baked kibble and makes it so yum.


The big companies did not use dead pets to my knowledge. They have their own factories associated with big slaughter facilities where "tanked" beef is processed into meat and bone meal, blood meal, calcium, etc.

What about the Euthansol? We suggest to people never to bury their PTS pets in a shallow grave because other animals could potentially ingest the left over Euthansol in their system...

 Quote: Michele Hinton

If I had know 10 years ago that Pro Plan could potentially compromise the health of my baby girl, then I wouldn't risk it either. But, I don't know that Pro Plan compromises my dogs health.

Purina does tons of research and has pretty decent quality control. They haven't had recall issues like some of the other companies. Hundreds of thousands of dogs do pretty well on Purina foods, and have for many years.

BUT, is it optimal? I can't believe it is. And the idea of feeding my dogs animal digest kind of turns my stomach.

One of my biggest issue with Purina foods is that they are overpriced for what you're getting. You can get similar foods from Diamond for about half the price. Half the price is a significant difference. Around here you can get foods with better ingredient lists for 15-20% cheaper than Pro Plan. Canidae runs about the same price of Pro Plan and the ingredient list sure looks alot better to me

-Chicken meal, turkey meal, lamb meal, brown rice, white rice, rice bran, peas, potatoes, oatmeal, cracked pearled barley, chicken fat (preserved with mixed tocopherols), millet, tomato pomace, natural flavor, flaxseed meal, ocean fish meal, choline chloride, suncured alfalfa meal, inulin (from chicory root), lecithin, sage extract, cranberries,