Dog Community

binge & purge?

Posted : 4/29/2007 1:46:41 PM

hi everyone,

i'm a 4.5 year old border collie / brittany spaniel* cross.

i've been eating the same brand (pedigree) of kibble since birth; currently i'm eating the "healthy vitality - active lifestyle recipe for all adults" variety - the pieces are about dime-sized.

almost a year ago, my mother and i moved a very large distance to be with my father, whom i had met once or twice previously. shortly after the move i began to vomit after each meal - the vomit would be almost entirely fresh water, and usually contained about 10 pieces of completely unchewed food. after a few weeks, my parents got the idea to elevate my food off of the floor to try and slow me down - for the most part this has helped, but i still encounter this problem about once or twice a week.

i eat at the same time every day, and most of the time the vomiting occurs within 15-20 minutes, but on very rare occasions i will vomit up some unchewed food the next morning when i drink some water.

they've got a few more ideas up their sleeves, but before they try anything else i was hoping your combined experience might have some input i can pass on to them:

increasing or decreasing the size of the pieces in my food
- they're not sure which of these is better and will avoid any potential choking hazards
soaking the food in water (temperature?) before feeding
- they want to avoid this if possible as they believe that hard food is better for my teeth and the cleaning value will be lost

looking forward to your replies, and thanks in advance for your help!

Raja19

Posted : 4/29/2007 3:29:19 PM

I am not totally sure what this is, except it could do a sort of bloat issue.

I would restrain water for about 30 min after each meal. Also Oliver might be eating too fast, you could always feed smaller meals more often, and take away the food after he's ate half then give it back to him in like 15 min.

And my first question was has Oliver been to vet for this? Also I wasn't sure is Oliver vomiting after every meal?

Also can you suggest some higher quality food? The Pedigree may be upsetting his stomach.

Canidae is a great auper premium food, and it is very inexpensive.
It is 28.00 fior a 40 pound bag in my area. But you feed alot less because the calorie are much more.

Soemone made a chart a while back on the cost of dog food...

"For example (to feed 1200 calories)
Purina- $17/38lbs. Feed 2.8 cups daily. Cost/day=$.30.
Kirkland- $18/40 lbs. Feed 3.5 cups daily. Cost/day= $.39
Pedigree- $19/44pounds. Feed 4.1 cups daily. Cost/day= $.46.
Canidae- $33/40 lbs. Feed 2.5 cups/day. Cost/day=$.54.
Beneful - $24/35lbs. Feed 3.7 cups. Cost/day $.63.
Innova EVO $44/29lbs. Feed 2 cups daily. Cost/day $.79.
Eukanuba $39/40#. Feed 3.4 cups daily. Cost/day $.82.
ProPlan Select $43/33lbs. Feed 2.6 cups. Cost/day=$.85."
-Yet in Sacramento, Canidae is $5 cheaper then in the chart!

(Hope Amyliz doesnt mind me copying that from an old

ost!)

Also Chicken Soup for the Dog Lovers Soul is a very high quality food,and I get it at a feed store for $27.00 for a 35 pound bag.

Stacita

Posted : 4/29/2007 4:11:42 PM

What a good looking

up!

I think the first thing I'd try to do is to slow down the eating. You can place something in the dish that makes him work harder to get to the food or even feed him entirely from a Kong where he has to work to get food and thereby be slowed down.

You could also add water to the food to make a soup, thus slowing him down. Kibble doesn't really clean the teeth anyway. The best bet there is to give him some raw (never cooked) bones to chew on. The cost of the bones will be saved by not having to have his teeth professionally cleaned. Do supervise chewing bones to make sure he's not swallowing large pieces, but even if he does, they'll come back up without harm.

I also second Raja's suggestion of Canidae as a food. It is easy on the tummy, and because of it's high calorie count and good bioavailibility, requires a lot less food, so is surprisingly affordable.

Good luck solving this problem.

janet_rose

Posted : 4/30/2007 3:58:56 AM

my parents got the idea to elevate my food off of the floor to try and slow me down

You can slow a dog down by feeding him with a treat ball:

Treat balls to make a dog work for his food:
[linkhttp://www.sitstay.com/store/toys/toysd.shtml]http://www.sitstay.com/store/toys/toysd.shtml[/link]
[linkhttp://tinyurl.com/34rh6j]http://tinyurl.com/34rh6j[/link] [size=2](www.jbpet.com)
[linkhttp://www.omegapaw.com/TrickyTreatBall.html]http://www.omegapaw.com/TrickyTreatBall.html[/link]
[linkhttp://www.dog.com/search.asp?SKW=treat+ball&searchcat=&x=28&y=18]http://www.dog.com/search.asp?SKW=treat+ball&searchcat=&x=28&y=18[/link][/size]

spiritdogs

Posted : 4/30/2007 6:15:27 AM

Has the dog been evaluated by a vet? If this behavior appeared coincidentally with a move, I would suspect bacterial infection, stress, irritable bowel, partial obstruction, etc. Please rule out any disease process before trying things like changes in diet or elevating food bowls. Also, was the food you had the dog on originally part of the recall (Pedigree's site says their foods are not), or was he ever on Diamond pet food, or a food manufactured by Diamond, during the aflatoxin recall? (That recall was about a year and a half ago, if I remember correctly, but the result was a lot of dogs with liver problems, which can eventually result in nausea & vomiting.)