Abady Response To The Critics

ORIGINAL: sarah_b

But they were built about like this setter. You wouldn't really see muscle tone like in the pointers, but they could hunt day break to sunset 7 days a week during season

Thank you Sandra. These are good old Field bred Setters...made to do just that...go all day long. Lean, mean, racing machines. I just dabbled a few years with Irish Setter's, field trials, show Irish Setters...many years ago.
His Setter is lovely. But honestly, to try and judge from a photo is very difficult ....

Good description by Sarah, 'lean, mean, racing machines'.  These dogs BTW, do not make good jogging partners unless you have a lot of wide open field and have some trust in your training she will recall. 

I notice besides plenty of food critics we have a number of would-be Westminster judges as well, and my advice to them would be don't quit your day job!

Laurie brings up good point about your Raw fed dogs and equivalent in comparison to overall appearance and conditioning.

This may come as a surprise by looking at these photos and kind of embarrassed to admit it, but the truth is I probably haven't given my dog a good bath in a couple years.  I know it's wrong, and I need to improve drastically with grooming.  I was also embarrassed the last time at the Vet several years back for a hang-nail.  Not sure if you have ever seen this, probably not but when a nail breaks off from being too long a new one comes back underneath.  Sometimes they don't fall off clean and best to have the vet clip it back in that case.  Keep in mind, shes has no smell either and that is another reason she honestly doesn't need regular bathing.  She doesn't have smelly ears either.

All the photos that you have uploaded to share all look very nice.

For those of you kind enough to share your thoughts as to my dog looking too skinny and having no tone or muscle development, I want you to at the same time think about this... I free-feed at about approximately 800 cals per cup.  The ration is very low carb, and ridiculously low fiber.  Food and water is available 24/7.  My dogs can eat whenever the choose,
and I have noticed over time the weight corresponds with the feeding tables; but if I was to answer are they at all on the + or - side of the feeding tables I would favor toward the minus side.

Here are a few more of that same group of shots:





Photos can be deceiving as someone mentioned.  Zoe only weighs about 35 pounds.  The following shots are from a small Vivitar camera (vivicam 55) $19 at Wal-Mart...and the pics reflect that.  Low quality, however you will see what I mean about the size thing and nearly 35 lbs.



We got the second Pheasant shortly after the first...she looks gassed in this one with tongue hanging out, aww don't worry,
river water flowing not far away and plenty of opportunities to stop for drinks; were still got a few miles to go back to the car.

Zoe looks beautiful. I don't think going without a bath is so terrible. My shorter haired dogs get two a year and my longer haired dog maybe three or four, mostly because she shows dirt. Keep up with the nails though.
 
This is Floyd & Wolfgang gladiating. Really, they get along just fine.

Thanks Stacita.  She got a good bath when she got nailed by a skunk a few years back, a tomato juice bath first!  I'm bad with the nails and need to get better with that...she's not to thrilled about having them done, and she never even got nipped before.  I have one those types with safety guard on them and careful not to go down to far.  I need to inspect and trim them more as routine instead of checking every now and then.  You dogs are looking good!
 
Charlie

You dogs are looking good!

 
Thanks! Wolfgang is a little porky in that picture, but he's lost four pounds since. My dogs are all middle aged and like people, have to watch their weight a bit.

My English Setter Pixie was only about 35 pounds--I named her Pixie because she was 4 weeks old and tiny when I got her after Duchess was poisoned.  Her Mom had been hit by car and died  and the lake patrolman got her for me.
I didn'n't think to mention it before, my my vet has a champion (bench) English Setter and one would think she skinny if one didn't know anything about setters. 
 
 
Some breeds of dogs are just naturally meant to be thin, some are meant to be beefy, and you will find thin in the beefy breeds and beefy in the thin breaeds.  But I think his setter looks great, judging from all the setters i have known and owned.

ORIGINAL:  But I think his setter looks great, judging from all the setters i have known and owned.

 
Thanks Sandra.  I love the old pic of the Blue Belton!  Does that photo have a date?  I going to guess....'55
 
A Llewellin like Zoe is a Field Bred Setter but unique in the sense by bloodlines.  Llewellin Setters to qualify only carry within those 6 bloodlines that would make them a Llewellin.  Llewellin bloodlines due there popularity at that time dominated the Field Setter circuit and one will no doubt find many a Field Setter with Llewellin bloodlines running through although those dogs technically in an historic sense can not be classified as a Llewellin.
 
Zoe comes from one of the top Llewellin breeders in the country, and there are not many breeders doing this, just a handful.  These breeders carry on the Llewellin tradition by only breeding within those 6 bloodlines established by Richard Llewellin.
When these dogs arrived in America from England, the quickly established themselves as top competitors and the ones to beat
in field trial circuit.
 
There was a TV show some of you may have heard of called "Hunting with Hank" (outdoor life network).  Hank was (RIP) a Llewellin.  The sire of Hank was owned by a gentleman named Alfred King (Kings Llewellin Setters) out of Arkansas.  That sires name was Irish King Bondhu Ashly.  Ashly had the notoriety of being top stud dog in country (probably sired more Llewellin pups than any other) and the father of Hank.  Ashly is a grandfather to my Zoe and Hank would be an uncle!  Besides Ashly (modern day), Zoe lines goes back to some very historic dogs with champion bloodlines on both sire and dams side (Count Nobel and Gladstone lines).
 
 

Duchess was born in '57 and I think this picture was taken in about '60.  I think I told you once before that we once had a setter that looked very much like your Zoe.  We just thought he unusually heavily ticked and  "patched".  From even  short distance he looked black & gray.   I had no idea of the Llweleyn (?) stran of English setters til you told me about it.  Commander must have either been full blooded or had a lot of that strrain.  My Dad lost him to heart worm treatment when he was 12 or 13.  That was back in early 70-'s and first time we had ever heard of heart worms.  The treatment was arsenic.  he was blind a few hours after treatment and died short time later.  I sure wish I had a picture of him to post.  I am just lucky to have what pictures i do of some of my/our dogs from many years ago.

I think working type dogs remain naturally thin much longer.
 
Tasha & Wolfgang both attained their full weight by two years old. They both maintained that exact weight with no effort until they were five and a half. Since then we have to really watch their calories.
 
I keep Floyd a bit higher in weight than the show standard. It isn't uncommon for female Mali's to need to gain a few pounds before they can concieve. So, if Floyd were showing he'd weigh about 66 - 68 and in a just for fun house weighs between 70 and 74. My vet, who isn't very familiar with the breed, was a bit concerned when he dropped to 66 pounds. And he really did look scrawny rather than well muscled.

ORIGINAL: willowchow

He must not be that way with his vendors though.  Because I know a guy who runs a online pet food distrubution company and he's very fussy about who he deals with and what brands he carries.  I know he wouldn't put up with that kind of treatment.

 
Robert Abady is a wonderful person with wonderful products.  I am sure that he would be rude if he were treated that way but I and my friends who also use his products have had nothing but great experiences with him, his staff and his food.
 
Where else could you find the owner of a pet food company willing to stay late and meet with you (someone he doesn't know) because your dogs are refusing to eat their Timberwolf and the compay won't give you any information.  I know that I was not the only one having trouble with TWO at the time and I know that I wasn't the only person to call and question it yet I was told that they had no other complaints and that nothing changed and nothing was wrong with their food.
 
I called Abady one day after half of my dogs refused 3 different bags of TWO for 3 days (three different varities).  I had looked at Abady before but I was skeptical of it, it was expensive, weird and had those "evil by-products" in it.  However, I was at a point that I tried just about all of the good holistic type foods and the only thing that I found that did agree with my dogs was TWO as long as I supplemented it.  My dogs wouldn't eat, I really felt that something was wrong with this batch that I got in and he was my last option.
 
I called there and talked with a member of his staff, I told her what my situation was and asked her about a distributor near me.  She took my information and said she'd get back to me.  In less than a half hour Robert Abady called me, agreed that it didn't seem right that they would stop eating a food that they had been eating and offered to stay late and meet with me.  Off I went to Poughkeepsie. 
 
He was wonderful, he spent hours with me going over the foods that I had fed in the past, his different formulas, my individual dogs and their issues....he was great.  He and his staff were very welcoming and helpful. 
 
I finally left there taking along the food that he suggested for my dogs.  I was still skeptical of it, it sounds too good to be true.  My dogs won't need supplements?  My dogs who are according to their allergy tests are allergic to some of these ingredients won't be allergic to this food?  I'm not going to need to give my seniors NSAIDs anymore?  All itching, even normal everyday itching will stop?  This guy was nuts....but I tried my other options and this was my last thing before I went back to cooking for all of these guys (which I hated to do).
 
Normally he tells you to gradually switch foods over a week or two but I couldn't do that so my dogs got half Abady and half TWO in one meal and then all Abady the next.  Everyone was fine.  I was shocked but they all did well with the switch.
 
I have to tell you, they are all doing amazing on the Abady.  Everything that he said would happen has happend.  Since I switched my guys to this (both the dogs at my house and my co-owned dogs who live with other people) 3 other breeder friends have also switched to Abady.  Two did shortly after I did and one just started last week.  Of the 50+ dogs that have been on it for a while there have been absolutely no complaints at all.  Everyone is thriving on it, from puppies to seniors.  I haven't talked to the other girl who started last weekend so I don't know how her dogs are doing with itso far.
 
The reason that he doesn't put his ingredients on his website is that people will go and read the ingredients and not understand why he uses what he uses.  He prefers people to call there and get the information or to go to a store and talk to someone there.  He's not hiding his ingredients, he just wants people to be completely informed and know why there are by-products and what by-products are.
 
I think I read somewhere in this thread that someone questioned why waggintails.com took the ingredients off of their site?  That is because they had old ingredients on there and they were asked to update to the current ingredients.  I'm not sure if they just took them off and aren't going to put the current ones up but I had also looked at them on that site and asked someone at Abady about the corn in the one formula and she told me that they didn't use it anymore and they were having that company update the site.
 
As far as the food being expensive....you get what you pay for sometimes.  I feed mostly the Formula for Maint. and Stress along with his raw and it's more expensive than the TWO but I also don't have to supplement it or give out all of the medications that I used to give. 
 
My opinion is that it's a great company to deal with and a great food.  Maybe it's not for everyone but I haven't talked to anyone who has tried it and didn't stay with it.
 
Nickie

Hello, and welcome to idog.  I hope you'll share in other discussions as well as this one.

Hi Nickie,
Nice post!  Thanks for taking the time to write a nice piece on your experience in dealing with the company.  Glad to hear all the dogs are doing great!  As some of you may have already figured, I know Nickie from another group and mentioned her earlier in this thread.  I had invited her to take a look at this thread and if interested feel free to comment; and was inspired to do so by the negativity stemming from this phone call situation, the word which need not be repeated, and the hang up.  There is always the other side of the coin you don't often hear about and it is nice to see Nickie took the time to let you hear about the flip-slide.

I hope you'll share in other discussions as well as this one.

Me too []

So,Charlie and Nicki perhaps one of you could find out why Abady called a potential customer an A-hole and hung up on them? I would be interested to hear his side of it.

ORIGINAL: Edie  So,Charlie and Nicki perhaps one of you could find out why Abady called a potential customer an A-hole and hung up on them? I would be interested to hear his side of it.

 
OK, I'll take a shot at that question:  Picture in your mind you run a dog food business.  Someone calls you on the phone and makes believe they want to intelligently discuss ingredients, but then it come to surface he would rather get testy, proceed to discuss marketing strategy, and tell you how you should be running your business.  What do you do?  You would probably call him a word need not be repeated again and hang up on the clown.

ORIGINAL: glenmar

DS asked if it was customary to let folks know what was IN the food they were paying that kind of money for, and Abady called him an a$$hole and hung up on him.

So much for personality.

 
What does that sound like to you?  Sounds like somebody who wants to talk about marketing strategy, and Monday morning quarterbacking you on how to run your business.  That's how I would take it.  Maybe if he asked a question like how does the nutrient profile of chicken by-product meal compare to that of chicken meal he would get better response?

Actually it sounded to me like someone who wanted to know what was in the food before investing in it! I still would like to know why that is a huge deal.

And no, if I am dealing with a customer, even if they are being rude, and even if they are being downright aggressive, I will still be polite. If they are harassing me I will politely call the authorities. Other than that, there's never any call for rudeness in a professional situation. Heck, I don't believe there's ever a call for rudeness or vulgarity, but I've noticed I'm rather in the minority in that opinion these days.