Saturday this 'n' that, with coffee
Dec. 12th, 2009 09:53 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
ksmithSunny outside. Could hit the 30s, which means the ground could defrost and the Season of Muddy Footprints in the House would resume. I'm ashamed of the state of my kitchen floor at the moment, but there's nothing to be done about it until a drought hits.
Spoke with the specialist vet yesterday. Gaby's allergy panel results came in--actually they had come in on Tuesday and vet had phoned, but I missed that call--and the results were kind of surprising. No reactions to beef or chicken, two things which I felt sure she would react to. Corn, milk, wheat, turkey, lamb, all OK. Venison, OK. What things did she show a reaction to? A very low level reaction to peas. Low level reactions to rabbit, yeast, potato (white, I assume), barley, and duck, which she happens to be eating now. Her strongest reaction was to oats.
The Natural Balance venison and sweet potato food I had been feeding her did contain potato starch as, iirc, the third ingredient. The Eagle Pack Power Formula that she ate for almost a year contained brewer's yeast. King's EP Natural Formula, which I fed her for the first few weeks I had her, contains oats. Thing is, she's been eating Evanger's Duck & Sweet Potato, with added white rice and probiotics and 5 mg pepcid 2x a day, for a couple of weeks and she has frankly never looked better or been more energetic. Her coat even feels silkier, and I don't think it's my imagination--her coat always felt rough and looked rather dull, which always bothered me. So. Vet doesn't believe we should try to switch to something like a lamb-based food now when she seems to be doing well. The Liquid Gold Allergy test that Gaby had has helped some dogs and not helped others, and is controversial. It's possible that whatever reaction she may be experiencing to the duck is being handled by the pepcid. It's also possible that she ate something outside that torqued her, and we're blaming the food. Or it may be that she simply has a sensitive gut, and will go off her food every so often no matter what we do and need to be switched. At least we still have some room to maneuver, protein-wise.
Vet almost died from the laughing when I told her that I caught Gaby eating the dirt from underneath the bird feeder, which was full of seed husks and who knows what else. She said that she's a young dog and she's going to continue to do young dog stuff, including eating the dirt under the bird feeder and drinking out of the birdbath and all those other things that make you tear out your hair. You can't watch them 24/7.
Right now, she's standing beside me with her head in my lap, trying to get my attention. Now she's standing on the edge of the chair. Now she's bugging King. I think I need to feed her.
Spoke with the specialist vet yesterday. Gaby's allergy panel results came in--actually they had come in on Tuesday and vet had phoned, but I missed that call--and the results were kind of surprising. No reactions to beef or chicken, two things which I felt sure she would react to. Corn, milk, wheat, turkey, lamb, all OK. Venison, OK. What things did she show a reaction to? A very low level reaction to peas. Low level reactions to rabbit, yeast, potato (white, I assume), barley, and duck, which she happens to be eating now. Her strongest reaction was to oats.
The Natural Balance venison and sweet potato food I had been feeding her did contain potato starch as, iirc, the third ingredient. The Eagle Pack Power Formula that she ate for almost a year contained brewer's yeast. King's EP Natural Formula, which I fed her for the first few weeks I had her, contains oats. Thing is, she's been eating Evanger's Duck & Sweet Potato, with added white rice and probiotics and 5 mg pepcid 2x a day, for a couple of weeks and she has frankly never looked better or been more energetic. Her coat even feels silkier, and I don't think it's my imagination--her coat always felt rough and looked rather dull, which always bothered me. So. Vet doesn't believe we should try to switch to something like a lamb-based food now when she seems to be doing well. The Liquid Gold Allergy test that Gaby had has helped some dogs and not helped others, and is controversial. It's possible that whatever reaction she may be experiencing to the duck is being handled by the pepcid. It's also possible that she ate something outside that torqued her, and we're blaming the food. Or it may be that she simply has a sensitive gut, and will go off her food every so often no matter what we do and need to be switched. At least we still have some room to maneuver, protein-wise.
Vet almost died from the laughing when I told her that I caught Gaby eating the dirt from underneath the bird feeder, which was full of seed husks and who knows what else. She said that she's a young dog and she's going to continue to do young dog stuff, including eating the dirt under the bird feeder and drinking out of the birdbath and all those other things that make you tear out your hair. You can't watch them 24/7.
Right now, she's standing beside me with her head in my lap, trying to get my attention. Now she's standing on the edge of the chair. Now she's bugging King. I think I need to feed her.
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Date: 2009-12-12 04:11 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-12-12 10:14 pm (UTC)