Rescue puppy food recommendation

[cooldude12344]

We foster/rescued a golden retriever puppy at about 12 weeks that came to us with Giardia and roundworms. It took two rounds of treatment to get rid of both. We picked up a bag of purina pro plan puppy large breed when we rescued him and transitioned to Open Farm puppy w/ grains after that small bag was done (2-3 weeks later). He’s 5months now and doing well except occasional soft poops and experienced diarrhea during the transition (mostly likely because of his giardia treatment). We do bernies perfect poops and Native Probiotic to help with gut health. I feel like he has more sensitive stomach and I’m not sure if it is from the pathogens/medication or because he’s a puppy that puts everything in his mouth. He’s also developed a runny nose/sneezing in the last week and I’m now psyching myself out that all of this is the food, but it’s hard to connect the dots because he’s had so many giardia and deworming treatments.

Anyone experience immunity issue or developed late onset allergies with Open Farm?

 

[shagsnacks]

@cooldude12344 Talk to the vet. I think puppies have pretty sensitive digestive systems. My girl has issues with diarrhea at that age, she was on antibiotics, prebiotics, and a prescription Science Diet food for over a month. Slowly switched her back to Pro Plan and she’s been good ever since. Pro Plan can be pretty rich so it might not be a bad idea to switch to Purina One, Iams, Science Diet, or Royal Canin if everything else checks out.

 

[cooldude12344]

@shagsnacks He did well on PPP, but he wasn’t on any medication/treatment during that time and he was only eating it for 2-3 weeks so I think I might try it again and see if I notice any differences with his coat/digestion.

 

[zachary1215]

@cooldude12344 Mine had to go on perscription food after she had giardia. It messed up her system and I think she also had some underlying allergies that got worse. We put her on perscription hydrolyzed protein from the vet and it finally formed her poo and allowed her digestive tract to heal

 

[cooldude12344]

@zachary1215 This is good to know! His poops were amazing before starting any treatment (shockingly for have giardia and worms) and pretty good after all the treatment was finished, during the few weeks of multiple treatments they were pretty much liquid. But I just feel like any small change his tummy gets screwed up. We just gave him his heartworm medication two days ago and it gave him diarrhea exactly 12 hours after. I called the vet and we are doing a bland diet, but I might suggest a formula like the one you had help with the inconsistencies.

 

[zachary1215]

@cooldude12344 We did royal canin hydrolyzed protein (HP) but purina has one as well. Vet prescribed it. The protein is broken down so it’s much easier on their digestive system but also is used to rule out sensitivities/allergies.

The vet suspected my girl had an enflamed gi tract as well as a food sensitivities. She had diarrhea for months it was horrible. Did so many meds and re tested for giardia multiple times. The HP prescription food was a god send.

Now I switched her to a limited ingredient food with lamb and she does pretty well on it. Decent poops but not as firm as with the HP prescription diet

 

[sevilodorf]

@cooldude12344 It's unusual for a dog that young to develop food allergies AND food allergies are quite rare, especially when compared to environmental allergies.

That being said, Open Farm is a lower quality diet than Pro Plan you were originally on. They do not emply appropriate experts on staff, they do not conduct controlled feeding trials, they use a giant copacking facility to manufacture their diets giving them very little oversight of that process, and they conduct zero peer reviewed research.

There could be a million things going on causing the symptoms you're describing. I'd schedule a vet visit to discuss them and at that point also discuss which diet will be most appropriate going forward.

 

[cooldude12344]

@sevilodorf Good to know! I switched to open farm as a recommendation from many trainers since the ingredient list is good and I value sustainable sourcing so I wanted to move away from the big conglomerate brands with less transparency. He was at the vet two weeks ago and they said he looked good (minus the recent sneezing this week, which will probably go away but i’m a helicopter parent) but I always wonder if could be doing more since hes had to take a lot of medication as a young pup. Do you have any issues with the ingredient list of open farm? I might consider just switching back to purina to test if there’s a difference.

 

[mufudzi]

@cooldude12344 Hey just wanted to let you know! If you go to Purina website and look at the food you want to buy, press nutrition then whichever ingredient, it shows you where the product is sourced! Super cool and isn’t as well known it seems but you can track the ingredients )

An example: https://www.purina.com/dogs/shop/pr...edded-blend-lamb-rice-probiotics-dry-dog-food

 

[sevilodorf]

@cooldude12344 Unfortunately trainers do not have education in pet health and nutrition, and ingredients lists are not helpful ways to evaluate a diet. They don't tell you anything about the balance or nutrients, and many boutique diets know you read those and make sure they look pretty even if that comes at the expense of formulation

Open Farm has less transparency than they want you to think given the copacker they use, I think. I'm sorry your pup has had to take so much medication! I have a medical dog myself who always seems to need some specialist so I know the constant vet visits can be a big drain (I also deeply share your helicopter dog parent personality)

https://acvn.org/frequently-asked-questions/#ingredient

https://www.petdiets.com/Library/Pet-Foods/Ingredients

https://vetnutrition.tufts.edu/2016/06/why-you-shouldnt-judge-a-pet-food-by-its-ingredient-list/

https://vetnutrition.tufts.edu/2019/03/stop-reading-your-pet-food-ingredient-list/

https://www.feedingravendoodles.com/articles/how-to-read-a-pet-food-label

https://nutritionrvn.com/2020/08/22/decoding-pet-food-labels-part-2/

https://www.bestfriendsvet.com/library/nutrition-wt-management/how-to-read-a-pet-food-label/

 

[cooldude12344]

@sevilodorf Good to know about the balance might be off I’ll bring it up to my vet! Curious, Does the copacker have a bad history? I work for a company that uses a 3rd party manufacturer for food products so I’m familiar with the process and know you can still have high quality standard and lots of control- they list the exact manufacturer and all the 3rd party testing they do on sourced ingredients and each batch so I didn’t have concerns about quality initially but if there’s bad news about the manufacturer I’m super curious to dive into it!

 

[sevilodorf]

@cooldude12344 The issue is that in the pet industry, all veterinary experts recommend diets that do not use these copackers. All of the diets that are associated with dilated cardiomyopathy (Open Farm has at least one case confirmed on a grain free diet) use co-packers, in addition to not having experts on staff, and skipping feeding trials. It's a series of common denominators.

http://acvn.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/AAHA-Nutritional-Assessment-Guidelines.pdf

https://www.alltradesdvm.com/topics/nutrition/wsava-guidelines-explained

https://www.feedingravendoodles.com/articles/how-to-pick-a-pet-food-part-1

https://vetnutrition.tufts.edu/2019/12/pet-food-decisions-how-do-you-pick-your-pets-food/

https://vetnutrition.tufts.edu/2016/12/questions-you-should-be-asking-about-your-pets-food/

https://veterinarypartner.vin.com/default.aspx?pid=19239&id=8808771

https://www.petmd.com/cat/centers/nutrition/evr\_multi\_10\_questions\_for\_pet\_food\_manufacturers

https://nutritionrvn.com/2021/01/02/researching-pet-foods-what-to-look-for/

https://nutritionrvn.com/2021/07/27/not-all-kibble-is-made-equal/

https://yourvetwantsyoutoknow.com/choosing-a-pet-food/

 

[dgodshelp7]

@cooldude12344 My vet recommended me FortiFlora probiotic and it cleared up about 80% of his poops at that age. I no longer give him the probiotic because PPP SS&S comes with it in the food. Try FortiFlora packets on top of his food. I’m almost 100% sure it will clear up his gut.

 

[cooldude12344]

@dgodshelp7 Love it thanks for the recommendation!!