The Best Food for Your Pet
March 31, 2023
What Nutritionists Wish You Knew: 5 Homecooked Diet Mistakes & Misconceptions
A common task of a Board Certified Veterinary Nutritionist® is to design custom homemade diet recipes for pets that have health issues or for pet owners who prefer not to use commercial foods. We’ve covered some general mistakes that pet owners often make with homecooked diets when they don’t work with a veterinary nutritionist, as well as some situations where cooking for your pet may not be optimal. In this post, I’d like to focus on misconceptions and mistakes about homecooked diets that my colleagues and I frequently run into with our clients – pet owners who get their recipes from a veterinary nutritionist. These issues tend to come up after the consultation, when our clients receive the completed recipe and start cooking. These misconceptions often cause frustration for nutritionist and pet owner alike. Equating volume of food with calories – after a homemade recipe is created for a pet, it is common to have the pet owner question the volume amount of the food because it looks like less or more than they expected it to be, often based on the pet’s previous diet. There may be the perception that there isn’t enough food, but more frequently, the concern is about too much food. Homemade diets are formulated to provide the amount of calories that the nutritionist feels is appropriate for the pet, either based on the pet’s diet history, or on published equations. Nutritionists are trained to think in terms of calories, not volume, and so the volume of the food rarely comes into consideration during the formulation process unless it seems particularly high. Pet owners, on the other hand, tend to think about food in terms of volume, not calories. Especially for pets that were previously fed dry diets, many owners are surprised by the amount of…
March 6, 2023
What’s the Best Diet for Dogs with Chronic Diarrhea?
Chronic diarrhea is one of the most frustrating medical conditions for both dog owners and veterinarians (and especially for us veterinary nutritionists!) However, while it can be challenging to find the optimal diet for a dog with chronic diarrhea, it’s worth the extra effort!
February 7, 2023
Diet-associated dilated cardiomyopathy: The cause is not yet known but it hasn’t gone away
A new FDA update provides more information on diet-associated dilated cardiomyopathy (DCM). While the specific cause is not yet known, the problem hasn’t gone away
December 19, 2022
Too hot? Too cold? Keeping your pet’s food temperature just right
What’s the best food temperature to keep your cat eating well? A new study provides some answers.
September 19, 2022
“Preservative-Free” Pet Food?
Preservatives are essential ingredients in some forms of pet foods but they are surrounded by a great deal of misinformation.
June 27, 2022
Test your Nutrition Know-How for Cats with Kidney Disease
How confident are you in your knowledge of how to best feed cats with chronic kidney disease? Take our quiz to find out whether your confidence is well-placed!
May 17, 2022
Comparing kitty’s calorie costs
The type of your cat food – wet, dry, fresh, or raw – not to mention the brand, can make a dramatic differences in what you will pay to feed your cat. We compare daily and yearly costs for different food types for a theor
April 4, 2022
Think Your Pet has a Food Allergy? Eliminating Mistakes in Elimination Diet Trials
Although food allergies are uncommon in dogs and cats, the only way to diagnose them is with an elimination diet trial. Learn tips to avoid common mistakes and to plan a successful elimination diet trial.
March 21, 2022
Expensive eats? Comparing the costs of different types of dog food
Pet food costs are particularly relevant right now, when the costs of many consumer goods have increased rapidly in the last year, leaving many of us paying more for our food as well as that for our pets. The form of the food fed – dry, wet, fresh, or raw – can have dramatic effects on the cost of feeding. We compare the costs of feeding some popular diets of each type for a day and a year for a medium-large dog.
January 31, 2022
Growth Guide: Keeping your Puppy on the Right Track
Growing puppies have very specific nutritional requirements that are different from those of adult dogs. Too much food can result in too fast growth, which can have lifelong consequences, especially for larger breed dogs. Using a growth chart can get (and keep) your pup’s growth on track.
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