Food, chewies, toys...

[Chelle]

Well, I continue my quest to get everything ready for Bella's homecoming on Saturday.

The breeder has her on Royal Canin MINI Puppy 33. I found some at Petsmart and picked up a bag, but is this a decent food that I should keep her on? The last time I owned a dog it was Eukanuba or Science Diet that was considered the 'good stuff'. There's so many more out there now 'adays.. not sure what's what

What is the current recommendation on rawhide - yea or nay? Or, does it really depend on the dog? I remember I couldn't give it to my Bull Terrier because she'd always gag herself trying to swallow it.

And Greenies... I though I heard something awhile back that they were causing problems with dogs' digestive systems.. but I still see them everywhere.

I also bought a Baby Kong, a small chew rope.. is there anything else that we shouldn't be without?

Thanks for your invaluable advice!

[Cathy Moon]

Royal Canin is a good food, as is Innova, Innova Evo, California Natural, Wellness, Solid Gold and others. Eukanuba and Science Diet are mediocre now - I remember when Eukanuba was 'good' too!

I don't give my pups greenies or rawhide. I do give them bully sticks, but only when I'm keeping an eye on them.

The kong is a necessity, also get the kong 'ball' that you can put kibble into. They roll it around on the floor to get the kibble out. Another nice chew toy is the nylabone little wishbone - the clear one you can see through or the butterscotch colored one. My pups used to love to chew those.

Stuffed animals with squeakies inside are nice for playing and cuddling. The Pet Stages toys are my favorites for puppies!

Ohhhh, just talking about this makes me want a puppy! Enjoy your little Bella!!

[judy]

I avoid rawhides and greenies for the reasons you mention. Usually they won't cause any harm, but there are so many other things that don't have the known risk, i don't find it necessary to use them. For chewing exercise, zack loves things like ropes and rubber and heavy cloth. He chews those to his heart's content and always has. He especially likes if there is something that squeaks involved. I don't use food for chewing exercise but i did when he was younger. I stopped because he found those more tasty than his kibble so he would just chew on them and try to get pieces off to swallow rather than eat his kibble.

I do give him a carrot stick a day and he consumes those very slowly, over 24 hours, he will gradually eat one up, but he likes gnawing on them. What i used to give him to chew before i stopped using food chews were bully sticks (do you know what those are? ), dental chews, edible nylabones (lamb and rice), booda bones, hooves, and bleached white dry femur bones. He loved those. someone at the pet store said puppies could break their teeth on those white bleached bones, and when i heard the cracking noise he made while chewing them, i put them away.

something that i got when i first got Zack that was useful was a soft fabric covered bag containing rice (i think). I would heat it in the microwave for 2 or 3 minutes and it would stay warm for hours, i'd put it in his crate when i went to bed at night.

About dog food, read Laura Lang's page on the subject.

http://www.roycroftcavaliers.com/manualfeeding.htm

I have heard from numerous sources whose beliefs make sense to me that regular kibble is more healthy for puppies than puppy food--puppies eat the same diet as adults by nature, and puppy food, some say, lacks the right balance for their proper development, causing their bones to grow at a faster rate than other tissue, with possible musculo-skeletal health problems possibly resulting.

Many people on these forums, people who care a lot about what they are feeding their dogs, feed Royal Canin kibble. I've fed it to Zack at different times. The kibble i settled on for a while was California Natural Lamb and Rice, he used to eat that regularly. Then, i tried Innova Evo and he seemed to like that much better than all the other kibbles, so for many months i've been feeding him Innova Evo. It's different from the other kibbles, it's got almost twice the protein and has no grain, and there are some who believe this is more healthy for a dog, having some of the health benefits of a raw diet. As you noticed, there are so many choices, and many of them are of high quality.

I would recommend staying away from dog foods whose ingredients are not fit for human consumption. I will look for that on a bag of food or treats. A certain level of dog food, less desirable imo, uses meat ingredients that are the rejects from human meat processing, sick or toxic animals, I think that Science Diet and Eukanuba are in this category

If you enjoy cooking or have a knack for it, you can combine home cooking with the kibble, you will find lots of info on that subject on cavaliertalk.

back on the subject of toys, there are so many wonderful choices. One of Zack's first favorite toys were the Doctor Noys Toys, which are very sturdy little furry cloth animals, small for a puppy's mouth, with little squeakers in them. They come with extra squeakers in case your dog wears out the squeaker, they have velcro opening where you can replace a dead squeaker.

how fun to be getting ready for a puppy!

[Cathy T]

I remember when Eukanuba was "the" food to feed your dog. Now it's considered mediocre. I feed CA Natural. It helped with Jake's sensitive tummy. I also remember when every dog had a rawhide and that was a staple. I also don't give rawhide. Jake (always Jake isn't it?!) used to throw them up. I also don't give greenies because of the chance of obstruction. Shelby is a gobbler and would poop out her greenie 24 hours later in 2 big chunks . Kind of defeated the purpose of them, which was to chew and clean the teeth.

Toys....oh my...where to start. My guys have pretty much every kind of toy out there. Jake's current favorite is a petstages toy from Petco, it's the Orka Chew toy. He just loves it and I love that it's something he can safely chew on. Shelby's favorites any stuffed animal. She has one (a Cavalier, of course) that's about 3/4 her size. She loves to fling it around and lay on top it, chewing it's ears.

I no longer give bleached bones. We had a veterinary dentist speak at our club and one of the things he said is that these bones are the most prevelant cause of broken teeth.

[merlinsmum]

Good luck for Saturday! My baby comes home on Friday and I think Lisa T's baby comes home Monday - 3 new mums all at once!

[Lisa_T]

She certainly does! I *sigh* have decided to call the pup Chloe. She looks like a Chloe with that demure little face and her streak of mischief. That's final. I'm not telling my friends. I'm not telling my parents. They can just learn to live with it.

Hmm. And it's closer to 'Claret' than anything else without the carrot effect.

[Cathy Moon]

Ohhh, I LOVE the name Chloe! (And Zoe and Cleo!)

Just wanted to throw in my 2 cents worth about a few chew toys I would NOT recommend.

First, booda bones - my pups chewed and broke off pieces, swallowed them and barfed them up.

Next, edible nylabones - Geordie bit off a chunk that was so jagged I almost died looking at it thinking about the damage it could do!

Last, bleached bones - Geordie made the most God-awful cracking noises when chewing on it that I was sure he broke off or cracked a tooth I sort of freaked out and quickly got it away from him!

Also, never leave a pup unsupervised with a rope toy or anything that could result in the pup swallowing a string, which is extremely dangerous.

As far as puppy food goes, our breeder told us NOT to feed our Cav babies puppy food - feed Royal Canin Adult 27. Then my best lifelong dog mentor, the lady who owned the kennel I always used for my maltese mix, told us to feed the babies puppy food. Then our vet told us to feed them puppy food. I think we gave in to the pressure and fed them one bag of Royal Canin puppy food, then we gradually switched them back to the high quality adult foods, like California Natural and Wellness. Nothing bad happened - they are all normal sized Cavs. Now we feed them Innova Evo.

[Karlin]

I like Royal Canin but wouldn't feed puppy food. A lot of breeders say this just makes them grow more quickly and perhaps too quickly for optimal bone growth. Eukanuba and Science Diet now would be considered so-so foods but with a lot of junk ingredients and mediocre protein sources. I remember when Iams and Eukanuba were THE designer dog foods!

I feed both Greenies (which continue to have vet recommendations) and some types of rawhide. Both always under supervision and because I have three dogs that do not chew off chunks or gulp. They adore Greenies. It is important to get the right size (petite is right for most cavaliers). My mom gets the even smaller size for her smaller cavalier.

I like the rawhide rectangles as they are least likely to enable the dogs to end up with a hunk (eg the tied end of one of those bone things). I throw rawhides away when they get down to a smallish piece. Rory's mom worked in a vet's and is studying at UCD vet school and has noted in the past that the vets at her practice all said rawhides were fine and that they'd seen few problems with them. I'd be more worried about stuffed toys with my three as they like to destuff them and Lily likes to chew socks so really have to watch to be sure she doesn;t get hold of and swallow them.

Mine like booda bones and the edible nylabones and have had no problems with those, even when they do break off chunks they chew them up. A lot depends on the chew habits of your own dog I think.

The Orka toys are really popular here; I have two or three of them. Also love the Wubba from www.helpingudders.com. When little Jaspar loved (and didn't destroy!) stuffed toys.

[Ginger's Mom]

Chelle, I love your websites (both you and your pup's)! You do look like a real cool geek! I admire the work you do... Seems real cool... Love all those systems you've built..
I'm getting my puppy in about 2 weeks as well. There is so much to think about and prepare, and it is honestly too fun!
Thanks for posting all these questions because your questions are exactly my questions as well!
Congrats

[Chelle]

You ladies are the best, thank you so much for the tips/advice!

I think I'm just about ready for our baby! One more trip to Petsmart should do it, and I took a walk around our backyard, made sure there was nothing laying around she could choke on, checked the integrity of the fencing, no gaps or holes that a little puppy can squeeze out of...

My cat absconded with the nylabone I bought for Bella, I keep finding it in various parts of the house

Lisa_T - Chloe is a beautiful name - love it!

RubyTuesday - thank you very much!