AboutMarie - Ask the Pet Nurse - pet food recipes Expertise Alternatives to Hill's RX dog foods ; Struvites in canines? ; Calcium oxalates, need a good home-cooked recipe?
Special diets for your dogs with liver and kindey problems. Just ask:
I would be glad to suggest a commerical food or home-cooking recipes;
Let me know your pet's health concerns.
No question is too small... I am here to help!
I will get back to you as quick as I can!
Pet Health and Wellness-------
***My comments and answers to your questions are not to be used "in lieu of" veterinarian's advise, diagnosis, or treatment.**
Experience Many Years in Pet Care and Health...
Own and Manage a Doggie Hotel, Also have been trained in Nutrition / Natural Choices for pets- Licensed Nurse for over 17 years
Organizations ***My comments and answers to your questions or any information in my articles is not to be used "in lieu of" veterinarian's advise, diagnosis, or treatment.**
Publications HOME Cooking recipes for pets with Kidney problems:
I have been working , along with the vet , on some HOME MADE feeding:
Let me know if you need help with home cooking:
Education/Credentials I have been working , along with the vet , on some HOME MADE feeding:
Let me know if you need help with home cooking:
Kidney failure / struvites / crystals
Calculi/Stones
(Urinary Tract Infections)
( my private e-mail is : mtnmom@gci.net)
Awards and Honors Licensed Nurse
Pet Chef for SoJo pet food and mixes...
Past/Present Clients Many clients for NuVET Plus Wafers/ supplements
- Many Clients at my dog boarding ranch
Question My male schnauzer age 7 had 3 stones removed from his penis along with being neutered due to prostate glad enlarged etc. in the first month or so he went from 14 lb.s to 18 and is holding at 18. They have him on Urinary SO (expensive though) and told me no other snacks. I was told that canned green beans would help him drop weight and be OK for him. If a dog has these types of stones can he eat popcorn, green beans, carrots? Thank you.
Answer Follow-up on Calcium Stones with Schnauzer boy.... ********
Did you try the recipe for Calcium ox stones?
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Hi Karen - Can you cook for your boy? You would need to cook up some dog food 1 x per week and freeze it: Here are some recipes for dogs with Calcium Ox Stones.... The Science Diet or Royal Canine food is full of junk fillers and makes the dogs gain weight, as you know!
So, try this : And Good luck MOM!!!
Here is a good recipe / you can try:
Also, a good supplement is a must when you cook your own dog food/
Try NuVET -
OH, DON'T buy "PET tabs" from the vet - **** ALL Sugar/ junk...
This recipe is for a Poodle with the same problems:
BEST wishes with this!
AMIE'S RECIPE AS OF May 14, 1999
Note: This has been designed specifically for Amie Hinchman-Wilcox, a 7 pound toy poodle with food allergies and a tendency to form calcium oxalate kidney stones.
It is included here to show the result of food testing and to include the recommendations of canine kidney specialists.
Do not use for your pet without consulting with your veterinarian. We KNOW it is not yet balanced, but it is where we are right now. I don't think it is just a superstition that chicken (or turkey) soup is good for you.
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This batch makes about six cups of food. (Turkey preparation instructions follow.)
6 cups Water (bottled spring)
1 cup Buckwheat groats (organic)
1 cup Turkey (cooked), finely minced and loosely packed (about 1/4 lb)
4 tablespoons Sunflower oil, cold pressed or a mix of Sunflower oil and turkey fat
1 1/2 teaspoon Bonemeal powder (calcium carbonate)
Turkey broth, homemade
Put all but the broth in a large pot and stir. Cook over medium heat until you smell the buckwheat. The mixture should be smooshy and most of the water absorbed.
Serve 3/4 cups slightly warmed food with
~ A slight amount of plain salt (salt, sodium silico-aluminate)
~ Several tablespoons of broth. Mix well.
~ One drop of echinacea (no alcohol)
~ One-half of a NuVET Plus Vitamin : just mix into food:
1/2 a NuVET 2 x Per day for your Sized Dog...
Order NuVET here from the Manufacturer: http://www.nuvet.com/81098
( use order code 81098 / tell them Maries sent you for a Special Diet / recipe ingredient.
A 60 count bottle is 39.00
A 90 count bottle is 55.00 ( ask for auto ship and get 15% OFF)
Amie -The POODLE , eats 2-3 times a day.
Notes:
~ I have also cooked a whole, organically grown chicken and a turkey breast. These take less time but I have to do it more often, so I prefer to cook a large turkey.
~ Joy of Cooking says ¼ lb of meat is equivalent to about ¾ cup packed, shredded meat. That is about 1 cup loosely filled cup. I haven't actually weighed a loosely filled cup of turkey.
~ Hill's u/d diet is 3.2% protein. The lab analysis of Amie's recipe showed 4.7% protein. I will reduce the proportion of protein a bit.
~ I had been making Amie's food with rendered turkey fat, skimmed from the freshly made broth, but it is acid-forming so I eliminated it. The UC Davis nutritionist said it wouldn't hurt to substitute the fat for the sunflower oil. It gives the food more flavor.
~ The original recipe included carrots. The "Animal Advocate" sent me info that said poodles don't do well eating carotene, and although he said it would be okay, I cut it out of the recipe to see if there was any effect.
~ I used to add 3 ribs of celery until I discovered that celery is oxalate-producing.
~ The original recipe included onions and garlic. The UC Davis nutritionist said onions cause Heinz body formation of erythrocytes (anemia), so I cut out onion and garlic.
Then vet Claudia Lewis said garlic has such good effects to try it. Amie loves garlic. If she shows any tendency toward anemia on her next tests, I will eliminate it.
Broccoli is good !
~ The Animal Advocate recommended including broccoli. Broccoli is not oxalate-forming. Amie loves broccoli.
PREPARING THE TURKEY
1 frozen Shelton turkey - the largest I can get
4 large cloves of garlic, coarsely chopped
About 3 gallons spring water
A 28 lb turkey yields at least 28 cups of finely minced turkey and about 28 cups of broth.
The Hard Way
Cut the turkey into parts and skin it. Discard the skin. Put the turkey parts into 2 large stock pots and cover with water. It takes about ½ hour to begin to simmer. After about an hour foam begins to form. Skim and discard. After the foam subsides, add the garlic. Simmer about 1 ½ - 2 hours total.
When cooked, remove the meat to a colander where the excess liquid and fat can drain into a collecting bowl. This liquid is put into a stock pot.
The Easy Way *******************************
Reserve the neck, gizzard, heart, etc. Roast the bird uncovered and unstuffed with some water in the pan. Cook 15 minutes per pound at 325 or until done. I baste it a few times and cover with foil when it is brown. Save the juices and the reserved parts for making broth.
Carefully remove the meat from bones and gristle. I prepare the meat as if it were for human consumption (omitting the icky, slimy parts). Put the bones into the broth and cook for about an hour.
Very finely mince the meat in an electric chopper/grinder and mix it all in a large bowl. It turns out that there is about 2/3 cups white meat to about 1/3 cup dark and about ½ teaspoon organ meats to make 1 lightly filled cup (or ¾ cup packed meat, which equals about ¼ lb). Each cup of meat is put in a freezer baggie and immediately frozen in a freezer ziplock bag. The broth is strained, pressing the vegetables to extract juice, then chilled.
The next day I skim the top of the broth to collect the turkey fat - discard it or save and freeze for use in the recipe, or save for your own use. Then I measure the broth (which is really a dense gelee) into 1 cup portions and freeze them in sandwich baggies in a ziplock freezer bag.
NEW DIET 10-26-00
Irene emailed me recommending Pat McKay's raw food diet (www.patmckay.com/).
Irene says her doberman with wobbly legs (like Amie's) saw quick results on this diet.
It seems to fly in the face of every bit of research I've found so far with the meat to carb ratio very high. The raw part seems to make such sense. Amie has been eating the turkey-groats diet with some steamed non-oxalate producing vegetables since 1997 and I've never felt that it was the best diet. It was the best we could come up with.
I feel I have to keep experimenting. I found Shelton's organically raised ground turkey at the natural food store and got Pat McKay's supplements. Her calcium is needed because "raw meat is very high in phosphorus and must have a balance of calcium and magnesium to be absorbed and utilized by the body." It was much easier to make food this way. Amie didn't scarf down the food like she would some sashimi-grade tuna, for example, but she ate. By morning common sense told me to abandon the high protein diet. I continued her custom diet using raw meat and Pat McKay's supplements. By the next day I returned to Amie's usual cooked turkey custom diet. She wasn't too interested in food at this point.
Pat McKay answered my request for information.
Here's what she said.
"You do not have to modify our diet for Amie's kidney stone condition. Unfortunately her problem is not unusual. We get requests for what to do about kidney stones on a daily basis.
Keeping the system acidic is very important. That's why we recommend feeding only meat and vegetables.
***************Grains are the main source of this problem*****
*****
The studies done on protein where done on cooked protein. Raw is totally different. Dogs and cats have a much more difficult time digesting and assimilating cooked foods of any kind. By nature they were not meant to eat cooked foods. For the past 20 years, I have seen only improvement by going raw and continuing to keep the protein high at 75%. You must also use our Calicum+Plus. It is the only calcium presently on the market that does not leave calcium deposits which convert to stones. Calcium carbonate is a man-made calcium that leaves deposits. Also you must have a complete line of vitamins, minerals and trace minerals. The body has to have balance."
I believe that Pat doesn't know that not all kidney stones are alike. Calcium oxalate stones are formed in an acidic system. I think this diet would be dangerous. I am interested in the raw aspect, though. Also, Amie's diet includes buckwheat groats. Buckwheat is a grass, not a grain. If I ever have another dog I surely will not feed it commercial food but I don't know what recipe I'd follow.
I would prefer to find a homemade recipe with fresh ingredients and no artificial additives. Easier said than done.
Ok, you can do some research and find more diets such as this one...
Just research and learn. I sure hope I have helped you start off your search for answers...
Marie Peppers LPN MA
Ask the Pet Nurse
mtnmom@gci.net
