Any vets or dog breeders here?

[The Goat]

I've got an American bulldog pup, male. He's 12 weeks, 24 pounds or so. I'm looking for a good food for the little guy.

As of right now he's on purina large breed which is 28% protein, only about 60% of that is digestable. He's really packing on muscle: but I'm against all the fillers and literal crap/poisons in this food.

I have a bag of blue buffalo for large breed which I'm thinking of moistening with goats milk or evapoorated milk/water/yolk...

Another option is the blue buffalo wilderness which us 42% protein 90% of which is digestable.

I'm concerned that ultra high protein will affect his bone muscle growth and cause health issues by him growing too fast...

And no I'm not one of those crazy people who worries about every litle thing. He gets meat daily and 3 marshmallows for treats. But holistic healthy food is actually cheaper per pound than the big brands and everything is human grade.

Opinions on foods? All dog owners chime in with type, size, and food.

The only food I'm against is science diet... It has too much corn and bone meal in it.

Otherwise, shoot!

[seadoo650]

We used to feed our Rott. Diamond from one of the local feed stores. Not priced too bad. After talking to our vet and alot of locals who have hunting dogs, they all said it was actually really good food. The vet also said stuff like Iams and all the other expensive crap but with the Diamond you're not paying for the Big name and advertising built into the price.

[piroguedog]

The older I get the more I hate artificial crap. I don't know anything about the Blue Buffalos, but if its natural, priced OK, made in the USA, Oh, and if the dog will eat it, and it doesnt give him the drizzeling shits, i'd like to check it out. I have had dogs all my life and fed everything from scraps to ProPlan. For the last few years, I have fed Dog Chow. It was one of the few that never got recalled and it is alot cheaper than ProPlan. If left to their own resources, dogs will eat grass when needed, and entire animals fresh or ripely stanky. Ive seen my dogs eat entire ducks, bones, bills, meat, guts and feathers. Thats what they do in the wild. here's some interesting info I found online. I'm gonna check into those white buffalos. LOL (blue buffalo)


"the best ratios for a healthy dog's diet are about 40% meat, 50% veggies, and only about 10% grain or other carbohydrate. The best grains for dogs (when used in the proper percentages) are rolled oats, barley, quinoa, millet, and brown rice. Avoid pet foods that use chemical preservatives BHA, BHT and Ethoxyquin. Vitamin E & vitamin C are great preservatives that are much better for your dog. To be able to market a food as "human-grade" the food has to be run through a series of trials and tests that AAFC officiates. If the food does not pass ALL of these tests and trials it is actually illegal to put the term "human-grade" on the bag.) "

[piroguedog]

http://www.thepetfoodlist.com/petfoods_pg1.htm

[The Goat]

Sweet guys.

Yeah blue buffalo is about a dollar a pound, but dogs don't have to eat as much because it's nearly completely digestable.

No corn. It's barley, chicken, carrots, cow roast, and real prtein. Also contains pills full of fish oil, vitamin c, and some other vitamins.

No bone meal, no euthanized animals, no rotten corn, no hormones to make up for all the bad stuff... Generally good food.

Any other dog owners?

[The Goat]

I'd just like to say that I've founda great food.

Before Grain.... buffalo.

Now it is expensive as all hell, but there is a catch. On the last trip we went on, the dog only ate 4-5 cups over a 3 day period. His growth continued as normal and he didn't lose any mass. It is near 85% digestable...he's a 80 pounds and craps the same size of a 4 pound toy dog does.

The food is a very premium food, dogs seems to really like the taste, I'm going to blend that and Blue Buffalo from now on as the Before Grain contains zero grain, and the BB contains barley and other good stuff.


Once again, I can't stress this enough though...yeah it's 50 bucks for a 20-30 pound bag...but they eat a third compared to the normal food. Your pets are healthier and so is your lawn....and your wallet.

[ATC-Eric]

Wow thats awesome growth!

Might go checkin into that buffalo stuff. Im getting a Boxer within the next few weeks.

If your still concerned about anything to do with the breed, heres one of the bulldog forums I found on a quick search:

http://www.bulldogbreeds.com/


And there are more out there. Talking to other same breed persons on a massive scale can be benificial.

Post some pics!

[Thorpe]

I have a purebred shiba inu. They are a little finicky about their protien sources, and I wont feed him any of the cheapo crap. We feed him Nutrisource, the lamb and rice formula... Works really well for him. its about 35 bucks for a 40 lbs bag... We had tried many foods before we came up with this one... Came by recommendation of the breeder...

[The Goat]

this here was the day I got the little guy, first thing I had to do was make sure he wasn't gun shy...broke him in with the .22. He slept through the majority of it.

http://i73.photobucket.com/albums/i211/roundheya/babylou.jpg

he still does this exact same stretch...only problem is now, if he's between you and the wall in bed when he does it...he will push you across the bed.

http://i73.photobucket.com/albums/i211/roundheya/Picture055.jpg

this is at about 5 months... 50 pounds or so at this point

http://i73.photobucket.com/albums/i211/roundheya/mouthopeningrass.jpg

Don't have any recent pics as I had to get a new phone and I lost a ton of pics.

He's easily 85 pounds... and at nearly 7.5 months he's got about a year left of growing. He has a great temperament the majority of the time...he just takes offense at the most random persons. Doesn't like anyone being loud by the car when he's in it, and doesn't like anyone approaching my window.

I've only seen him actually growl at 3 people and actually be serious, a little boy who kept screaming "I LOVE DOGS" at the top of his lungs in the hallway at a hotel, a housekeeper who was speaking very loudly outside of the room, and one of my mom's elderly friends (who I don't particularly like either). There was something he didn't like about all three and he was on a leash each time. I think the fact he was unable to remove himself from the situation had a lot to do with it along with the fact he'd been on a road trip for a while.

He does love to scare the hell out of my cousin though, likes to run up teeth bared mouth wide open, and then slobber all over him.... he's much too goofy to ever hurt anything. We had a video of him running up to an opossum to play, only to have it hiss at him, he got this strangely indignant look on his face stood there for a second and walked off.

So far he's great with kids, as long as they realize he's clumsy as all hell and bumps into everything. Loves other pets, even the cousin's cat who constantly scratches his nose up.


I'd certainly recommend the breed, but they are DEFINITELY a handful at times. He's not fond of baths, and thinks that drying him off is play time. I'm no slouch, but he can and will pull away from you if you aren't careful. I usually just lift him up to dry him so he can squirm all he wants but not pull me around. Playing in the yard the other day, I tried to block him with my foot, seriously underestimated what an 85 pound dog running 25mph would feel like when it collided, and spent the next few days limping.



His diet consists of two buttered biscuits in the morning along with a deli meat of some type. He munches on the Blue Buffalo here and there throughout the day. When I get in he gets one small honey bun, provided he has behaved, a handful of almonds and a natural peanut butter on wheat sandwich. Then he eats a half a bowl of his food with a light dosing of olive oil.

If whatever I'm eating isn't heavily seasoned, he can also have that. The only corn products he's allowed to have is fresh corn on the cob when we boil crawfish, he loves it and can't get enough of it. Other than that, I try to keep him away from anything with seasoning in it, while treating him with the above stuff from time to time. I don't feed him ANY cooked bones of any kind...mainly on principle more than anything else.

I would also advise getting a prescription for Comfortis (a flea stopper) as most fleas are becoming immune to Frontline. If you really want to avoid any chance of fleas, then use a soap free shampoo... the comfortis will stay in the oils in his skin, and a soap free shampoo won't remove them.

Eric, before purchasing your boxer try to get xrays of the parent's hips... they are VERY prone to hip issues.

I'll try to get some new pics of the little guy tomorrow after a bath.

ps...yes I'm crazy when it comes to my dog, but he's like the kid I hope to not have for ten years. lol

[joshco84]

hey of all the dog foods out there, plain iams is probably about the best.

We feed the mini chunks. it is the same adult food, but in smaller pieces and dogs love it. We are feeding hunt test and field trial labs on it and they do great. Keep good energy throughout the day and is way better than any other "regular" dog food. Also another nice thing about it is the dog poop shrivels up and goes away really nicely. I have two dogs, and never pick up poop in the yard. I mow the yard once weekly and rarely ever run over a stinky turd, and if i do, its usually fairly fresh.


I have heard good things about diamond and some others, but you have to remember one thing. If you are feeding a dog super high protein food, it usually comes with really high carbs as well. You need to be working that out of the dog in excersize or they will get fat as hell.

Good luck with your dog, we really like the iams and it is in the dollar/pound range. My uncle is a pro-trainer, and everything gets and stays with iams as long as the dog does good on it.

On a side note, if iams doesnt seem like its working well for the dogs, we feed nutro from tractor supply. It seems to be more stomach friendly for dogs with finicky stomachs.

[ATC-Eric]

Man thats a good lookin dog goat!










Eric, before purchasing your boxer try to get xrays of the parent's hips... they are VERY prone to hip issues.





Everything seems to check out. Parents are checked out and healthy (hips and all) , pups come with a health guarentee, so I feel good.

Really excited, gonna be 3 weeks before she's ready though, CANT WAIT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[The Goat]

your new boxer pup will look exactly the same for the first few months, all my pups looked the same.

are you planning on getting the ears nipped? brindle or fawn? flashy or not?

my boxers were a little smarter, and a little less energetic than Louis is... they were just easier to train honestly because they didn't have his size until later on. They also had a much higher threshold for pain, you accidentally step on a foot and they didn't care, Louis gets PISSED.

Josh, unfortunately my dog doesn't do very well with processed corn...he looks like a salad shooter, so iams is a no go for him. But most hiprotein foods are actually very LOW carb as they are lacking grains, or they consist of whole grains rather than sugary corn. I supplement that lack of carbs with all kinds of little things. His dog food merely adds consistency to his diet as he takes in about a third of his calories from prepared/raw foods.

[ATC-Eric]

your new boxer pup will look exactly the same for the first few months, all my pups looked the same.

are you planning on getting the ears nipped? brindle or fawn? flashy or not?

my boxers were a little smarter, and a little less energetic than Louis is... they were just easier to train honestly because they didn't have his size until later on. They also had a much higher threshold for pain, you accidentally step on a foot and they didn't care, Louis gets PISSED.



No ear cropping. We did that with 2 of our boxers growing up, and I just dont feel like putting another dog through that. My brother adopted a boxer last year, and we like him just fine with the natural ears.

I searched out a Flashy Fawn. Was gonna go brindle for a bit, then decided I wanted a flashy girl.

Less energetic then another dog?! Our boxers always did have calm time, but Ive never seen another dog, even when they get older go crazy like a boxer.

Ive always loved the breed.



I actually almost went American Bulldog right before our 2nd to last boxer. Good lookin dogs for sure.

[brapp]

wanan talk abotu hyper my black lab is goign on 5 years and is 3 times mor ehyper then his 2 yea rold son lol

[The Goat]

which is why I picked your dog up over the head to scare him so he'd stop jumping on me lol

140lb lab going "LET ME DOWN!!!!!"