The month of August is upon us again and traditionally, vet clinics have touted the importance of pet dental health by promoting dental services during this month. I find this amusing since the importance of dental health is not just for the one month per year. I did a little digging.  Guess what I found? The Australian Dental Association (people, not pets this time) also promote the importance of dental health during the month of August. It seems we vets have jumped on the human dentists’ bandwagon… Dental Health Week, which takes place in the first full week of August, is the Australian Dental Association’s major annual oral health promotion event. Its aim is to educate Australians about the importance of maintaining good oral health in every aspect of their lives. The Importance of Oral Health I strongly agree that the importance of a healthy mouth cannot be overstated.  Pets are no different from people here. The beginning of poor dental health is the beginning of decline for so many of our pet cats and dogs. Sadly, many pet owners see bad breath or brown teeth as a ‘natural aging sign’ of their pets and do not treat it as the serious health issue that it is. We have always maintained that the best way to care for your pet’s teeth is to feed them a fresh food diet with raw meaty bones. The high carbohydrate content of processed dry foods actually sticks to the teeth.  This creates the perfect environment for the bacteria that cause tartar to grow and form their protective biofilm. Fresh food with a need for chewing reduces the ability of these bacteria to bind to the teeth and gums. But what to do if your dog does not tolerate raw bones? Or your cat just refuses to eat anything other than kibble. We know that not all pets happily eat the ideal diet. And although we can sit and advise you to just ‘wait it out’ or keep on trying those bones, there are just some pets who cannot and these pets need some other form of help. Our recommendations So, what products […]

The fundamental reason you shouldn’t feed kibble to a cat. We’ve all been there haven’t we? Stuck in the aisle of the pet food store trying to choose the best quality food for our furry felines. They sleep there on the couch all day looking for all the world like an angelic fluffy cushion, but at dinner time (or 5am breakfast time) the inner hunter emerges and they demand what they want. And if we don’t have their ideal meal planned that day, they let us know about it. So here we are again, staring at rows upon rows of meals for cats,.  Trying desperately to reconcile the taste demands of our ‘Lord and Master’ with our desire to feed them food that will keep them well. Being influenced by our budget, and that nagging doubt you’ll never find the ‘best food’ anyway. Does it even exist? Well I’m here to tell you that if you are looking on the shelves of the pet food store, then no. You are not going to find the ‘best food’.  Because we all intrinsically know that good quality, fresh and wholesome food is not found in a bag or a can in the long-life storage area of the store. Real food goes off. Fresh food needs to be chilled or frozen. Fresh food is not ‘convenient’. Why do cats need fresh food? Our furry feline friends are highly evolved as master hunters. They are obligate carnivores who are so successful in their hunting prowess that they have discarded all other nutritional adaptive measures that would mean they can eat a varied diet. They are finely tuned to eat a diet consisting of small animals, several times per day. These might be mice, rats, lizards, rabbits, frogs, insects and birds and yes, they do eat the gut contents of small prey. They do not eat vegetables, grains or grass. This evolutionary elitism means that cats are designed to eat raw diets, raw meat, organs, bones, skin and feathers. Unlike dogs who have adapted to living with humans and eating their food, cats have done […]

Eat your greens! I was asked the other day, three times in a row during busy morning consults, how to feed vegetables to a dog. Each time I was a little baffled by the question… Just cook or blitz them for your pooch! But by the third consult, I realise that this is obviously a topic that perplexes many of our clients. And so, here it is. What vegetables should I feed my dog? There are some vegetables that are best served cooked for your dog.  These are all of the starchy vegies, such as potato, pumpkin, sweet potato and carrots. The starches are easier to digest once they have been cooked. And then if that cooked starch has been left to cool, it becomes even more beneficial to those ever-important gut bugs by converting into ‘resistant starch’ which is essentially a prebiotic form of starch, or fibre. There are also some dogs that will have trouble digesting the brassica vegetables and will show this in the form of tummy pain, gas or even loose stools. The brassica family include broccoli, cabbage, brussels sprouts, cauliflower. All other vegetables are best served raw.  Although they do need to be finely chopped, grated or better yet, blitzed in a food processor to be easily digested. How do I prepare vegetables for my dog? So how do I prepare vegetables for my Bonsai Wolfhound, Ash? You all know that I am a time poor, working parent running a family business. I’d like to say that I have the time to dedicate to preparing each meal for my precious furry family member each night but in all honesty, she’s lucky if I remember to feed her… and the kids… Apparently they need feeding every day too – at least according to the school they do…. So, to make it easy for myself! I prepare a large batch of vegetables for Ash on a weekly or fortnightly basis. I buy the ‘Winter Veg’ snap frozen bag of vegies from the supermarket and blanch these in boiling water until just cooked. Drain and mash with a […]