It’s so surprising how much this little girl can eat! I think our little Lexi would eat 24/7 if we let her, but what’s really amazing is that I don’t think there’s anything she doesn’t like.

Most dogs don’t enjoy leafy green veggies, but she just loves baby spinach leaves! She was begging for them today when I was cooking. And the other day, I brought home some beets and they were in the shopping bag on the kitchen floor, and she started chewing on the beet greens hanging out of the bag! Such a riot!

Outside today, Lexi peed then was sitting at the pine tree by the door. I noticed her and it looked like she was pooing or peeing again. Her leg was kind of “up”.

Then I realized that she was sitting down and her right leg was hurt. I immediately picked her up and held her for a bit. When I put her down she seemed to be alright. She was running around chasing her ball just like usual.

I don’t know what was up but I hope it was just a one time thing and not a problem like with Mindy.

Updated from article dated Jun 13, 2009

This is so strange. I haven’t been happy with any of the other kibble choices, I was using the rest of a leftover bag of California Natural and some samples of Nature’s Variety Instinct, but I really wanted EVO….so yesterday I bought a bag. Guess what! The size of the kibble is small again. I compared it to the original smaller sized samples I saved, and they match!

And now I am wondering if I was right all along, and they messed up on a batch of food. I wish I noted the expiration date of the bag I returned, to compare. I guess I assumed that since Heather said they changed the processing, it was a permanent change. Unless of course, I have a bag that was processed before the change. I don’t know. But thankfully, this bag will last a long time, so we’ll see what happens when I have to purchase again months from now.

Oh I came so close to giving up on the RAW food diet for Lexi. She is my little Rat Terrier, about 10 lbs and 8 months old.

She was having trouble with her poop. Ha! What else is new!? It seems like that is the main struggle when feeding RAW. Trying to find a balance to make normal looking poop! Well her poop was on the soft side and many times had a gel jelly goopy coating.

I know there is a certain time period of “detox” when the body can weep and poop can be covered in that gel. But we’ve been on RAW for a couple of months now, so she should be over that. I was getting even more frustrated because she was regressing in housebreak training as well. Pooping in the house, sometimes right after she pooped outside. She even peed on our comforter one evening when she got excited and jumped up on the bed. eeek. That one was my fault though. I should have known better and taken her outside BEFORE bringing her upstairs to the bedroom.

My husband was ready to kill me (not literally!) and he was getting very frustrated as well. He kept telling me to stop, that it was the RAW food making her sick!

I really really didn’t want to stop feeding RAW to Lexi. In a million years, I never thought I would be feeding RAW in the first place, and now that I am, I am finding it very easy. And both my Ratties love eating it! Their fur is gorgeous too!

Mindy (my 4 year old Rat Terrier, 15 lbs) is doing just fine on it. Her poops are solid and small. Everything seemed to be agreeing with her.

After some deep thought, I decided to just feed RAW, with no supplements (fish oil, kelp) or eggs, sardines, etc.

I realized that it was me who wasn’t being consistent! When her poo was doing well, I would deviate from the normal, and start adding all the other ingredients and supplements, and she would get overloaded again. I wasn’t keeping good track of what was working and what wasn’t.

So, now I am just feeding her a portion of Bravo RAW twice daily and a small beef or marrow bone in the evening. That seems to be working. Today her poop was well formed and solid. No more jelly gel. Yay!

I will keep this up for another week or so, and then see what I can do to start adding a tiny small amount of the fish oil.

(note: the fish oil I am feeding is the Concentrated oil from Seapet – I have been giving Mindy 10 drops (which equals 1/4 tsp) and Lexi about half that amount)

I am happy, my husband is happy, and hopefully we can get her housetraining back on track. Things are going to get better! yay!

Found a whole mess o’ Pet themed podcasts over at www.petliferadio.com

I am starting out with the Wynn With Dogs podcast. The latest episode #15 includes an interview with a wonderful holistic health expert and author of The Healing Art of Pet Parenthood, Nadine M. Rosin. I follow her on Twitter and she’s awesome. Looking forward to hearing the show. I downloaded and it’s ready for my drive to work tomorrow!

Updated once again…2009-08-11
Updated 2009-06-15 read below!

Even though I feed RAW food to my two dogs, I still like having a bag of EVO Small Bites. I sometimes give it for a quick breakfast meal and I use it for training treats.

I like it because the pieces are very small, and since Lexi is under 10 lbs, small is good.

Well, I just opened a new package of EVO Small Bites this morning and was surprised that they looked larger. I still had a few pieces from the last bag, so I compared the two sizes. The pieces in the new bag were DOUBLED in size of the previous bag.
What is going on?

Here’s a photo for comparison (note: the depth of each bite is still the same, even though the larger piece looks thicker in the photo, it’s really not)

I am going to try to contact them today to see what their explanation is. If this is the new size, then I am very disappointed. It’s not small enough!

Update 2009-06-15: I phoned Natura Pet, I spoke to Heather; I explained my problem.

She went on to say that they have a new processing system now and that it allows the pieces to retain their full size. She said that before pieces were breaking down in transit (to the stores) and therefor causing a lot of crumbs in the bag. She said that EVO was their toughest product to make since there were no grains. The pieces were very hard and crumbled easy.

She asked me to compare the size of the new pieces to the example on the bag. At first they did look comparable, and it sounded reasonable. I asked if I could return the bag, and she answered of course.

I hung up, and then I compared the old pieces I had to the bag example photo, and they seemed just a tiny tad bit smaller. On a second look, the new pieces were indeed a little larger than the example on the bag. Some pieces were a lot larger than the example.

I redialed Natura, and Heather answered again.

Same story, she said there was nothing wrong, and the pieces now are the way they are supposed to be. She suggested that I return the bag and try to find one that was a different expiration that might have the older size.

Okay, update #2. I just looked at pieces from an older bag of California Natural Small Bites and they match the size of the larger EVO small bites….so maybe Heather was right all along! Oops, my bad. I guess I am being too picky!

Maybe I will keep the bag and just break them in half before giving them out. Oh well! I am now remembering why I always liked the EVO better for feeding and training. They were always smaller than the California Natural. Truthfully, I didn’t even realize the California Natural was Small Bites until I looked at the bag label.

I guess "small" is relative!

UPDATE 2009-08-11: This is so strange. I haven’t been happy with any of the other kibble choices, I was using the rest of a leftover bag of California Natural and some samples of Nature’s Variety Instinct, but I really wanted EVO….so yesterday I bought a bag. Guess what! The size of the kibble is small again. I compared it to the original smaller sized samples I saved, and they match!

And now I am wondering if I was right all along, and they messed up on the size of a batch of food. I have no idea!

Unfortunately, I didn’t blog too much about Lexi’s spay operation. Not sure why. I guess I was just too busy (?)

Anyway, the operation went well. I dropped her off in the morning and got a phone call mid morning that she was out of surgery and in recovery. Phew. Everything went well.

We picked her up at around 5:30 that evening, and I held her in my arms for the drive home. She was in good shape, not at all how I expected. If I remember correctly, Mindy had that “skinny” dog look and smelled sort of like a hospital. Lexi looked very well!

They said that she should be acting normal by tomorrow, along with eating, peeing and pooing normally. I was to give her a light meal tonight.

They gave us a “cone” to use just in case she wanted to lick the incision. It was a new type of cone that I had never seen before. Tabs hold it together on the side, while there’s loops on top that her normal collar goes through; the collar and cone go over her head, and then the collar is fastened. It worked very well, she got used to it fairly quickly. But unfortunately, by the following week, she figured out a way to chew on the tabs that run along the vertical side of the collar. I tried fixing it, and moving it toward the top of her head, but it was impossible to get her to not stop chewing on the plastic tabs. So, I took it off, and she was fine. No problems with the stitches.

Keeping her quiet for the past two weeks was a challenge, but truthfully not as difficult as I thought. I kept her in her crate most of the time, giving her a chew bone or allowing her to sleep. I did allow her to occasionally walk up and down the stairs, and she did try to run around herself a few times. But for the most part, I carried her on the stairs and around the house to make sure she wasn’t too active.

I didn’t bring her to training class last week, I decided to go by myself so we wouldn’t miss anything. I think she would have been fine if I brought her, since it’s such a low impact class, but it’s probably for the best that I didn’t. We took her to class last night, and she did okay, but she was a little off, and skiddish. She wasn’t herself, she was acting scared. I ended up holding her for the last few minutes. I think she was a bit tired from all the sudden activity.

But when we got home, I allowed her to roam free with us, while we watched TV downstairs. She played a little with Mindy, chewed on old bones, and tore apart a fluffy toy.

I can’t wait for her stitches to be out today. I am hoping everything will be okay and she’ll get the ‘go ahead’ to go back to normal again!

So, Nutro decided to “voluntarily” recall some of their cat food products but in the meantime, dogs are still sick and dying from their dog food.

They state the recall on the cat food was due to a mixup on the levels of two minerals:

Franklin, Tennessee (May 21, 2009) — Today, Nutro Products announced a voluntary recall of select varieties of NUTRO® NATURAL CHOICE® COMPLETE CARE® Dry Cat Foods and NUTRO® MAX® Cat Dry Foods with “Best If Used By Dates” between May 12, 2010 and August 22, 2010. The cat food is being voluntarily recalled in the United States and ten additional countries. This recall is due to incorrect levels of zinc and potassium in our finished product resulting from a production error by a US-based premix supplier.

Two mineral premixes were affected. One premix contained excessive levels of zinc and under-supplemented potassium. The second premix under-supplemented potassium. Both zinc and potassium are essential nutrients for cats and are added as nutritional supplements to NUTRO® dry cat food.

This issue was identified during an audit of our documentation from the supplier. An extensive review confirmed that only these two premixes were affected. This recall does not affect any NUTRO® dog food products, wet dog or cat food, or dog and cat treats.

Affected product was distributed to retail customers in all 50 states, as well as to customers in Canada, Mexico, Japan, Korea, Thailand, Malaysia, Singapore, Indonesia, and Israel. We are working with all of our distributors and retail customers, in both the US and internationally, to ensure that the recalled products are not on store shelves. These products should not be sold or distributed further.

Consumers who have purchased affected product should immediately discontinue feeding the product to their cats, and switch to another product with a balanced nutritional profile. While we have received no consumer complaints related to this issue, cat owners should monitor their cat for symptoms, including a reduction in appetite or refusal of food, weight loss, vomiting or diarrhea. If your cat is experiencing health issues or is pregnant, please contact your veterinarian.

Consumers who have purchased product affected by this voluntary recall should return it to their retailer for a full refund or exchange for another NUTRO® dry cat food product. Cat owners who have more questions about the recall should call 1-800-833-5330 between the hours 8:00 AM to 4:30 PM CST

They stated that they received no consumer complaints related to this issue, ha! hmm, but did they receive complaints regarding other issues?

Why pet guardians are still trusting them is beyond me! It just makes me crazy and angry! I think the only way to really put them out of business is to just stop buying their products! Stop!!!!! Just stop!

Lexi is scheduled for her spay surgery next Friday. I had learned previously that it’s best to stop fish oil 7-10 days before surgery, because of the anti-clotting properties. I stopped giving it the other day.

I also just realized that it’s better to stop Vitamin E as well, for the same reasons, so I will stop that as well. I am continuing to give a 1/4 tsp of probiotic powder once or twice daily.

It’s okay to start giving fish oil again 7-10 days after surgery.

Mindy (one of our Rat Terriers) and I had a wonderful day yesterday.

I try to spend extra special time with just her, especially since Lexi (our 6 mo Rat Terrier puppy) appears to be the bossy queen of the house. We start each morning with her sitting on my lap while I work on my laptop in the home office. There’s not a lot of room for her 15 pound body on my lap, but we don’t mind.

Lately, Mindy has seemed sort of sad; perhaps it was the new addition of the puppy, perhaps it’s do to Lexi being so bossy and fresh. I try not to let Mindy feel neglected; I was initially hesitant to get a new puppy for fear that we would ignore Mindy in favor of the new puppy, but it’s been the opposite. I have never appreciated or loved Mindy more!

It was so good to see her running around outside yesterday morning. She grabbed the leash and was racing in circles around the yard. She was acting like her old self, almost like a puppy!

Yesterday after work, I wanted to shoot some photos in the yard, so the two of us went out and sat in the front yard. She was good as gold, just breathing in the fresh air, watching me shoot photos. I swear I think she could sit outside for days, as long as she had the sun and grass!

Besides the flowers, I tried taking a few shots of Mindy, but she didn’t like looking into the camera for some reason. But I did manage to take a few fun snaps.

Later on, Mike and I took both Lexi and Mindy outside, and played fetch. Lexi ended up stealing the ball and teasing Mindy with it. Mindy tried to chase her, but Lexi was too fast for her. I don’t think I laughed that hard in weeks! It’s wonderful to finally be through with winter. Spring and summer are going to be awesome this year!