In another thread I described the fact that my new rescue (16 days) Kitty, has been throwing up bile about once a day in the afternoon. It probably is that she has an empty stomach. Here is my feeding problem:

We have an 11 year old Lab that eats Purina Beneful. I have argued with my significent other that the food is junk, but she argues that the dog is on a vegetarian type diet and is doing wonderfully well for an 11 year old dog. I argue that many dogs seemingly do well on junk food, but her longevity is assuredly being impacted in a negative way.

I chose Nutro Natural Wellness for the Grey based on a big sales pitch at Petsmart by a Nutro rep. Although she would eat nothing for the first three days she was with us, when she finally started to eat, she was seemingly ravenous, and would be waiting for more. I noticed that if the other dog leaves some scraps of Beneful, she leaves her own food to eat it. When we bring out the feed dishes she always seems to want to get to the Beneful, but not the Nutro. Recently, she started leaving her meal half eaten. This morning, she would not even eat. The Lab left no scraps for her in her bowl, so the Grey's choice was simply not to eat anything.

We decided to mix some Beneful with the Nutro, but that didn't fool her - she simply ate around the Nutro, and consumed all of the Beneful.

I have no idea why her attraction to the low end type of food - perhaps its analgous to chosing between a Snickers bar and eating your spinnich!

I guess my question is this: What are some high-end, nutritious foods that I might try that would be so similar to Beneful in taste/smell that she would be interested.

As an aside, I have a full report on her from her three months in the SCAL prison system, and one of the comments is that she is an enthusiastic eater, so her issue is not that she does not like to eat. She apparently just doesn't like to eat Nutro.

I guess on this round, I will buy a rather small bag rather than winding up with a big bag of expensive uneaten food. Thanks for your input.

Also, I know that there must be a zillion threads on food, but perhaps not one on this exact situation.

I wouldn't add extra stress by changing her to a food she doesn't like. My opinion would be to keep her on the Beneful, which she truly enjoys and in a little while you could always add a small am't of home cooked foods or a tablespoon of healthy canned food

How is Purina Beneful a vegetarian-type diet?

You might try sample packets of various foods when they are available to see if she likes any of them, but I kind of agree, that at her age, if she's doing well, she ought to be able to eat what she enjoys. That's what I intend to do when I'm her age!

Candidly I don't know, I'm just quoting my significent other, the owner of the lab. I guess because she sees things like corn as the main ingredient which according to everything I read is not good. Understand, the issue is not with the Lab. She can eat Beneful forever as far as I'm concerned, but I worry about my new 5 year old Greyhound, and in the scoring of dog foods that leads this section of the board, Beneful scores a grade of F, and seems to be the lowest scoring food of all those listed.

My guys love Diamond Naturals senior kibble. They prefer it to any other brands I've brought home, and it is more affordable than most, decent ingredients, too. Might be worth trying a small bag just for taste testing purposes?

Before Soul's recent health issues he did really well on Taste of the Wild Pacific Stream. Grain free for his Lupus.

Zella refused to eat Nutro almost from the start, maybe after a week. If Kitty doesn't like the Nutro try something else, doesn't necessarily have to be vegetarian. There are so many foods that you may just have to experiment until you find one that works. Natural Balance is a high end food that has a vegetarian formula if you decide to stick with that formula.

If the 11 year old Lab is doing well on Beneful let her be. Her health and willingness to eat are more important than a random rating.

You can definitely return the rest of that bag of uneaten Nutro. There's almost always a nutro rep at our petsmart too. it wasn't a success here either,so it defintely could just be the kibble choice.

There's lots of really greyt choices out there with a range of prices. If you're looking for an option to Beneful for any reason,Solid Gold is one that makes a very good quality,good assortment of kibble,and it's easy to find.
I do agree with you that there are better quality foods then Beneful,for your lab as well.
The thing is,with labs,they generally have really great appetites! it can be hard to tell whether you need to,or just should switch foods!

Foods that I would try that are comparable in price are

Kirklands (sold exclusively at Costco)
Diamond Naturals
Canidae (might be a bit more expensive)
Eagle Pack (probably more expensive than Nutro)
Chicken Soup for the Pet Lover's Soul

I will say that I think Beneful tastes like candy to them- I think of it as eating junk food


Having given those suggestions, I will say that my dogs are raw fed and very healthy. I have helped many friends find foods for their pups though and they have had good success with the above mentioned foods.

One thing I would suggest is to try to add a bit of water to her kibble... softens it up, makes it smell a bit more and makes it easier to eat all in one.

If that doesn't work, I would suggest trying the Kirkland stuff. Both of mine are on their chicken, vegetable and rice and they have firm stools, barely any gas and (for the most part) good coats (we have to add a bit of oil to Dexter's as he's prone to dandruff). Plus it's pretty smelly stuff so it might work for her.

Can you talk your SO about trying to switch the Lab to Nutro for a bit to see if it's just food jealousy? Maybe try feeding the two of them in separate rooms as well?

Our best selling foods at our store are Diamond products.

Diamond Naturals are corn free...Lamb and Rice is our biggest seller and alot of Canidae customers around here are now using this.

http://www.diamondpet.com/products/diamond_naturals/

Chicken Soup Pet Foods I fed my greys for years until my non-grey's allergies showed up-then I tried and tried a zillion foods to find one that worked for everybody and didn't cost a fortune.

http://www.chickensoupforthepetloverssoul.com/

I was always very happy with this dog food and only stopped using it because Hogan couldn't tolerate it.

The new line from Diamond is there grain free, and the Pacific Stream is what I currently feed all the pups and have fed for almost a year now with great results.

http://www.tasteofthewildpetfood.com/

FWIW, my greys never did that great on Nutro either.

I made my list of all of the foods rated A+ in the list on this forum. I also noted that Canidae seems to be very popular according to the poll, so I just bought a small 5 pound bag of that to see how it works out.

I'm pleased to report that I removed the un eaten Nutro with a cup and half of Lamb Canidae (unfortunately, the most expensive of their choices), and she ate it with the enthusiasm that I reserve for eating a Nutrageous candy bar after lunch!

Beneful has a lot of sugar, as well as sorbitol etc. in it-- literally, it IS like eating junk food. Dogs love the taste because of the sweetness and saltiness. (Just like my elementary students would very happily eat a snickers bar instead of a healthy snack or doG forbid, a sandwich on whole wheat!)

My inlaws feed it to their dane (though it gives her awful runny stools and she loses lots of weight), and when she comes over, I switch her to a different food. In part, because she looks so bad and needs more weight (most of the foods we feed are higher calorie), but also because my guys LOVE the beneful, but it does NOT love them. It's not worth a vet visit for the diarrhea with lots of blood that results if the manage to get ahold of it.

Because it's so enticing, it may be hard to get her to want something else. You might want to pick another food (some really good ones were mentioned) and add something appealing (and healthy) like green tripe. It stinks, but boy do they love it! Even my in laws' dane LOVES it.

I figured that was the case with Beniful. In that the lab will eat anything, we are going to switch her to Canidae with the hound.

An exaggeration perhaps, but not entirely inaccurate.

From their website: Beneful Original ingredients:

Ground yellow corn, chicken by-product meal, corn gluten meal, whole wheat flour, animal fat preserved with mixed-tocopherols (form of Vitamin E), rice flour, beef, soy flour, sugar, sorbitol, tricalcium phosphate, water, salt...

Vegetable matter: Corn, corn gluten, flour, flour, flour, sugar, and sorbitol.

Animal products: Chicken, animal fat, beef

That's too much vegetable matter for a dog, IMO.

We switched from Canidae to the Kirkland chicken and got soft poops but the Kirkland Lamb has been great!

Canidae was a great food, but it was starting to get VERY costly, and wasnt really agreeing with her anymore.

I'll have to second what BlackandBrindle said -- have you considered raw feeding?

I'm not sure I know what you mean by "raw feeding." Do you mean canned food?

Feeding uncooked, raw meat and (certain types) of bone. In other words, purchasing a flat of chicken parts at the local grocery store and then, against every single word of wisdom you've ever heard about not feeding your dog chicken bones, giving them a drumstick.

Cooked bones are a strict, absolute no-no. Uncooked poultry bones are safe.

Interesting, thanks. I'll look into that if my current effort fails, but right now she seems to be enthusiastically consuming the Canidae.