Gillbox I don't cook every day for my dogs. I do large batches of food once or twice a week, then portion it out into plastic containers which I then label and freeze. I defrost them in the microwave. The only exception is when they have srambled eggs. When we go away for a weekend I take frozen containers with me in an insulated bag and if necessary defrost them in hot water.

Its possible that your dog is intolerant to not only grain but the meat products your are feeding her. My dogs were weaned on Royal Canin which also produced soft poos etc. One of my two were also scratching an unusual amount. I put him on Burns Lamb and Rice and he was a lot better but I had trouble keeping weight on him. Finally after trying Nature Diet etc I got him tested. He is intolerant of Pork, chicken, beef, most grains. I put him on Orijen (expensive ) and he never looked back. His poos are well formed and he and his brother have thrived on it.

The other day we were at a friends and he snaffled a rawhide chew ... oh boy did he suffer later in spite of only having had it for about 10 minutes.

When you change food you need to do it very gradually mixing the old with new over the course of a couple of weeks and then give the new food a couple of months to see any huge change .... although when I changed to the Orijen 6 Fish which is a whole prey food, I noticed a difference within 24 hours.

I'm sure you'll know all the above but another cause of loose poo can be over feeding.

Good luck.

I have been careful to introduce new stuff slowly
Thanks for the advice everyone.
Can anyone recommend a wet food that's not got chunky veg in it?

Hi Gillbox,

We have used Natures Instinct which is a ready made good quality frozen raw food, contains meat, veg and ground bone. The veg is pureed so doesn't come out as it went in.

With the Arden Grange was it wet or dry you tried?

Hi, Jenny. I have heard good things about Orijen, as well. If I had a small breed or a medium breed, I might give it a try. But Jade is 55 pounds and Nigredo is a growing 62 lbs and it's too expensive.

But just as a note... they really charge a LOT for that dog food... it's ridiculous! It costs more than EVO, which is ridiculously expensive. Oh, well.

It's also sold only at VERY special shops here, not even the large pet chain shops sell it as it's manufactured in Canada... so they like for people not to buy it.

Hi,

We've been on James Wellbeloved dry for years-- switched to it when our sadly now gone dog, Laszlo, developed epilepsy, and food without corn or soy was recommended by lots of folks on dog forums like this one. They all love it (I've tasted it myself; it's quite nice) so we are sticking with it. It's their main food, every day.

That said, they do get treats, and the favourites of the younger ones are apples and carrots! I haven't tried parsnips, but I'd bet they'd like them too. I suspect it's the sweetness. I detect no extra farting or bad poops, unless Taji has more than three apples-- then it's likely to be a four-in-the-morning RUN to the canal where he can explode. We have learned to put the apples where he cannot reach them.

So I think fruit and veggies are just fine-- in moderation. Dogs are generally brilliant digesters, but you have to evaluate your own. Cabbagy stuff I would tend to avoid, but carroty or harder fruity things seem more or less OK. Peas-- yes! Frozen ones can be really fun as a treat, or for a teething puppy. Sweetcorn-- probably best to avoid it, as dogs can't digest it, much though they might like its sweet taste.

That made me smile. When I was about 7yrs old I tasted our dog's food. Ruffchops, a mongrel, fed on PAL (which older members might recall 'prolongs active life' lol) I have never tasted anything so DISGUSTING since! But it looked like lovely meat and rich brown gravy like you'd find in a pie lol!

Amazes me sometimes when I read all the stuff about 'feeding' dogs now and recall those old mongrels that lived to be 20 in some cases and were fed on PAL (if they were lucky!) I don't even recall dog biscuits back then. And quite a few GSDs who lived long healthy lives fed on Chappie (which was quite highly recommended back then - I seem to recall it came out well in the Which report of the time).

My own GSDs used to get a huge tin of Chappie and the equivalent volume of Winalot biscuits and everything left over from our own meals (didn't have many leftovers with 3 blokes in the house mind you!) and cooked bones in abundance - in fact, back then, I only recall being told that you should never give a dog 'chicken bones' and no other advice about them - i.e. whether they should be raw or cooked. As most bones given to dogs back then were the bones of whatever had been the sunday roast - obviously they were cooked.

I don't feed my dog like that now but I do still wonder how on earth dogs survived healthy old ages back then in the 50s, 60s and thereabouts. Same as I wonder how all the street dogs here in Cyprus look so fit and healthy when NO ONE gives a thought to their dietary requirements and they eat what they can scavenge or is chucked to them.

The dog we had in the 50's was fed on PAL and Winalot biscuits - and the woman across the road used to bring over the [cooked] bone from their Sunday joint each week. She was a mongrel from Battersea Dogs Home - probably around 18 months to 2 years old when we got her, and she must have been about 18 years or older when she had to be pts.

My dog is raw fed and to keep her weight down her first meal is mostly vegetables - either lightly steamed or grated. The only things that sometimes go through her are undigested bits of the skin of raw sweet red peppers which she has as a treat.

I remember when I was young and we had a GSD and he was fed on chappie and thrived and winalot biscuits too, he loved them and my mum used to get massive bones from the butchers that he used to share with our little cat. Guess who got the big end lol