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Posts tagged ‘halo’

Food and Poop!

(I have this on my kitchen wall for Wes to refer to, if I am away)

Boogie has been eating The Honest Kitchen for about 1 1/2 years now. I alternate between most of the formulas: Force, Embark, Keen, Thrive ... but stick mostly to Keen because:

Boogie does better with grains in his food and Keen has oats.
Keen is cheaper than the other formulas
Keen takes the shortest amount of time to absorb water and firm-up. The other formulas, with the exception of Force, stay “soupy/liquid” for a longer time.
Keen produces the least amount of poop (Will elaborate on this, later! :))

We have had no issues with The Honest Kitchen at all. He has been doing really well on it (compared to previous foods that made him throw up) but I am still always on the lookout for other brands that are of the same high quality as THK . I don’t want to become totally dependent on one brand and its limited range of protein choices. I am also always trying to give Boogie some variety in his diet.

Lately I have been mixing in some HALO’s Spot’s Stew .

I first read about HALO on Tracie Hotchner’s blog.

See THIS post, and Tracie’s reply in the comments:

Halo’s Spot’s Stew is now the only kibble my dogs are going to get because I learned that they use only meat that is fit for human consumption in their dry and canned foods. You can’t get better than that! It is also a high protein kibble at 33% but the vital fact is the origin of that protein. You don’t really know what is being counted as protein in foods with much higher protein levels (EVO being one). Remember that melamine AND the wheat gluten which it polluted were both being counted in a total protein percentage when neither was really bio-available to the dogs digestive system. So don’t be sure of what exactly caused it when your dog has a bad reaction to a food – just avoid it! As for The Honest Kitchen, my dogs have been eating it for years as 1/3 of their meal. As large dogs, I have always given 1/3 of the meal as kibble but now I can feel really good about it! And Halo has joined me as a website sponsor – along with THK – so you’ll be keeping it all “in the family.”

70/30 THK Keen + Halo, with Perfect Form & Ultra Oil

Our local pet store doesn’t sell HALO kibble so I am starting him off with the canned stuff.

I mix it in with THK – maybe 30 – 50%, and Boogie loves it and we have had no problems. So far he has tried the Chicken, Salmon and Lamb. One thing I notice is that when I feed mostly Halo (approx. 80%) Boogie’s poop is harder, darker and sometimes “pebbly” – perhaps a sign of constipation? I wonder if this is because there is lower water and fiber content in the Halo canned food than in THK? Boogie doesn’t drink much water to begin with. (He’s a strange dog)

Speaking of poop…

I think most THK people are already aware that this food produces a HUGE amount of poop compared to other brands. Which can be a little scary at first. For my friend Christa, whose Emma is incontinent and wears a diaper, the poop issue is more problematic. Here’s a little list that Christa and I came up with after comparing our THK “feeding and pooping” notes.

The Honest Kitchen POOP CHART. Yes, I am a crazy dog person.