Sam at 9 weeks

From the time Sam was really little, he seemed not to have a big appetite. Sometimes he would eat. Sometimes he wouldn’t really eat much. And sometimes he wouldn’t eat at all. It drove me nuts because it was really stressful to have my puppy not eating!

Then when he was about eight months old he started having a lot of symptoms that were brought on by a bad response to his food. He has a sensitive stomach and it seems that he has an allergy to foods with chicken in it. And I was feeding him stuff that was supposed to be really good food.

Sam at 8 months

So I tried to figure out what food would work for him. I switched to another food that is high quality and didn’t cause him to have gastrointestinal distress, but he didn’t seem to like it. I know that now. At the time I thought he was just not that sometimes he was just not that interested in eating much. That was until I put some other food in front of him. Then I was shocked.

I was babysitting Chloe (Luke’s littermate) and she was getting some different kibble than my boys as well as this reconstituted wet food. Hmmmmmm. Seemed interesting, so I stole a little bit of the juice and put it on the doodles regular food. They wolfed (or woofed!) it down. And little Chloe was missing her mom and feeling a bit out of sorts and she didn’t eat her food for a day or so. Just to see what the doods thought of her food, I gave her leftovers to the boys. They absolutely wolfed that down, too.

Well, that was all I needed to see. I did a little research and then the very next day I was on the road finding the food the doodles would eat, the food they seemed to love!

First the kibble: Blue Buffalo Basics Salmon & Potato Dog Food. It’s made for dogs that have food sensitivites. You can get this at Petco, for sure. Not sure what other pet stores may carry this, but if for some reason you have trouble finding it, you certainly can order it from Amazon. I put a link below, too.

For the wet food: Sojos Complete Beef Dog Food. Now, this stuff is cool. I bought the 8 lb. bag, and considering that this food is freeze-dried when you get it, that’s a significant amount. I put some on top of the boys’ food morning and night. I would guess we go through somewhere between 2/3 cup to 1 cup per day total for both dogs. At that rate the food lasted 8 weeks, almost exactly. We got to a couple of days over 8 weeks, and would have had more to go if I’d been more diligent about picking up the leftovers and putting them in the fridge. Even so, 8 weeks for an 8 lb bag for two dogs.Not bad! It’s easy and the boys love it. Hard to ask for more than that!

Of course, I do mix in other things the doodles like a few times per week. They live for broccoli and a number of other vegetables. So I’ll make some veggies for them or use leftovers, as long as they are steamed only. They also get cottage cheese or yogurt on their food a couple of times a week. And a new favorite is scrambled egg mixed in. Oh, man, do they love scrambled egg!

Speaking of which…they finished off their breakfast and are ready to go for some playtime. We’ll see you soon!