What do you guys think about sardines for your fur babies?
 

I was thinking to add sardines into Chloe's diet for Omega 3's, and I looked around YT and noticed a lot of posts about sardines being good for them. How often can you give sardines, is it okay daily or only a few times a week? I would like to add it to her home cooked recipe.

I feed sardines as snacks occasionally. They eat about a 1-2" piece. I would be careful with the fat. I think it's better to just use a fish oil rather than throw off her home cooked diet proportions. If you're getting a diet from PetDiets you can ask her for a fish oil dose for chloe.

Would you say it is okay to add any type of fish to her over-all recipe or just sticking with chicken and using the fish oil is better?

I spoke to Dr. Remillard and it seems her diet is very similar to the one that I use from BalanceIt so I haven't decided to make the switch yet. Is there any specific difference between the PetDiets and BalanceIt recipes?

I used the EZ Generator on BalanceIt to add the fish but if you think I should just stick with chicken, I'll take that advice.

For the carbs - I know that Chloe doesn't like peas or digest them that well so I have these options left: white/sweet potato, brown rice, whole wheat macaroni or couscous. Chloe isn't crazy about potatoes and I think rice makes her constipated so right now best option I think would be either whole wheat macaroni or couscous.. do you like the couscous for yorkies?

I've been cooking for a few months now but I still haven't found the *perfect* diet for her yet but I think in these few months I did notice what she likes best and doesn't like/also what she digests better. So now I basically have in my recipe: Chicken, Carrots, Green Beans and Zucchini. For the carbs it's couscous. For the oil I have Olive Oil. What do you think about this? From my conclusions, those veggies and combinations work best for her but it all depends on if this diet sounds reasonable. She also does well with Red Pepper and Celery but I probably won't add that unless you think these are better than the veggies I chose.

The only thing that I have for debate is wether to use Nordic Naturals or to add something like sardines to the overall diet.

I forgot to add that I have alternated Coconut Oil and Fish oil for her recipes. The sardines just came to mind if they are a better substitute to fish oil.

I look forward to hearing your opinion on this! :)

Zoey doesn't like sardines...try adding squash. She loves that....its a sweet vegetable..

Oh
 

I use Nordic naturals

In general, fish is great for dogs! A lean, easy to digest protein source. As far as giving sardines often...I think my only concern would be the salt content and the oil. So, I'd probably give them occasionally and then supplement with fish oil like you're already doing. I like Ark Naturals Royal Coat bc it already has the extra Vit E in it, which is needed to process the omegas.

I have a concern about the diet you're feeding. Is Olive Oil the only oil you are adding?

I think it all sounds fine to use couscous or macaroni (although I would not use whole wheat - I would use regular enriched durum semolina like Barilla's mini bow ties or shells or ditalini).

The chicken part -- is it dark meat or white meat chicken?

I'm not a huge fan of green beans. I use a veggie mix of carrots, zucchini, red or yellow bell peppers, and broccoli florets. Other times I use all of one kind of veggie or just two. As for celery, my dogs like celery but I dont use it in the "staple" diet. I might give them a piece now and then.

The petdiets recipes tend to be more simple with ingredients. The recipes now use chef's complete vitamins which is needed by one of my dogs. So I switched the younger dog to it so two are are on Balance It Canine "K" and the others use Chefs complete.

I'm probably going to keep her on BalanceIt because she's been doing well on it and I just recently bought the bottle so I have A LOT left in it. I might check out Chef's Complete once the BalanceIt finishes.

Okay, so for the first question about olive oil - I have been using Olive Oil + either Nordic Naturals or Coconut Oil. I alternate between the fish and coconut oils. Am I suppose to be adding something else?

For the chicken, I give her white meat breast. I like your veggie mix, do you ever add fruit like apples into the mix or do you keep that just for snacks?

Would a fish such as cod or salmon be considered better for the diet?

I think you are probably right, I will most likely keep the fish to an occasional kind of thing but also have fish oil on hand for when I don't give her fish.

Yes. The diet seems deficient in linoleic acid. You won't get the right amount from olive oil. Coconut oil and omega 3s also don't provide. Every diet I have with white meat chicken calls for canola or corn oil. Are you not following a BI recipe???

It's not that any one kind of fish is better than another -- it really comes down to what the other items in the diet are. I have a few salmon diets from petdiets including salmon and sweet potato and they seem to like them. They also like tuna. But, I mostly stick with chicken.

You could really do any fish...cod, tilapia, salmon, sole...any whitefish is excellent and they usually love it. Mine go just nuts when I cook them whitefish of any kind. They also love salmon.

I put all the ingredients I want to use into the EZ Generator on BalanceIT and if the recipe says "Passed" on a mid-range protein/carb recipe then I use that recipe. I have never had to add Canola to the recipe because when I choose Olive Oil and Nordic Naturals in the 3rd column it balances out in the full recipe.

For example, I chose chicken breast, red pepper, zucchini, celery, carrot, couscous, olive oil and nordic naturals and it balanced out for a mid range protein/carb recipe for a 3 lb dog (with 1.75g BalanceIt).

Are you saying that even though it balances on the EZ Generator that the recipe could still be missing something?

Chloe looooves fish too, lol! I decided to stick with just chicken for this recipe and fish oil.

I remember you told me about Ark Naturals Royal Coat before with Vitamin E - is the Vitamin E in the Ark Naturals brand necessary for me if BalanceIt already has Vit E in the supplement?