Warning about a new dog food

Thank you Cheryl for sharing this info on our ISD yahoo groups, I did feel that it was important to put up on the puppy blog, I don't know if anyone was planning on feeding this food but in case they were, please consider waiting till your dog is an adult or choosing a different brand of food.


"Sorry this is loooong....

I'm not merely passing this info along second hand, this is my experience with my dogs.

Two of my dogs, a 11 week old ISD puppy and my 7 month old Chinese Crested Sully developed partial digestive system blockages apparently from eating Purina's new SmartBlend foods. The new food has been on the shelves for approximately 2 weeks and we've been feeding it for about 7 to 10 days.

I have x-rays taken yesterday that appear to confirm that the new "tender meaty morsels" are causing a partial blockage in 2 of my smaller dogs. My vet agreed that it appeared to be the new "tender meaty morsels" that were causing the problem even though her pre x-ray opinion was that it couldn't be the food. All her plans for all sorts of tests were immediately cancelled after viewing the x-ray.

The new "tender meaty morsels" are very rubbery in texture and don't change much even after soaked in water for 8 hours. Even when soaked for hours they were difficult to break up well even using a fingernail.

My smart little ISD puppy, Tofa, alerted me to the apparent cause of her distress when she ate around the new "tender meaty morsels" yesterday morning after suffering with severe digestive tract distress for the previous 24 hours. My puppies typically act like every meal may be their last and gulp everything down and plead for more. Leaving food behind was very unusual. Her appetite had remained good even while experiencing the digestive distress.

I got out the bag and read it after Tofa gave me a not so subtle clue as to the potential source of her distress. Did I miss something, did they not recommend that this new formula be fed to puppies? Nope right on the new bag it stated... "start puppies on Purina ONE as early as they will nibble at solid foods, generally three to four weeks of age.....".

I begin switching all my puppies to adult food at 7 to 8 weeks after Pat Hastings suggested while evaluating my 2007 litter that no puppies be fed puppy specific foods....ever.

In spite of the fact that Tofa had not held down any food for nearly 18 hours the x-ray showed her stomach quite full (the vet said her stomach was over full taking up much more space than it should) of what appeared to be the rubbery "tender meaty morsels". Her intestines also contained areas of what looked just like the rubbery "tender meaty morsels" mixed with pockets of gas. The only thing that had been moving past all this was very watery diarrhea the color of the more digestible kibble propelled by gas, IOW projectile liquid diarrhea.

The first symptoms with Tofa were watery diarrhea. About 24 hours later she started vomiting all food after which the diarrhea and basically all bowel movements stopped, yet her appetite, color, temperature and attitude remained good other than some initial signs of discomfort.

Tofa finally kept her dinner down last night (we changed food) and so far has kept her breakfast down today, and at 2 am last night she finally had a normal stool! YAY!!

My poor chinese crested Sully is still having liquid diarrhea, vomiting all food and is very uncomfortable. It hurts me to know that it appears the food I gave him is hurting him.

Purina wants (me?) to believe I caused the problem by not doing a gradual enough transition to the new food. Well that's kind of difficult when you open the new bag and go holy crap what is this?! We did mix what we had left of the old formula with the new, but yeah, it wasn't 10% new 90% old day 1, 20/80 day 2, 30/70 day 3, etc.... 10 day transition like they said I should have done.

I've feed a LOT of dogs a LOT of food for a LOT of years. I've switch back and forth between Purina products and even a few other brands over the years and never had a problem with or without a 50/50 for a couple of days switch over.

Needless to say we did an immediate switch to new food, NO transition period, yesterday evening and Tofa has shown nothing but immediate improvement. My poor Sully still needs to turn the corner.

My vet feels that they will digest the food just very slowly. So I'll monitor Sully for signs he's worsening rather than improving and seek help immediately if needed. Thank goodness we finally have an after hours emergency vet in a nearby town.

Anyhow I just want to warn those of you with small or young dogs to feed the new Purina SmartBlend foods with caution or not at all until this is all sorted out.

PS I just took out my sweet Chinese Crested Sully and he had what started as a gooey bowel movement changing to almost a formed stool, a huge improvement over the squirting liquid diarrhea he has had for the previous 24 hours! Apparently the sudden change in food last night was a good move! So much for me making a not gradual enough change in Purina One to Purina One being the source of my poor babies' distress or in other words partial blockages!

Cheryl... hitting send & NOT proof reading again or it will never be done! LOL

Sand Creek Icelandic Sheepdogs"