A Dog Food Dilema

The last few months have been a roller coaster with dog food in this house.  At times, I felt like I spent more time researching dog food than I did my own food.  It started in December.  While Andrew was out of the state for work, Maya got her paws on a rabbit in our yard.  She has been perfecting her hunting skills recently; much to my dismay.  For whatever reason, these rabbits obviously didn't take her seriously when she nearly caught several of them.  They continued to hang out in our yard. 

I don't make a habit of leaving the dogs in the yard for long periods of time without checking on them.  I know there is enough trouble for them to find in a short period of time.  I caught Maya mid snack one day.  I brought her inside and went out to scoop up the rabbit and throw it over the fence. 

A day and a half later, Maya was very ill. She threw up at least seven times in less than an hour.  It was after 10:00 PM, and our vet wasn't open until 8:00 the next morning.  I called the vet hospital and rushed Maya in.  When we got her there, she was severely dehydrated.  There was a concern that she had an obstruction from eating the rabbit.  A short while later, they had done x-rays and determined it didn't appear she had an obstruction.  She stayed overnight to get re-hydrated.  By the following evening, she was released from the hospital.  The next several weeks were touchy.  We went through a course of antibiotics as well as anti nausea meds. 

While she was on the road to recovery, she stopped having any interest in her food.  I thought she might have been associating her food with causing her to be sick.  I started to make the rounds on food.  I found out that her Hills Science Diet Sensitive Stomach was a three star food, so I began researching four and five star foods.  We started with Whole Earth Farms Grain Free Beef and Lamb food.  While Buddy enjoyed the food, Maya couldn't handle it.  She continued to get sick.  We also tried mixing in a probiotic to help her stomach recover from eating the rabbit.  Next up, we tried Canidae Grain Free Pure Elements.  Notice all the grain free food, I was convinced she had a food allergy.  We tried that for a couple of weeks and she was still having problems with her stomach. Although, her symptoms changed, she was still having issues.  At least once per day, Maya was regurgitating.  It wasn't right after eating either, it was generally several hours later.  One minute she was running across the floor, and the next minute she had regurgitated.   

We were on the verge of taking her back to the vet to have her tested for problems with her esophogus when we decided to try one last effort with her food.  We circled back to her original Science Diet Sensitive Stomach.  After a few days of mixing it in with the Canidae, the regurgitation hadn't come to an end.  We decided to go all or nothing and switch back completely to the Science Diet.  I'm happy to report, our plan worked!  After almost a week and a half of all Science Diet Sensitive Stomach, Maya is doing well and the regurgitation has stopped.  There is something about the ingredients in the Science Diet that just works with Maya's stomach.  It is still a decent food, and one that works for her.  Aside from her tummy issues, Maya is a very happy young pup. We are keeping our fingers crossed that tummy issues are a thing of the past for now.   I have learned to read the ingredient listing as well as the breakdown of percentages for fat, protein, etc.  Turns out the Canidae had 18% fat while the Science Diet was only 12%.  I'm not sure if it was the fat percentage alone, or a combination of things but Science Diet seems to be the thing for Maya's tummy.