Nature's Variety Instinct and Raw

[Rough_Collies2008]

I found a store locally that sells Instinct(and Prairie) as well as their packaged Raw food.

I am interested in moving one of my dogs onto a grainless food if possible(or just a higher quality form of Kibble). I think he would do better on something else(the other two do fine on their current kibble). He is a year old, and 65 pounds, and very active(he goes on 4-6 mile walks daily, and is just an all around active dog). He could do with some weight gain as well.

I was considering doing 50/50 Kibble and Raw. I know that Kibble digests slower then Raw, so I would feed him the Instinct in the morning, and Raw 12 hours later at night. Does that sound alright? At this point, I am not comfortable doing 100% Raw.

Does anyone feed Nature's Variety? What do you think of it?

The place I am going to sells a variety of high quality food here is a list of food they offer:

CALIFORNIA NATURAL

EAGLE PACK

INNOVA

INNOVA EVO

SOLID GOLD

WELLNESS

PINNACLE

MERRICK

CANIDAE

BREEDERS CHOICE

Opinions on the above kibble would be great. I am also interested in Sold Gold and Innova EVO(I believe he is old enough for this now)....I also hear great things about Eagle Pack.

I know all dogs are different, and some will do better then others on the same food. However, general opinions of the above kibble would be greatly appreciated! Thank you!

dogfoodanalysis is not working for me, so I can't read up on their reviews.

 

[Hillside]

Django eats the NV raw and I am very happy with the results. His coat is pretty, his poo is JRT sized, and he is always excited about dinnertime. Hopefully the place you go to sells the 2lb chubs, they tend to be cheaper.

 

[Rough_Collies2008]

Thanks for the quick reply Hillside! I am going to go check out the store today, and see what they have currently in stock.

Going off of the feeding calculater, he will need 10.1 ounces a day of meat(not including the kibble he will get in the morning). I was thinking a patty and two medallions would work quite nicely at night.

What type of forumula do you use, or do you rotate? I am thinking of starting with Chicken as it is the most gentle on the stomach, correct? He is currently on a lamb and rice kibble however, so maybe that would be best.

I am very excited to have found this store...hopefully, it stays around for awhile.

 

[Hillside]

I started the Mango with the lamb because he was on a lamb kibble. He is on the chicken now. I also buy the canned Instinct for when I forget to thaw the raw and it doesn't upset his rather sensitive tummy. What I would do if I were you is get a kitchen scale and get the chubs and measure it out that way. The patties are convient, but a lot more spendy. I spend about 10 bucks less on the same amount of raw by using the chubs.

 

[minpinluvrs]

I see you got your answer as far as the raw question, but since you asked about the different kibbles, I figured I'd chime in. We currently feed our pack Instinct chicken, Solid Gold Barking at the Moon, and EVO RM. All of these are grainless formulas, and we also feed Prarie now, and we switch on and off with Canidae.

I can't complain about any of these foods, all of my dogs are in excellent health, the reason we switch is they get bored quickly with one food, and if we can feed a different food every day, the dogs are happy.

If the foods you listed are your choices to supplement your raw, I don't think you can go wrong, they're all pretty good brands, you just need to see what your dog likes. Also, as far as the grainless foods go, two of our Min Pins go crazy if you feed them straight grainless, so we mix the grainless with the Prairie or Canidae to sort of "dilute" it. The other 2 Min Pins only get grainless, and they're fine on it.