Tag Archive for: digestive health

Natalie Soonthornswad

Probiotics vs. Prebiotics for Dogs & Cats

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Dogs and cats can sometimes struggle with health issues, and the most prevalent one we encounter is gastrointestinal or stomach problems. From protein allergies to irritable bowel disease, there are several solutions you can use to help alleviate the symptoms of stomach upsets in dogs and cats. In this post, I’ll be talking about probiotics and prebiotics, what the differences are, and the benefits of each for your animal. If you’re looking for more help or other solutions for chronic bowel problems, please visit us at the store or read our other blog posts on similar topics, which you can find at the end of this post.

One of solutions or tools you can use to help your animal with upset stomach are probiotics. Probiotics are healthy, beneficial bacteria that are part of a complex ecosystem that resides in our pet’s gut. In this ecosystem, a lack of good bacteria can result in poor digestion and nutrient absorption, which can result in a spider-web of other symptoms such as skin and coat issues, bad breath, or persistent, loose stool. This complex ecosystem of bacteria can be thrown off by balance by a variety of factors, including your pet’s genes, environmental factors, or medicines like antibiotics. Some dogs or cats with IBS or IBD (irritable bowl syndrome or irritable bowel disease) need an extra boost of these beneficial bacteria to help stabilize them during certain periods when they’re showing symptoms.

Adding probiotics to the food of a dog or cat with a chronic issue will help alleviate these symptoms and improve the overall gastrointestinal (GI) health of your animal. Probiotics can be found in the form of powders or naturally in raw foods such as goat’s milk. We carry both forms at The Happy Beast, and are happy to talk through the benefits of specific brands. We typically recommend probiotics for people having an active or acute problem or symptom with their animal.

Compared to probiotics, prebiotics are the foods that probiotic bacteria feed on in the gut to reproduce and thrive. Many brands of pet food supplement their products with prebiotics, such as chicory root, which helps with digestion, but you can find a variety of supplements to give your animal that provide an overall boost to improve digestion and absorption of nutrients.

Digestive enzymes are also a great addition to a supplement regimen and are often found alongside prebiotics. Adding digestive enzymes can help your animal’s body more easily digest its meals, boost absorption, and improve their stools. This allows your animal to gain more nutrients from every meals. Here at The Happy Beast, we carry a variety of prebiotic and enzyme powders that are fast and easy to add to your daily feeding, including InClover’s Optagest, Honest Kitchen’s Perfect Form, and Super Snout’s GI Balance powder.

In summary, you can think about prebiotics as a great long-term supplement, whereas we believe probiotics are most useful in the short-term while your animal is going through a current phase of digestive upset. Dealing with digestive problems for your animal can be stressful and hard to manage, but using whole, raw foods and supplementation can ease many of the common ailments pets experience.

If you have any questions about probiotics, prebiotics, or digestive health in general, please call or visit us for a one-on-one diet consultation where we can help evaluate your pet and his or her specific needs.

Other Diet & Digestive Health blog posts from The Happy Beast

Picky cat holding nose
Natalie Soonthornswad

Kibble Transition Guide for Picky Cats

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As everyone who knows me knows, I always encourage people to get their cats off of kibble and onto a high moisture, high protein, low-carb canned or (ideally) raw food diet. Our kibble transition guide is great place to start. 

Convincing some cats to give up their “sugar” addiction isn’t always the easiest transition. For those cats that are giving you a run for your money, here is a step-by-step guide to getting your picky, kibble-addicted cat on the road to a healthier and happier life. Remember patience and persistence are the keys to success!

First, let’s reiterate the importance of getting your cat off of kibble.

  • Too low in moisture.
    can lead to kidney and urinary tract issues.
  • Too low in animal protein.
    Animal proteins provide the full spectrum of amino acids, including Taurine, which a cat needs, whereas plant-based proteins such as peas and potatoes do not. Peas and potatoes are the most common “binder” found in grain-free kibble, and can make up as much as 44% of the total kibble diet!
  • Too high in Carbohydrates.  
    All kibble, even “grain-free,” contains an average of 25% carbohydrate (a cat’s natural diet is generally less than 2%). This excess amount of carbohydrates promotes obesity because it is higher in sugar and causes cats to overeat. Cats tend to overeat kibble because the carbohydrates in it do not trigger satiety like fats and proteins do.

 

Kibble Transition Guide

  • Step 1: Eliminate “free-feeding” (leaving out kibble). Cats will be more inclined to try something new if they are hungry. The most difficult part of transitioning away from free-feeding is often that we humans feel bad taking away their “choice” to eat. However, keep in mind that a cat can easily go 8-12 hours without food, just be sure to leave out water.
  • Step 2: Once your cat has not had any food for 8 hours, offer a “stinky” can of cat food, such as B.F.F. Tuna or Weruva Paw Lickin’ Chicken.

If your cat eats the canned food…

  • Step 3: Feed your cat canned food 2x/day, always aiming to expand their palate by introducing new proteins and different textures. Don’t get discouraged if all your cat wants to eat is tuna. Eventually your cat will try and like different proteins, but you must be persistent.
  • Step 4: When offering new foods, leave new food out for up to 30 minutes and if untouched, place their “old” food next to it or in the same bowl.
  • Step 5: Incorporate freeze-dried treats or foods into the diet. Freeze-dried foods have a very distinct odor, flavor and texture which can be very alluring especially when enticing a cat to try something new.

If your cat won’t eat the canned food…

  • Step 3: Try sprinkling freeze dried food into the cat’s kibble. Or alternatively, you can try sprinkling a little bit of the cat’s kibble on top of the canned food.
  • Step 4: With each feeding, decrease the amount of kibble and increase the amount of freeze-dried or canned food. Remember that because kibble is so high in carbs the cat becomes “addicted” to the sound, smell and texture and the longer the cat goes from having kibble the easier the process will get.
  • Step 5: Once the kibble has been eliminated for 4 weeks, try introducing raw food

Why switch to raw from canned? Raw is less processed and therefore more digestible, and surprisingly can be less expensive than doing canned foods.

  • Step 6: Because raw food does not have a strong smell, using a little bit of canned or freeze-dried on top of the raw is a great way to entice your cat to try something new. Also be sure to add a bit of warm water to the raw as cats like their food at room temperature.

If your cat does not like the raw, continue serving 1 tsp of raw next to the cat’s current food, either in a separate dish or next to it in the same bowl. Some cats are very suspicious of new things, and this allows your cat to become familiar with the new food and begin to associate the raw with meal time.

Good luck and happy feeding!

If you want to tell us how your cat’s transition to raw food is going, send a us an email at eat@thehappybeast.com, find us on Facebook, or stop by the store. 

 

Digestive Enzymes for Pets | The Happy Beast
Chelsea Niekelski

Digestive Enzymes for Pets

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What are digestive enzymes? Enzymes are responsible for making the chemical reactions in our body faster and more efficient. Digestive enzymes aid the body by breaking down proteins from food into amino acids which can be absorbed and utilized. Enzymes facilitate proper absorption of foods.

Digestive enzymes are found in raw foods. They are what cause foods to break down and decay. For example, bananas contain the enzyme, amylase. Amylase breaks down raw starch into sugar, which is why green bananas become softer and sweeter as they sit on the counter. All raw foods contain the right amount of the specific enzyme required to break the proteins they are made of.

Why is this important? Cooking destroys the enzymes that are required to break food down, so when we eat cooked food our bodies have to source enzymes from an internal supply. If the body is focused on producing enzymes for digestion, less energy is allotted to the metabolic enzymes used in organ, muscle and cell function.

Efficient and complete digestion is essential to good health. When the digestive system is functioning well, the rest of the body is prepared to maintain good health and fight disease. Digestive enzymes can take the body from merely surviving to truly thriving. This is especially important in animals with allergies, compromised immune systems, IBD, IBS, and pancreatitis. Symptoms of an enzyme deficiency can include bloating, gas, irritability and fatigue.

How should this affect your choices for pet food?

  1. Feed raw. Any food that hasn’t been cooked over 118 degrees will retain its required enzymes. Choose a frozen, dehydrated and freeze-dried raw food that is complete and balanced. See some of the foods we recommend here.
  2. Supplement with a digestive enzyme. Choose a plant-sourced enzyme as they survive under more diverse conditions. Avoid enzymes called “animal pancreas extracts” which may not survive the acidic environment on the digestive tract. We like InClover’s Optagest.
  3. Choose raw treats like frozen marrow bones and raw goat milk. These treats contain live enzymes to support the digestive tract and overall good health and your animals will love them!
  4. Read our blog post on “Helping Pets with Digestive Problems“ for more info and recommendations.
Helping Pets with Digestive Problems | The Happy Beast
Chelsea Niekelski

Helping Pets with Digestive Problems

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Many pets will likely suffer from one type of digestive problem or another in their lifetimes. The symptoms may be mild, including bad breath, excessive gas, a rumbling tummy; or more severe, including chronic diarrhea, constipation, vomiting, or mucus or blood in the stool.

The causes of digestive problems include food sensitivities and allergies, low-quality or species-inappropriate diets, overeating, stress, and ingestion of contaminated water or “found” foods (i.e. from the trash or picked up from the ground.) They can also be a side effect of another health condition, medication, or a result of parasites or bad bacteria in the digestive tract.

If your animal is suffering from chronic or acute digestive problems, including colitis, parasitic infection, irritable bowel syndrome (IBS), irritable bowel disease (IBD), or bacterial infection, be sure to consult with your vet. Often treating pets with digestive problems can be done through diet and inexpensive supplements.

Other things you can do to help pets with digestive problems:

  • Feed more fresh, less processed, species-appropriate foods.
    Highly-processed foods like conventional kibble (i.e. “dry food”) are harder for the body to digest. Replace some or all of your animal’s food with dehydrated, freeze-dried, or raw food. (We like Grandma Lucy’s, Sojo’s, Primal, Steve’s Real Food and SmallBatch.) Less-processed foods are more digestible and easier on the digestive tract.
  • Eliminate foods commonly associated with food allergies or food sensitivities.
    Choose foods that do not include “filler” ingredients like corn, wheat, soy, and animal by-products. Moving to higher-quality foods that don’t contain those ingredients often relieve many digestive issues. Some animals have reactions to other ingredients and will benefit from a limited-ingredient diet. Complete and balanced raw foods with simple ingredient profiles are ideal for experimenting with and eliminating potential food-allergens.
  • Add prebiotics, probiotics, and digestive enzymes.
    Digestion requires a lot of the body’s energy. (Think of how tired you feel after a big meal!) Adding enzymes found in fresh foods, raw goat’s milk, raw bones, and supplements (like InClover’s Optagest) can support the digestive system by helping to break down foods. Prebiotics and probiotics work in the intestine and improve efficient digestion. Read our blog post about “Digestive Enzymes for Pets” for more info.
  • Control portions and meal times.
    Many animals can also have upset stomachs from from overeating. (Again, think of how you feel when you eat too much!) Measure out how much food your animal gets at each meal and decrease those portions on days when your dog gets a bone or a lot of treats. Be cautious about feeding your animal too close to playtime/exercise, especially if you have a large-breed dog, in order to avoid bloat.
  • Make a meat stock.
    Adding a meat stock to your animal’s diet can help “seal” the gut. NOTE: Meat stock is different from a bone broth. Bone broth is cooked longer, resulting in high levels of glutamates. Bone broth has numerous health benefits for animals and people who have healthy intestines, but can worsen symptoms in a compromised digestive system.

    • Meat Stock
      • Ingredients:
        • 1 whole chicken or 2-3 lbs. chicken quarters or bone-in cuts, or
        • 2-3 lbs. beef or lamb knuckles, marrow bones or ribs
        • 2 tbsp apple cider vinegar
        • Water
      • Instructions:
        • Place meats (still with the bone in) into a crockpot/slow-cooker with apple cider vinegar. Add enough water to cover meat.
        • Cook on high for 1 hour, reduce heat to low, and simmer for 3 hours.
        • Remove meat and strain broth through a colander or cheesecloth.
        • Add ¼- 1 cup of broth to your animal’s meal or serve separately.
        • The meat can also be deboned and consumed and the bones can be used to make a bone broth.
    • Bone Broth
      • Ingredients:
        • The bones you just cooked!
        • Water
      • Instructions:
        • Place bones back into a crockpot/slow-cooker. Add new/fresh water; enough to cover the bones.
        • Cook on low temperature for 12-24 hours.
        • NOTE: Bone broth should be reserved for animal and human members of the family not suffering from colitis, IBS or IBD.