An Animals Diet – and my soap box

Now let me say up front that I was raised within a family that is very conscientious of our animals and their care.  A huge part of their care revolves around their diet and the need to make any changes gradually.  Just as if a vegetarian suddenly started eating meat, or someone who consumed little to no fat suddenly started eating rich foods, they would have serious effects on their system, so will an animal have dietary and health upsets should you change their feed suddenly. 

Now, on to the issue.  One of our goats is having a little trouble keeping weight on, and having de-wormed her on schedule, and increased her feed and trying gentle probiotics for her, she is finally starting to at least hold her own.  She isn’t rounding out much yet, but she’s looking a little bit less scrawny.   As you can imagine, nearly every time I go to the feed store, the owner and I discuss how she’s doing.  When I mentioned our slow and gradual change to him, the response was immediate. 

He began with “You’d be surprised…”  followed by multiple tales of clients who have animals of various types and the rampant change of diet for these poor animals.  It’s so very hard on their systems, that it’s really unfair to the poor animals to put them through such abuse as frequent and or abrupt dietary changes.  One would hope that livestock owners would know better, but it seems that is far less often the case. 

I beg of you – anyone who reads this – if you care about your pets, and I don’t care if it’s your cat, dog, parakeet, horse, cow, goat, llama, etc – any sudden change can do much more harm than good.  Change them over slowly when you use a new food.  A 10 day plan, replacing 10% per of the old food with the new food on day one, 20% on day 2, and so on, so that on day 10 they are on the new feed completely.  It will be easier on their system, and in the case of house pets easier on your floors too. 

If they really hate the new food, you’ll know before the ten days is up.  They can all be remarkably careful about which food they leave behind in their bowls or pans.  That means you have not invested a huge amount of money before finding this out.  

Once they are solidly on the new food for about 6 weeks, you’ll be able to genuinely note if their health is improved by this change. 

Treat them with love and care, and that means taking care of their digestive needs with respect.   They count on us to take care of them in the best way we can, and good nutrition is one of the best ways we can express that!