Why Good Food Matters

Before May we had one dog, Leo. Then we adopted Gordy who has filled the slot of emergency back-up dog. You should always have a dog and an emergency back-up dog. I have told the story of where he came from, but the short version is he was being trained to be a service dog but didn't quite make the cut and washed out. Thanks to Sue, who works for me, we were able to adopt him. He's been a great fit for everyone and is a great dog. Here they are together, Leo on the right, Gordy on the left.

When we got Gordy we noticed that his coat was coarse and a little scraggly, and he shed a lot. A LOT. We have always fed high quality food, in our case we have long used Hills Science Diet but there are many fine brands. We give a few treats and the occasional people food, but mainly our dogs eat Hills. And come September we noticed a funny thing. His coat was significantly better. It was smooth, soft, glossy, and it just looked better, like a golden retriever should. And we have noticed a lot less shedding.

My wife the veterinarian has always touted the benefit of quality food but this is the first time we've been able to experience first hand how amazing it is. It's one thing to tell people something you've learned from the Hills sales representatives, and it's another to be able to say, "My dog..."

I want to mention the service dog facility for a minute.  They are a fine place and do great works in trying to supply dogs to people who need them, but they are a non-profit and run on a tight budget. I cannot fault them one little bit for having to save money on food. If they have X number of dollars to spend on food and they can get 100 pounds of brand A or 200 pounds of brand B they are going to choose B and I don't blame them. I would too. It's up to the forever home to upgrade foods.

Any good brand is fine, Hills, Iams, Pro Plan, and the many, many, many small label premium foods.  But don't expect instant results. It took a good four months for us to notice and we weren't looking. I guess we could have seen subtle changes earlier but for us it was kind of a light bulb moment, where we said, "Hey, do you think his coat is better?" So it pays to either be patient, or to just not be paying attention.

A New Dog for the Price of a Haircut

Our newest dog, Leo, is a golden doodle. This means he's part poodle and part golden retriever. He's pretty much always had fluffy hair

and in our minds we've tilted him toward the golden retriever end of the scale, because that's what he seems like. Until now.



His hair is extremely prone to matting and requires faithful brushing. We are not faithful brushers. Nor even occasional brushers. By the time we decided he needed to be brushed it was too late. He was full of mats and there was only one solution: shaving him.

Now, in the kennel I have to be the one to break the bad news to people that their dog is beyond the de-matting stage and needs to be shaved. Many have already resigned themselves to the possibility, but some are simply unprepared. They drop off a fluffy, hairy, mat-beast, and pickup a smooth-shaved, skinny alien dog. Some people actually scream.

So it was with this in mind when I took Leo to the groomer.

"You know what he's going to look like, right" she said.

"Yes."

"Are you sure?"

I thought I was but it turns out it's impossible to fully prepare for how different he's going to look. (My wife actually laughed for five minutes.) He actually looked better than I thought he would but that doesn't mean I was prepared. She was able to leave a little on top of the head, and half the tail had some poof. The rest was shaved all the way down. Pinkness shows through. He's got a skinny little head now. He's smooth and soft and he looks pretty darned good, but just not at all like Leo. He looks more like...a poodle.

Now I have this poodle-looking dog who acts like Leo. He lays in the same spots, and begs for ice cubes when I open the freezer, and turns in circles the exact same way when we go to let him out. But he just looks like an imposter, like someone trained a strange dog to pretend he's Leo. I keep waiting for the real Leo to show up.

The hair will grow back, and we vow to keep him brushed, but the reality is we'll just have to keep him short. Big ol' fluffy golden-y Leo is gone and we have to get used to poodle Leo.