KIBBLE AND WATER RETENTION

[TALLMAN]

Four days ago I switched 7 on a raw diet. The kibble I had been feeding had three of the four 6 month olds hog fat, along with a mature female. Two extremely active 1 1/2 year olds and one 6 month old did not have the weight I like in cool weather. All the dogs when on kibble had loose stools half or more of the time. When I would increase the kibble on the active dogs by just 3/4 of a cup, they had completely loose stools all the time with a little weight loss. I could reduce the kibble and they would go back to loose stools half the time. Thus the raw diet came into play.
Immediately on the raw diet the stools were firm and all dogs. But, I noticed in just 4 days the hog fat dogs lookeded on weight. I could have skipped feeding them the 4 days and probably could not have seen such weight loss. Also, they look and acted great.
MY QUESTION ARE: Is it possible that the fat ones were just full of water,S they had retained? Has anyone experienced the same thing?

[Nut]

only if they were not drinking enough

[SteelyDan]

When I fed raw and made the switch I had 2 dogs mid 50s and within the week they had both lost 3 1/2 lbs of water weight. They had "tightened up" so to speak. I switched them from pinnacle kibble. Which I thought was a good kibble to a raw/ crock pot mixture.

[Mudville]

Steely, how you been bro? How them pups coming along, hit the pm.

[tasoschatz]

Depending on kibble and raw food programme, extra glycogen storage due to high carbs comes to mind.

[No Quarter Kennel]

Your run of the mill kibble (diamond, purina, science diet, Ole Roy, etc) fits what you describe.
Your higher end kibble, like Earthborne-Blue-Taste of the Wild, etc., do not have this affect as much at all.
I feed both raw and kibble b/c of work, time and life-style. There are times I cannot feed RAW due to time restraints.
It costs me more to feed Kibble b/c I'll buy things listed above as well as Fromm. When feeding these kibble brands, I do not see a physical difference in the dog nor do I see a difference in behavior.
The only difference I see at all is water consumption. Stool size is the same - HOWEVER - clean up is much more a necessity b/c it is not biodegradable like the RAW stool.

I use to feed just like most folks. Started where I could, worked my way up to Diamond and then on to Canidae (I say work my way up tongue and cheek b/c they are almost all the same) and saw all the things you mention above.

I do believe there are very good kibbles out there that are extremely sufficient for the dogs. Definitely a Good-Better-Best just like all things.
Good-Kibble
Better-High End Kibble (grain free and loaded with the right ingredients
Best - RAW

[EWO]

Good post. When I switched I went to a diet basically like the one in the Pit Bull Bible, not exactly but pretty much the same.

Looking back the biggest difference I saw was in the dogs who were not all that chain active. The spazzes that ran all day ( and night) were the same. They were high metabolism type dogs that just had energy to burn. I didn't see much change in these dogs. The less active chain dogs pretty much all lost weight and had a different muscle tone. They really looked different, same size yet lower weight within a couple of weeks.

Not being able to perform a double blind study or anything close to that, I attributed it to assimilation. The 'less active' dogs did not burn as many calories during the day and the raw food was better assimilated by the body. The dry food not so much, leaving both fat stores, water retention and waste along the way. The 'faster' dogs just needed calories. They would burn them up, good or bad, high or low quality.

I am not sure how accurate that is scientifically speaking but it was the observation I had on my dogs. I did not see a change in energy levels per dog. The spazzes were still spazzing and the less active dogs were still less active.

The real difference I noticed was going in to my first keep with a dog being fed raw. The 'walk out dump' just threw me. On kibble I could always count on a timely dump to get the work started. That first day or two turned into an hour long walk waiting for a dump that was simply not there. On raw the dog does not appear to carry as much waste from meal to meal.

2nd thing is that the dogs on raw come off of water a lot easier than those fed kibble. The dial in is easier, or at least I think it is easier.

Sorry for the babbling. EWO