Vegan Dog

It's Otis' birthday month! He's 6!! The adoption place we got him from didn't have an exact birthday for him, but they told us they thought he was born around April of 2008, so we always celebrate his birthday on tax day, April 15. I thought in honor of his birthday I'd share some of his favorite diet/chewing related things.

A lot of carnivores (non vegetarian or vegan peoples) that I know feel bad that Otis has to be vegan. They think he is deprived of all the meaty wonderfulness that dogs seem to love. I don't want the poor little fella to suffer or be teased by all the other doggies at the dog park, so we try our best to find vegan alternatives to popular dog items.

We feed Otis Nature's Recipe Healthy Skin Vegetarian Recipe dog food. More for convenience than anything, since this is the ONLY vegetarian dog food that our local pet store carries, and we haven't found any other great vegan/vegetarian options locally. He really seems to like it. Or at least he gets super excited when we say the words "dinner time".

As far as treats go, I surprisingly have awesome luck at TJ Maxx, Marshalls, Home Goods, and Ross at finding vegan dog cookies. They normally always have a box of organic cookies in fruit, peanut butter, carob, pumpkin, or ginger flavor. Otis does seem to prefer some over others, but the brands are ever changing so I just go with whatever they have. Boxes of these are normally around $2.99 to $3.99 and they last us for several months. We normally give him a portion of a cookie whenever he comes back in from peeing or pooping outside, or right after we brush his hair or teeth, or wipe his face clean, as a reward for the torture that is grooming. The super adorable painting of Otis in the photo below was done by my best friend Bonnie. We LOVE it!!!

I always see a lot of what I call chewy treats on the market. By this I mean moist, chewy, not dry cookie type treats. I knew Otis would love them, but I never could find a vegan option... until recently. Otis really loves both brands listed below, which can both be found on Amazon.com. I'm pretty sure I purchased the Wag More Bark Less Soft & Chewy treats at Drugstore.com and the Lick Out Loud treats I think I found at Ross. The Lick-Out-Loud treats I purchased in Peanut Butter flavor. To me they smell a bit weird and they are tiny, but he seems to like them. The Wag More Bark Less Soft & Chewy treats he goes crazy for. We buy these in Pumpkin Pie flavor & Peanut Butter Cookie flavor. They last a long time unopened in the bag, so I normally stock up. I don't dare run out of these treats! We give him these whenever we have to crate him or right before we leave the house if we are leaving him un-crated. I'm pretty sure he's so spoiled now that if we tried to get him in his crate without a chewy treat he'd just stare at us.

Our vet recommended we give Otis a dental chew once a day to help keep his teeth clean. That's all fine and dandy if you've got a meat eating dog, but finding a vegan/vegetarian dental chew was crazy hard. I did finally find these C.E.T. VeggieDent Chews on Amazon.com. We've been through two bags of these now and I can say for a fact that Otis absolutely LOVES them!! We give him one around 7pm every night and if we forget he will stare us down until we remember. He actually sits himself directly in front of us and stares at us until we give him one. We buy the regular size dental chews instead of the small dog chews, because we are able to make them last longer that way. When we get the bag, we break up each regular sized chew into three smaller chews. I am always concerned about Otis' safety and we have watched him very closely with these to make sure he doesn't choke on them. Many months later he seems to be absolutely fine eating the regular size chews broken up. 

Dogs love bones and rawhide right? Well I did my best to find a solution to that. It's crazy frustrating how even the nylon/plastic type bones are flavored with beef and chicken. I finally found a couple that list peanut butter as the only ingredient. I had previously purchased a JW Pet Evertuff Bone Toy in peanut butter flavor which Otis absolutely loved, but I won't be purchasing one again because I found out they are made in China and I prefer to only buy treats and doggie edibles that aren't made in China. Ya dig? Anyway, I thought all was lost until I found these puppies (pun intended). Nylabone Dura Chew in allergen-free Peanut Butter flavor. Made in the USA. We just gave him his first one of these for his birthday and so far he seems to like it. I wish they had a smaller sized bone, but I didn't find one. This one is about twice as thick as the JW Pet Evertuff Bone and slightly longer. Otis doesn't seem to mind the size though. I laid both bones right beside each other in a brutal head to head battle to the death and Otis chose the Nylabone for the last three times. I'd say it's a definite winner.

Otis also loves fresh vegetables and fruit. We're careful not to give him anything not safe for doggie consumption. He goes crazy for lettuce, carrots, frozen blueberries, pumpkin, applesauce, and banana. We tried pineapple once, but I'm not sure he knew what to think about it. He also loves dehydrated sweet potatoes which we buy for him from time to time. I'd like to get a dehydrator sometime and dehydrate my own for him. 

Anyway, there's my incredibly long post on what my dog eats. Riveting stuff right?  

We love you Otis!