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-   -   anyone use "balance it" (http://www.pets.ca/forum/showthread.php?t=39769)

golfgirl April 28th, 2007 08:16 AM

anyone use "balance it"
 
Hi, on the advice of my vet (because I told him I want to prepare my own home-cooked meals for our dog) he admitted not having enough information on proper diets and suggested I go to [url]www.balanceit.com[/url] and check it out. It looks really good and was wondering if anyone has used their recipes or supplements? thanks in advance!

Puppyluv April 28th, 2007 08:53 AM

At $20 a recipe, I wouldn't even think of it. There are plenty of free resources or books that cost the same as one recipe that can guide you in your way. Especially when a recipe having the ingredients listed as "salmon, sweet potato, chicken broth and water" costs 20$. For that price, the ingredients better be included too.

golfgirl April 28th, 2007 09:14 AM

I agree with the price, although if you order 3 or more recipes they are only $12.50 per recipe. My vet explained that there is a lot of "free advice" on the net and that the people coming up with these recipes do not have any veterinarian nutrional education, and even admitted that he doesn't have enough education on nutrition as there can be some very harmful recipes lacking proper proportions, elements, minerals,vitamins. He said that the University of California-Davis-is the best place for advice, and this website is run by "board certified veterinary nutritionists" from the University of California. Apparently there are only 37 "board certified vererinary nutrionalists" WORLDWIDE. He also said that if this was just an interim desire, that it would be ok, but for long term it was very important to make sure all of my dogs nutritional needs were being met with proper supplements. To tell you the truth, all this information has made me realize the importance and responsibility of taking up the desire to properly feed our dog. After reading "food pets die for" by Ann Martin, I'm aware of how lax the controls are for commercial pet food. It's disgusting what is allowed to go into pet foods. Sorry this is so long, I just wanted to explain what happened at the vets yesterday and my current thought on home cooking!!

Puppyluv April 28th, 2007 09:20 AM

Oh I agree on making your own pet food. I feed my dog raw, so I know where you're coming from. But I still wouldn't pay that site for recipes. I've done all my research off of websites and books and feel that I've balanced my dog's diet quite well. Paying 12.50-20$ for one recipe without even getting an idea of what this recipe is composed of makes me wary and I would never do it.:shrug:

technodoll April 28th, 2007 09:26 AM

I wouldn't pay a dime either, what a rip-off, sorry. Many of us here have valuable information and experiences and advice to share, gleaned from years of experience feeding a non-commercial diet, purchased books, shared resources among thousands of members world-wide feeding this way also (the wonderful world of forums, LOL). I doubt many people fell for the "pay for a recipe" scam. cuz you know it's all it is, people looking to make a buck off innocent pet owners who are afraid to "do it wrong".

stick around the food forum, you'll see we're not un-educated on the food issue... unlike most vets in the world :rolleyes:

golfgirl April 28th, 2007 09:27 AM

If you make a selection of a protein and carb, then click on "for dogs" they give you a brief description of what is in the recipe. Also check out their "help" section-there are quite a few questions I had answered there, but I was just wondering if anyone had actually used their supplements, or recipes. Boy, feeding a dog was never more confusing than in the last month!! "ignorance is bliss" comes to mind, but these are our "fur babies" who love us unconditionally and I am so happy there are forums like this for us to comment, ask and learn from!! I feel so sorry for anyone who has lost a beloved pet from the recalls-my love to those.

technodoll April 28th, 2007 09:40 AM

golfgirl, it's really quite simple... this homefeeding. think about how dogs and cats ate for thousands of years before the advent of commercial dog food... i doubt people bought pet recipe books :D also, many countries today don't have commercial petfood available - think africa, south america, russia, asia... ;)

but yeah there are basics to follow (calcium-phosphorus ratio being the most important), we can help you. But if you want to throw money at something that's your perogative, we're just trying to help :grouphug:

golfgirl April 28th, 2007 09:56 AM

thanks for everyones replies-and offers of help! I'm sorry I have to go out now and won't be able to reply to any more comments-but I will research more and read lots more! This is a great forum for us all to share ideas, knowledge, questions! After all, we all love our pets-too bad commercial pet food manufactures dont!

pitgrrl April 28th, 2007 10:22 AM

I think if enter "vin" as the promotional code you can get the recipes for free.

Puppyluv April 30th, 2007 12:49 PM

[QUOTE=pitgrrl;417056]I think if enter "vin" as the promotional code you can get the recipes for free.[/QUOTE]

Using this promotional code, I got a free recipe:
[QUOTE]SALMON & SWEET POTATO STEW FOR LAYLA
from the kitchen of Ms. Rebecca

The following homemade recipe was specially created for layla, a healthy 3 yr. old female spayed lab x whippet using Balance ITŪ. layla currently weighs 37 lb. which is a healthy weight for her. Based on her weight, her calculated energy requirement is around 929 Calories daily. The following recipe provides 937 Calories daily.

LAYLA'S HOMEMADE FOOD RECIPE

Ingredients Grams Amount
(1) Sweetpotato, cooked, baked in skin, without salt 655.6 g 23 1/8 oz
(2) Fish, salmon, Atlantic, wild, cooked, dry heat 124.0 g 4 3/8 oz
(3) Oil, vegetable, corn 10.1 g 2 1/4 tsp
(4) Soup, chicken broth, canned, less/reduced sodium 345.0 g 1 7/16 cup

PLUS

3 black and 2 white scoops (12.80 grams) of Balance ITŪ canine per day

Per Above Recipe: 937 Calories; 21% protein calories (197 Calories); 20% fat calories (187 Calories); 59% carbohydrate calories (553 Calories); 79.0% moisture. Note: These percentages do not correspond to the percentages listed on commercially made food.

Preparation Instructions:

Bake the salmon and sweet potato in the oven without any added salt. Once cooked measure out the salmon and sweet potato in the amounts above. Cut the sweet potato and salmon into small pieces. Measure out the above amount of chicken broth* and heat to a warm temperature on the stove or in the microwave as desired (take care to ensure that the broth is not too hot for feeding). Place the sweet potato in a serving bowl and add the salmon, chicken broth, oil and the necessary supplement. Mix well to ensure that all essential nutrients are eaten.

*Please ensure that the broth does not contain added onion or garlic because these can be harmful to dogs.

The recipe must be followed exactly. Any alteration in amount or substitution of ingredients may cause adverse health consequences.

Monitoring:

Please monitor layla's weight and make sure she maintains her current healthy weight. If she begins to gain or lose weight, please contact her veterinarian.

layla should have regular visits with a veterinarian to check that her homemade diet is meeting her needs.[/QUOTE]

$20 for that? I think not. They probably don't even have the calorie requirements right because they don't ask abour her activity level, so it assumes normal activity and normal metabolic rate.
Not to mention, that's a tonne of sweet potato compared to fish.
Rip off. Deffinately.
(Thank you pitgrrl for the promo code)

technodoll April 30th, 2007 01:46 PM

[QUOTE]The recipe must be followed exactly. Any alteration in amount or substitution of ingredients may cause adverse health consequences.
[/QUOTE]

they're kidding, right? :eek: are these people on drugs??

Crestedcrazy April 30th, 2007 03:57 PM

I now do a home cooked diet for my Noid.

The crested breed, hairless variety can be prone to missing teeth, connected to the hairless gene and my Noid is no exception! He has about a dozen left mostly the front ones so kibble was never much of a choice for him as he had a hard time eating it.

He had been on a canned food diet with table scraps supplementing it but then in January he got severely ill, vomiting and diarrhea with blood in both, very scary I was just beside myself.
Anyways the vet thought it was the food but at that time we didn't know about the food recall so that wasn't a thought untill afterwards of course, now one of those things that make you go Hmmmmm???

He was on a bland diet at first but once he got better I had already decided to switch to home cooked since it wasn't proving to be very difficult at all.

I belong to a Chinese Crested forum and a fellow moderator there has always fed homecooked so I just follow her formula.

Basically it's 1/3 meat 1/3 grain and 1/3 veggie and I add the missing link supplement and an fish oil

Noid has wheat/corn allergies so I mainly use barley or brown rice.

I like what I am seeing with this diet for him, his skin is clearing he has put on weight which was always a difficult thing to do, he's such a scrawny butt :)
And our vet says he has never looked better!

Best part is I know what he is eating however I guess keep my :fingerscr that the human food chain is better regulated than the pet food one!

It was all very scary and very heartbreaking so many dogs and cats got sicked and passed I feel so bad for all those people and I just thank my lucky stars that my Noid is OK, I couldn't imagine life without him around, he's my heart!

golfgirl April 30th, 2007 04:41 PM

Thanks for everyones input! A special thanks for posting that sample diet. I also don't agree with the ingredients-I think it is way too high in carbs and don't understand why the meat would be such a low percentage, when all the recent research seems to indicate a much higher percent of meat is best! I will continue researching and using the 1/3, 1/3 1/3 proportions. I'm just a little worried about phosphorus, calcium and ash proportions. I would probably also like to get a good supplement to make sure I have all the minerals, vitmains, oils etc. covered. My vet also suggested contacting the University of California and asking for a prepared home cooked diet for our dog, but I think the $$ would be very high for that and seeing what "balance-it" suggests as far as protein quantity (knowing they are from the U of C) I'm not sure I'd agree anyway!! If anyone knows of a good supplement that would cover things that aren't covered in my home cooking, I'd love to hear. Presently, I am adding 2 tsp. of olive oil per pound of meat and 1 tsp. of ground (baked) eggshell. Thanks everyone!

Rosalinde August 15th, 2013 01:40 PM

Vomiting Blood
 
I'm using Balance IT Feline with my cat right now. The recipes are free now (unless you want a custom-designed recipe). I think they're basically good recipes. I'm not sure about vegetable oil for cats, so I leave that out when making the food. The Balance IT supplement seems very well researched. I wonder whether it may have a little too much phosphorus and calcium and be a little low on taurine. My cat still eats half commercial food, so I'm not too concerned about this right now. I just add a little more taurine powder that I buy seperately. (I'm not an expert. I just try my best to keep my cat healthy.) My cat actually likes the taste of this supplement, though it depends somewhat on the food I add it to.

Now for the BIG problem: Balance IT Feline makes my cat vomit blood and it gives him bloody stools. He does not have these problems when he isn't getting the supplement. I received a very nice phone call from Balance IT in response to my request for help. However, we were not able to come up with a solution. My cat does have food allergies, and these are the kinds of symptoms he used to get when he was eating foods he was allergic to. I do wonder whether Balance IT has succeeded in removing all animal products from its supplement, like they say. I have the feeling there may still be a bit of something like fish in there. It's also possible that the supplement is causing nausea and vomiting some other way. I'm going to keep trying Balance IT for another few days, but I have the feeling this supplement may not work for my cat.

Rosalinde August 17th, 2013 09:48 AM

No Longer Vomiting Blood
 
Some good news: my cat is no longer vomiting and there's no more blood. He's still getting his Balance IT every day. I need to increase the amount of supplement slightly now because my cat is eating more food than I expected. That can easily be worked out using the recipes on the website. You just work out how many calories your cats eats per day, find a recipe that gives this number of calories, and the amount of supplement will be given in the recipe. I hope things will continue to go this well.

CheetoBowie November 12th, 2017 04:15 PM

Ridiculous!
 
There are a couple of posts on here that are absolutely asinine. You want something for free? Go ahead and get a recipe off line for free, but is it balanced? Is it created specifically for your dogs condition? Maybe you'd rather go pay an nutrionist a couple hundred dollars for a recipe? Btw the recipes On the site are no longer charged, they are FREE. How nice is it to be able to go on a website create and or get a free recipe catered to your pet, and it's all FREE?+ The only thing you pay for are the supplements to make it balanced. Or would you like those FREE also? I understand why your pets have so many issues, relying on everyday non specific recipes off Google. Good luck!

hazelrunpack November 12th, 2017 06:37 PM

Welcome to the board, CheetoBowie. This is an old thread, and most of the posters aren't regulars anymore. That being said, not every supplement works for every animal. If someone experiences a less than optimal outcome, please try to respect their opinion. At the very least, please don't make it a personal issue.

Enjoy your stay here.


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