I have a 3 year old Chihuahua! He is in general very healthy except
that the skin on his belly is a bit dry. I have tried feeding him
Science Diet and now he is on Eukanuba. But his skin is still dry.
Could it be the dog food that is making him dry? Is there another dog
food that I should feed Gizmo?

Could be the food....
I personally feel the quality of Eukanuda is not what it used to be. Iams
(and thus Eukanuba) was bought out...or merged...or whatever...a while back.
We were feeding Eukanuba at the time. About 6 months later two of our dogs
started with the itchies. (dry skin).
We switched to the natural blend of Royal Canin and the skin is better.
There are just too many dog foods to choose from!
Without knowing what is available near you, what you are willling to pay,
whether you are okay with trips to a specialty store or whether your time
schedule is more suited to getting food at Wal-Mart while you are doing your
other shopping....

Bil-Jac is an okay food and readily available.
Pro Pac is fairly good...though can be difficult to find.
Innova is a good food
Diamond is what alot of sportsmen use.
Nutro-Max (not nutro) is fair to midland and easy to find.

alot of the speciality foods are good but hard to find...

If the problem is food related you will likely have the best luck with foods
without a pluthera of grains and fillers...my rule with commercial foods is
this....
I want to see meat as primary ingredients.
If in the first 5 ingredients there is something I need a chemist to not
only explain to me what it is but also to pronounce...I will look for a
different food.
If I read the label and there are a bunch of things that sound like I would
not want to feed them to a child...I wont feed them to my dog.

Maybe get some suggestions from your vet.
Maybe a Chihuahua breeder or breed club, there may be some dietary
requirement (or common problem) that makes one food better than another for
your breed.


"wendy" wrote in message
oups.com...
I have a 3 year old Chihuahua! He is in general very healthy except
that the skin on his belly is a bit dry. I have tried feeding him
Science Diet and now he is on Eukanuba. But his skin is still dry.
Could it be the dog food that is making him dry? Is there another dog
food that I should feed Gizmo?

Thanks for the information!

My breeder fed all her puppies Iams, so that's why I decided to go with
Eukanuba. I mean in general he is ok besides the dry skin on his
stomach.

I know I can get Bil-Jac from Petsmart. But I am not sure about
ProPac, Innova and Diamond. I know I can get RoyalCanin, but I can't
seem to find too much information on RoyalCanin so I am not sure about
it.

Since my dog is a chihuahua I am not too concerned about cost and if
it's convient to get the dog food. He is so small a bag of dog food
last him a long time and I am willing to spend the money for my baby!

I will try to check out some chihuahua clubs!! Thanks!

wendy wrote:
Thanks for the information!

My breeder fed all her puppies Iams, so that's why I decided to go with
Eukanuba. I mean in general he is ok besides the dry skin on his
stomach.

I know I can get Bil-Jac from Petsmart. But I am not sure about
ProPac, Innova and Diamond. I know I can get RoyalCanin, but I can't
seem to find too much information on RoyalCanin so I am not sure about
it.

Since my dog is a chihuahua I am not too concerned about cost and if
it's convient to get the dog food. He is so small a bag of dog food
last him a long time and I am willing to spend the money for my baby!

I will try to check out some chihuahua clubs!! Thanks!

Wendy,
Try your vet first, there could be other issues that are the
cause. If s/he rules out other issues then s/he can make some
suggestions on what to feed if they think that is a solution.

We feed royal canin at our rescue...not because it is some really great
food, but because it is readily available and because it has a prescription
line (like science diet). Royal Canin is kind of on the upside of middle of
the road. Has been bought out by Waltham's though, so wee will have to see
where it goes from here.


"wendy" wrote in message
oups.com...
Thanks for the information!

My breeder fed all her puppies Iams, so that's why I decided to go with
Eukanuba. I mean in general he is ok besides the dry skin on his
stomach.

I know I can get Bil-Jac from Petsmart. But I am not sure about
ProPac, Innova and Diamond. I know I can get RoyalCanin, but I can't
seem to find too much information on RoyalCanin so I am not sure about
it.

Since my dog is a chihuahua I am not too concerned about cost and if
it's convient to get the dog food. He is so small a bag of dog food
last him a long time and I am willing to spend the money for my baby!

I will try to check out some chihuahua clubs!! Thanks!

i would pay a visit to the vet to rule out any thing nasty and then he will
look to the food.

my shih tzu is allergic to beef and beef flavours i was using bakers
complete but the itching drove her up the wall, now we have a different
brand made with chicken and all three of my dogs are thriving

I actually asked the Vet. And he told me to feed him some fatty acid
supplement. But that didn't seem to help. His skin is always skin in
the stomach. What about Nutro?

I talked to my vet and he suggested to feed him fatty acid supplements.
I did that for a while but his skin is still dry. What about the food
Nutro Max? Would that be better than Eukanuba?

dallygirl wrote:
i would pay a visit to the vet to rule out any thing nasty and then he will
look to the food.

my shih tzu is allergic to beef and beef flavours i was using bakers
complete but the itching drove her up the wall, now we have a different
brand made with chicken and all three of my dogs are thriving

wendy wrote:
I actually asked the Vet. And he told me to feed him some fatty acid
supplement. But that didn't seem to help. His skin is always skin in
the stomach. What about Nutro?

If you could get Nutro to tell you the levels of Omega 3's in the diet
you might have some idea. Unfortunately the calcium levels in Nutro are
usually exceptionally high which may have some affect on skin status.
You are usually better off feeeding a good quality food than adding
supplements. For example you would have to feed 17 Derm Caps regular
per day to the mythical 20 pound dog to equal the Omega 3 level of
Science Diet Adult, you would have to feed 52 Derm Caps regular to
equal the Omega 3 level in Science Diet Senstivie Skin. You would have
to feed 14 Derm Caps regular per day to match the Omega 3 level in
Eukanuba Adult Maintenance. Derm Caps are a common supplement capsule
which contains 42 mgs of Omega 3 per capsule.