Several years ago I used to own a wonderful, fun-loving and healthy Alaskan Malamute dog named Shadow. He was a beautiful specimen of the Alaskan Malamute breed as can be seen in the below picture.

When shadow was younger, he was as playful and spunky as could be. He had no real bad habits, did not bite, was not aggressive, and rarely barked unless he needed something. A model canine citizen if ever there was one.

Shadow was actually the reason behind many of my life decisions. He became the inspiration for all of our pet related websites, he was the reason I bought my first house, and he was with me longer then my first wife.

But that's another story.

The picture to the left shows Shadow in his prime, near the age of 2-3 years old.

Unfortunately, by the time he was much older,

I had not known that he was developing several health issues. Some of which were being exacerbated by the food he was being fed.

First, let me say that shadow likely ate better food then I did. Remember he was my animal guide, and like a son to me., Everything I did was geared for his benefit. The house I bought had a fencing in yard, was close to a dog park, had no stairs for him to climb, and he was being well cared for.

As his health began to decline, they found that he was losing his fur. This happened one night when brushing him, where his fur simply came off in a big clump, leaving bare skin below. After several visits to the vet;s office, they were unable to determine the exact cuase of his condition. However bad it made me feel to see him lose his fur, it did not seem to bother him at all.

As time went on, he was later diagnosed with a fluid like buildup in his chest cavity. The vets tried to do chest taps to remove teh fluid several times, also with no luck. The area was more of a fibrous material then a strict fluid. (think more like an orange versus orange juice).

This led the doctors to prescribe a diuretic pill. In this case Lasix. Little did I know at the time, nor was anyone telling me, that this is a common drug that is to help remove water in patients with heart, kidney or liver disorders.

Ok, so he was doing well on these pills, losing water weight, but still not regaining fur. He was in good spirits, still loved to be outside, go running, and having fun. He was not showing any signs of being sick other then the outwardly missing fur issue.

But then he started gaining a considerable amount of water. What had changed? he wasn't drinking more, his lasix was still working. But wait, his diet changed. But why did his food change? Because like so many people who had been through a divorce, I was pretty broke and bought him what I could afford.

So I took a good look at the food that he was eating. This is when I found out that his medical conditions had deteriorated in a large part due to the food he was eating. But what about the food was so bad? After all he liked it. He was not throwing it up, or spitting it out. Well, upon researching the food, if you actually read the ingredients to the food, you will likely be scared as to what you actually find in them.

Aside from the old "horse meat" issue, (which may still be true), consider that your pets food is made mostly of sub-par food parts, such as ground bones, liver (which filter garbage out of the blood), and a host of other by-products that used to be garbage. This does not even yet cover the chemicals that could be in your pets food. Here's the very short list:

• Butylated hydroxyanisole (BHA)
• Butylated hydroxytoluene (BHT)
• Propylene glycol (also used as automotive antifreeze)
• Ethoxyquin

These chemicals are used as preservatives and other agents to allow the pet food to "keep", or sit on a shelf for a while. So I went back to my vet and asked them about these chemicals. It appears that some dogs can build up quite a bit of these in their blood, and then develop allergic reactions to them.

S o I orders a Science Diet food from my vet that contained none of these ingredients. This was much more expensive, but the results were almost immediate in Shadow. After a few days of the new diet, he looked much healthier, was less lethargic, and was back to losing water weight like normal. As the water would put additional pressure on his internal organs, causing potential problems with breathing, the new food also allowed him to breath better. He was like a new dog.

While his fur did not grow back, I later found out he had a tumorous mass near his heart, I do know that the foods he was eating were causing complications with his problems, and could have even caused them in the first place. Because all dogs genetic makeup is different, not all dogs will develop problems, just like all humans do not automatically get cancer.

If you can feed your dog good food, do so. If not, find foods that are better then others. You may even find that feeding your pet a premium or specialty food actually can save you money on your pets health and vet bills. For additional resources, check out Dog Food Conspiracy and see if your pet has any of these problems.