Should You Rotate Your Dog’s Food? Miss By An Inch, Miss By A Mile

Miss by an inch, miss by a mile seems to be a diving expression, even though that’s not where or how it originated. The point being made is that a miss is a miss, regardless of the distance.

A miss is a miss but what if it’s perpetuated?

Commercial dog foods are formulated to be complete and balanced. Many of them, complete and balanced for life.

Is there even such a thing as a complete and balanced diet for life?

Nutritional needs change during life stages, lifestyle changes, and with any medical challenge a dog might be dealing with. I believe that while dogs have generally common nutritional requirements, each dog is an individual and the nutrients and their amounts they need are not completely identical.

But let’s not even go there. Let’s say that we have a universal dog that fits the profile perfectly. And let’s put the dog on one complete and balanced dog food for life.

Firstly, one reason for rotating the food is to help prevent development of food related allergies.

Allergies develop with exposure over time. If your dog eats the same protein and carbohydrate source over and over, the chance that an allergy will crop up increase.

But let’s say that doesn’t happen. Should we still rotate the food?

I believe we should.

Is it possible to balance a recipe down to a fraction of each nutrient? Is it possible that the one specific recipe really has everything your dog needs to the dot? Or is it possible that there just might be a nutrient or two the levels of which are just a tiny bit off? Not much, just a tiny little bit? And could such a tiny discrepancy be important?

Major nutritional deficiencies show up loud and clear.

But what about just a little deficiency perpetuated over a long period of time?

Chronic minor deficiencies can sneak up quietly and wear many hats.

For example, according to fur analysis results, majority of dogs today are deficient in zinc and calcium.

Nutritional profiles of different nutrients vary. And that is not accounting for variations caused by other variables, such as the soil or food animals food source. By rotating different recipes, the likelihood of chronic deficiencies is much lower.

Besides nutrients that might be missing in the food, today we need to think about things that might be present that shouldn't be there.

At this day and age, contamination is something we have to keep in mind as well, be it pesticides, heavy metals or toxins.

I for one like to use a variety of ingredients, be it animal protein sources, carbohydrate sources or veggies.

I believe that unless there is a medical reason to stick with one particular recipe, food rotation can prevent quiet chronic deficiencies.