My dog is allergic to pretty much everything, help?!

[Shirley & lottie]

I have just received the results from my West Highland Terrier's allergy test and she is borderline allergic to White Potato, Milk, Yeast, Rice, Soy Bean, Peanuts, Berry mix, Banana & Green Beans. She is borderline/positive to Tomato, Squash, Pumpkin, Green Peas. She is positive allergic to Barley. The advice from the Vet was to avoid Tomato, Barley, Squash & Green peas.
Trouble is, I am struggling to find a food without the green peas, and she eats wet and dry.
She is about to start Immunotherapy treatment for at least 15 other allergens.
I have tried the search engine but peas appear to be in everything.
Has anyone else had a similar issue with the peas, or does anyone know any foods that don't include the ingredients the vet advised us to avoid.

[Dottie]

Hello and welcome to the forum. You have a lot of problems with your West Highland White Terrier.  I've heard of dogs being allergic to peas but don't know how common it is.  TBH I think you are going really struggle to get a suitable commercial food.  If you use the Dog Food Directory on this website you could filter out some of those products but not all.

I think you would be better off making your own food or feeding raw.  There are a few complete raw meals on the market but I am not sure if they will meet with your requirements.  Natures Menu uses peas in at least some of their raw meals, Nutriment uses pumpkin and Natural Instinct Adult has butternut squash. 

Again, if you go to the Dog Food Directory and under type of food, place tick just in the raw complete box it might throw up something that is suitable.  I found seven:
Basil's Dog Food
Honey's
K9 Natural
Natural Instinct
Natures Menu,
Nutriment
Wolf Tucker

Honey's looked as if it might suit but it has 'seasonal vegetables' so you would need to ask them if they use peas.  Also wondering if K9 Natural might fit the bill (it is freeze dried so no need for freezer space).

Dry food needs filler to form into kibble and this is either grain or a combination of sweet potato/white potato so that is why I can't see that you will find one that fits the bill.  Many have pea products too.  You might find something in wet foods - as mentioned previously, just place the tick in the box by the side of wet food under type of food.

[Shirley & lottie]

Thank you for taking the time to research and reply, however raw is most likely out of the question because of the high protein levels and last time we tried her on it she ended up having a bad reaction.
We also had the same reaction with Millies Countryside Mix, I really think i'm going to struggle with this one as I need to keep her proteins levels down as well. Have looked at some of the wet foods and the odd few may meet the requirements. Thanks Shirley

[Dottie]

I forgot to ask - what are you feeding her at the moment?   If you had mentioned the problem with protein and a raw diet I wouldn't have gone up that path.  I looked  at it because of the lack of ingredients, particularly carbohydrates. Wet food also tends to have fewer ingredients but they usually have higher protein and fat levels.  The lowest protein and fat wet food that I found recently was Burns Penlan Farm chicken.  It will be a case of going through each one in the Dog Food Directory. Time consuming but worth it if you can find something suitable.  Remember to look at the dry weight, not the analysis given by the company.

IMO home made food would be best. I remember reading an article about this in one of the dog magazines and they recommended 40% protein, 50% vegetables and 10% carbohydrate.  Here is an article on making food for a dog with allergies.  A vitamin supplement that might help is SF-50. Salmon oil is also good if your dog is OK with fish.

Please would you let us know how you get on? 

[Tinyplanets]

Hello and welcome to the forum. That list really does make things tricky. I would agree with Dottie and if it was me I think I would be looking at home cooked food. I see your girls test don't mention oats. You could perhaps cook some up in water and use as a source of carbs.

I hope the treatment helps.

[Shirley & lottie]

Thanks for alll your advice, apologies i never mentioned all of the issues on the forum. I was just wondering if anyone knows how reliable these test results are? She's also allergic to 15 other things, such as grass and barley etc etc etc. Also storage mites found in dry food. She needs to have two vials made up of immunotherapy treatment, has anyone had this done before? All these treatments are very expensive. Thanks, Shirley.

[Shirley & lottie]

Sorry forgot to mention she's on barking heads grain free salmon wet,and their fish delight atm.  But they contain tomoto and peas.
She was always on symply b4 but she always had problems with her anal glands,hence me trying raw and millies.

[Dottie]

It sounds quite complicated. I have no experience of this so can't offer any advice or support.  I can imagine that the veterinary treatment would be expensive.  I can see that you are trying different foods and in itself that is costly, especially if you have to order online because there is the p&p too.    With the allergy to storage mites you are definitely going to need wet food. I've just tried this on the filters of the Dog Food Directory:

Type - wet
Properties - natural, hypoallergenic, grain free
Avoid ingredients - all red and cereals.

It returned two pages.  Billy and Margot  looks like it might be OK.  If the protein is too high you could possibly give a smaller amount and bulk it up with something that she is not allergic to - perhaps sweet potato or (as Tinyplanets has said) well cooked oats. Also Bob & Lush.

[George]

I was just wondering if anyone knows how reliable these test results are?

See this post by David:

http://www.allaboutdogfood.co.uk/forum/index.php?topic=691.msg1047#msg1047

I'm afraid to my mind, with results being "at best 25% accurate" - ie more likely to be wrong than correct - allergy tests are just yet another way for vets to con money out of us.

[Schnauday]

I'm not totally sure but I think Honeys do tailor made food specific for your dog. Might be worth giving them a call

[Shirley & lottie]

Thank you all so much for the advice,   ziwipeak food is one I've found also on the search engine that does not contain any of the ingredients lottie is supposed to be allergic to.   However it's very expensive.    Will have a look at the Bob & lush.

[Dottie]

The problem with ZiwiPeak is that although it is air dried, AFAIK it is also raw meat once reconstituted.  The protein is 40/fat 30.6 so it may not suit your Westie. 

[Shirley & lottie]

Thanks for the info on ziwipeak, will definitely not be trying that one!   Think it's going to be home cooked for lottie

[Shirley & lottie]

Hello again,   I have just been looking at Happy dog food (wet tins)  They contain 100% of  turkey or duck, lamb, buffalo or beef.   Have put the ingredients in the instant review regenerator and it scores 4.5.
Meat and animal by-products (100% turkey), minerals.
The 100% of a particular meat sounds good, as i could add some veg etc. But does the by-products mean nasties??

[Schnauday]

If it says meat then it can be any animal bits head, feet, fur, heart, lungs. By putting the turkey in brackets could be misleading and may not be all turkey as its suggesting, only the animal by products are 100% turkey.

These bits are all from animals that have been passed for human consumption but not necessarily eaten by humans. So when food manufacturers state "made with meat fit for human consumption", it is, but you wouldn't want to eat the heads, fur, skin etc. Its not the nice tasty meat bits that we envisage as fit for human consumption from the advertising.