Chester and Gretel have been spotted on some of the toughest trails in Western Washington. People are always amazed at how far and long Chester and Gretel can hike. People are even more shocked when I tell them that Chester is 11 years old. They can hardly believe how young he looks and how much energy he has.
One of the keys to keeping Chester and Gretel healthy and in hiking shape is to feed them natural, healthy, high quality food, treats, and supplements. I prefer to give them foods and supplements that are as high of quality as I expect for myself. I didn’t always feed Chester that way (I had learned by the time I adopted Gretel) but I know that matters because I have seen his energy increase over the years, instead of decline, as I gave him higher and higher quality foods and started giving him vitamins and supplements.
There are a handful of brands that I admire for their integrity and use regularly. I just learned of a new one last week – Only Natural Pet.
Only Natural Pet products are made to human quality standards using human quality ingredients. The products meet a rigorous set of ingredient standards that keep out chemicals, pesticides, preservatives, allergens, and anything artificial (flavors, colors, sweeteners, etc). All of their ingredients have a certificate of analysis and, since the ingredients used are human grade, they have FDA approval behind them. Only Natural pet also rigorously inspects their sourcing and manufacturing facilities and is an audited member of the National Animal Supplement Council.
Natural, active dogs like natural products
The company started about 10 years ago with the owner, Marty, trying to find anxiety solutions for his dog Crinkles. He couldn’t find products he wanted so he started working with a holistic vet. The rest is history. I don’t know who Marty’s holistic vet was back then but now all of their products are formulated by Dr. Jean. They’ve launched many products over the years and take great care in developing new products. They take inspiration from the human natraceutical industry, customer requests and topic trends, and new, innovative discoveries by Dr. Jean.
Only Natural Pet has one brick and mortar store in Boulder Colorado but have made their products available online through Pet360.
A lot of their products, except food and treats, are appropriate for cats AND dogs so you don’t have to buy double of everything if you have a bi-petual household. The Only Natural Pet products line includes Easy Raw – their most popular food made of dehydrated raw meat and freeze dried veggies; Max Meat – a 95% meat air-dried food; Vital digest to help your pet better digest and absorb supplements; and herbal heartworm preventative.
I am very interested to try their Canine Bladder Control to see if it helps with Chester piddling in his crate. I think he is losing bladder control a she gets older. When we are home, we let the dogs out about every 3 hours. When we are gone, they can be in the crate up to 8 hours at a time and I think he can’t hold it that long anymore.
I know not everyone can afford to always buy the best for their pets but if I am going to scrimp on something, I scrimp on things I put on them, and they play with, rather than things I put IN them. Honestly, I found the prices of Only Natural Pet products to be pretty reasonable. If a product doesn’t work out, you can take advantage of their 100% guarantee and return it.
You can connect with Only Natural Pet on Facebook or check out some of the Only Natural Pet products on YouTube.
Disclaimer: This post is sponsored by Only Natural Pet on behalf of the BlogPaws Blogger Network . I am being compensated for helping spread the word about Only Natural Pet, but YouDidWhatWithYourWeiner.com only shares information we feel is relevant to our readers and everything we say is really how we feel. Only Natural Pet is not responsible for the content of this article.
Jessica says
There is NOTHING that can make me have a dog-health meltdown faster than “herbal heart worm prevention.” Somewhere like Boulder is such a low heart worm risk that you can probably get by with no prevention at all (which is what herbal prevention is). I live somewhere where untreated dogs WILL get heart worm. I have never seen local rescues pull a heart worm negative dog off the streets, unless it’s a puppy. Herbal prevention is just not safe if you’re in an area with moderate weather year round.
Otherwise I’m sure they’re a lovely company. I lean toward the hippy-dippy myself, but I don’t screw around with vaccines and heart worm prevention.
Jessica says
(Although, I will say that my vet runs a modern 3-year vaccine protocol for both rabies and the other stuff. Now that Silas has has a few cycles, I’ll probably switch over to titer testing. I would be extremely hesitant to do yearly vaccines.)
Rebecca says
Just curious – why do you say herbal heart worm preventative is like no preventative at all?
Jessica @ YouDidWhatWithYourWeiner says
Hmmmm….good to know. I am a bit confused though. You say “moderate weather year round”, which Seattle is. I’ve never given either of my dogs heartworm prevention and my non hippity-dippity vet knows it. We spend a lot of time outdoors and we’ve never had it strongly recommended to us or had a heartworm issue. In three years ive only known one doggy friend to have heartworm and it came from the breeder that way. Perhaps I am really uninformed about it?
Jessica Rhae says
Ahhhh..perhaps this is why my vet didn’t recommend it (we are lucky to not have many ticks in Western Washingtin either).
“In the Seattle area, the primary saving grace up until now has been our fickle, maritime northwest weather where the ideal temperatures for heartworm development haven’t been consistent. While we know we have mosquitoes (including the species that can harbor heartworm), and the humidity, we haven’t had the third variable: the sustained heat necessary for the maturation of the microfilarae to larvae while in the mosquito host. Specifically, the typical drop in evening temperatures, even on the warmest summer days, retards the maturation of the larvae. So besides the occasional non-native heartworm positive dog, we’ve only seen a handful of cases of native pets (never traveled outside the area) coming up heartworm positive in Washington State.”
We travel though, and heartworm looks scary, so maybe I should start treating them.
Jessica says
I didn’t mean to alarm you. We just live in a really high prevalence area, so it’s a hot button. It’s actually not the easiest thing to catch–it takes quite a confluence of events. There are some good incidence maps online if you’re curious, but I can’t post them from my phone.
Jessica Rhae says
No, I think it is a good reminder that although it’s not a big problem here, it is in different areas of the country. Honestly, I didn’t give that much thought.
Rose says
I live in Michigan where heartworm disease is a constant threat. We use Heartguard monthly year round. No problems.
Years ago we adopted a terrier/doxie mix who was heart-worm positive. He had three major treatments to kill the worm, and it darn near killed him. The treatment always carries a risk of being fatal, but once infected, you don’t have a choice because the dog would die either way.
He lived to the ripe old age of 14, but was rather sickly because of the damage the infestation caused his heart.
If you are traveling to an area where your dog might get infected, please practice heartworm prevention. You don’t want your dog to get this.
Jessica Rhae says
Apparently not. I am learning more already. It sounds like the preventative is no big deal? But that the treatment if they get it is BAD. I do know that the one dog we know that had heartworm is blind. One side effect of the treatment medication was given is that it could case blindness. His owners were not warned. It sounds like they would have had no choice anyway but at least they would have been prepared.
Bethany says
It’s good that you are learning about heartworm prevention before your trip, Jessica. I am sure you have talked to your vet about it but you should always test for and prevent heartworm before traveling anywhere with a heartworm risk and for at least three months after returning. And yes, all chemical heartworm preventatives pose huge risks but no natural ones have been proven 100% effective. Treatment for heartworm is not as bad as some say, though, IF (and it’s a big IF) the infestation is caught early. So if your not chemically treating year round, frequent heartworm testing (every three months!) is always a good idea, especially if there is a string of summer nights in Seattle warm enough for the mosquitoes to start carrying and infecting with heartworm!
Jessica Rhae says
Yeah. I will talk to my vet. I’ve had 11 years of traveling with Chester and had no issues (and no vets recommend the preventative to me) so I am not paranoid. Sounds like I haven’t traveled to the worst parts of the country for heartworm though. Good to be aware of the risks.
Jessica Rhae says
Although some may see this holistic vet’s view as extreme, it’s really good food for thought and probably more the direction I lean than cramming Chester and Gretel full of vaccinations and chemicals out of fear http://www.thewholedog.org/heartworm.html
Lara Elizabeth says
First – I love that picture of Chester.
Interesting conversation about heartworm and preventative which has sparked me to do some more research. I have had Ruby on Heartgard since her adoption because of the area of the country she came from, but did not have my previous two Colorado native dogs on it and we never traveled out of state.
I know that it did not used to be much of in issue but it has been increasing, and we can have some bad mosquito seasons dependant on weather conditions. This veterinarian recommends treatment May through October in Colorado and I may ask my own vet their opinion:
Jessica Rhae says
I used to be in charge for running the West Nile Virus program (a disease vector also transported by mosquitoes) for a local City and May through October seemed to be the peak mosquito season everywhere. The incidence of West Nile Virus was highest in the September and October months because toward the end of the season was when the virus had the maximum ideal conditions (temp and time) to be present in the highest concentrations. I would assume that heartworm would follow the same pattern.
Lara Elizabeth says
I’m very familiar with West Nile as it is a major concern for the horses. Unfortunately, my horse had a terrible reaction to the vaccine several years ago and we decided it was too risky for him.
Mosquito populations are so scattered in Colorado since we are a very dry climate it just depends how close to bodies of water you are. I actually live fairly close to a large reservoir.
Kimberly Gauthier says
I’m really excited about this brand. Once I started stepping it up with our dog products, I found that we practically had to clear out our cabinets, because we had so much junk food for our dogs. We’ve since found brands that we can trust, but what blows me away about Only Natural Pet is that they have so many great products under one roof.
I’m really stoked about the green tripe treats. Our dogs love these!
Jessica Rhae says
It’s nice to have one. really trusted company where you can get most of the things you need instead of trying to sleuth out what you need one-by-one from different sources.
For the first half of Chester’s live, he didn’t eat super great. Looking back, it wan’t too terrible (Avoderm kibble and no junky grocery store treats) but now he eats like a king and it shows!