Rupert had painful urinary crystals

His owner made contact with me as she was very concerned about his recent illness. Rupert suffered from an extremely painful urinary tract infection and blood in his urine which ultimately led to him needing surgery to remove a stone from his bladder.

The crystals had joined to form a very spiky and painful looking stone as shown in the image that definitely needed removing as any bladder infection can lead to long term kidney failure in dogs.

All plant-based diets in dogs, whether dry foods or homemade (with no supplements), tend to be alkalinising which means that your dog’s urine will have a pH above 7 instead of below as is normally found in dogs on a meat-based diet. This means that your dog is more prone to developing a urinary tract infection, which unfortunately also results in the right environment in your dog’s urine to develop crystals that can join and become stones.

The condition is very painful and debilitating for your dog and as in Rupert’s case; it is very worrying as he needed surgery to remove the stone which in itself is risky surgery and can be life threatening if the kidneys become involved.

“Carnivores and omnivores excrete acidic urine as the catabolism of protein produces nitrogenous waste but, as plant proteins have a higher pH, the urine of herbivorous animals may be more alkaline (Knight and Leitsberger, 2016). The raised pH increases the susceptibility of urinary salts crystallising into predominately struvite stones causing urolithiasis (bladder stones) (Tion et al. 2015)”

What is the solution to prevent these problems?

There is thankfully a very simple solution to preventing this problem from recurring and help treat Rupert. His devoted owner felt she was always doing the right thing by feeding him Benevo wet and dry, and supplementing with cranberry powder, but it was just not enough to correct the alkaline urine.

Foods such as Benevo, Ami, V-Dog and Lily’s Rainbow Stew tins do not list an extra addition to the food called methionine in their ingredients. Methionine is a sulphur amino acid that is found naturally in all meat products and has to be supplemented in a plant-based diet to ensure that it is balanced. It is the one ingredient that will acidify not only the urinary tract environment, but also the gut microbiome which enables better absorption of nutrients as well as enabling urinary tract health.

Rupert’s owner is unable to homecook due to time constraints and that is the first bit of advice I give as the balanced recipes recommended are made using supplements that contains the valuable addition of methionine as well as added natural plant-based Vitamin D3 for a healthy immunity, zinc and Vit B for a healthy skin, and taurine for heart health.

A wet homemade balanced diet also provides more necessary moisture that is needed with any bladder infection or inflammation – especially in dogs that do not like to drink. There are natural urinary acidifiers such brown rice, oats, corn, lentils, brussel sprouts, asparagus, peas, yeast, vitamin C and cranberry powder that can be used in a homemade diet with the addition of our Just Be Kind supplement.

As Rupert’s owner wants to feed only a dry food, she found the perfect solution with soya free and nutrient rich Greta from Vegan4Dogs. Please listen to Rupert’s story below as told by his owner – it is SO inspiring!

She was buying it straight from Germany but due to changes in import duties and worries about being charged extra import tax, she requested that we stock this diet again to be available in the UK with next day delivery.

We have listened as Rupert is not alone in loving his Greta food!