I have the argument (lots) with greyhound people (lots) about high protein and greyhounds (lots) and of course other sight hounds (lots). The old school and a lot of the rehoming charities say they shouldn’t ever be fed high protein. I of course wonder if this is something to do with the food they sell ???
I’d really love an article on food for ex racing greyhounds, and how they have exactly the same nutritional requirements as other dogs. I am sick of fighting the 18% protein argument.
Please do it if you can, I’d really appreciate it. I can supply pictures of 80/20 or raw fed ex racers who aren’t fat, are in fantastic condition and are cancer free!
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I totally agree with you, in fact Eden have sent bags of food to Greyhound Gap charity after meeting them at a recent show.
It may be useful to track this to it’s source and ask these people why they have made this assumption. Often they have no scientific evidence and it is just hearsay, passed on from one generation to the other. It may be something to do with rubbish food that they are selling but I wonder if it is also related to racing in that carbohydrate gives the dog a release of energy, albeit short lived.
Actually that is also incorrect, the short initial burst of energy comes from glycogen stored in liver and muscles and then the body switches to fat for energy, which is converted to blood sugar. Carbs can help in endurance situations if consumed little and often, but otgerwise, if not burned off immediately are converted to be stored as body fat.
The success we are seeing with a number of agility dogs being fed on Eden (they post to our Facebook group) shows that there is certainly no detriment to performance, though it’s hard to say if there are any overall performance benefits at this stage, other than keeping lean.
Interesting article her that suggests that racing greyhounds may indeed do better with lower protein, although it doesn’t make clear whether that should be their regular daily diet, or just for race days. it refers to slow twitch and fast twitch muscle fibres, and the amounts of these do change based on the training regime (hence why performance athletes that have had a period of inability to train take some time to get back to full fitness again) so the rules may also be different between actively training and racing greyhounds and those that are just pets or have retired
http://jn.nutrition.org/content/128/12/2686S.full
This one also seems to advise more moderate protein levels, but does warn against usage of grain. it seems carbs should come from sugars rather than starches, which does again suggest that this is more of a race day diet
http://www.greyhound-data.com/dir/806/Feeding_a_Racing_Greyhound.pdf
The greyhound-data people are all racing breeders or trainers. Their focus is often mostly on economy and adequacy, rather than quality.
They tell people (and trainers in general do too) that they must never feed their dog more than 20% protein or some such twaddle.
This is perpetuated by the RGT’s and a lot of rehoming groups.
An athlete may well have slightly different nutritional requirements but the focus is always about winning a race and nothing to do with health - the dogs are merely a commodity used short term and then disposed of.
Non racing greyhound surely have the same nutritional needs as other dogs in a non working environment.
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