Pet Care Info

Herbal Alternatives:

Pet Wellbeing: Pet Wellbeing
From personal experience, I highly recommend their products. Particularly their Kidney Support Gold for Cats and the Life Gold for Cats and Dogs. Their products provide comfort, support and pain relief that standard Veterinary medicine cannot. They can be given in conjunction with standard treatments and don't have the side effects like standard drugs can have. Their website provides valuable info on their herbals and what they are used for.

Nail Trimming:

Dogs:
           WSU Veterinarian College: Clipping Your Dog's Claws 
           Vet Babble: No Fear Way To Trim Your Dog's Nails

Cats:   WSU  Veterinary College: Clipping Your Cat's Claws

Pet Food Storage

1. Don't throw away original packaging. It has information you may need in the event of illness or a pet food recall or even restocking. Plus it was designed to store that particular food for long periods of time. And it has the expiration date. Don't take any chances and feed past the expiration date. (It's not worth the vet bill, or loss of a senior citizen pet to save a few pennies feeding old useless food.)

2. Try to keep exposure to air at a minimum. Store both dry and opened canned foods in airtight containers to prevent loss of nutrients and contamination. (After all, that is the purpose of food. Who wants to eat stale, spoiled, and/or tasteless food?) Tip: When possible, use the bag that it came in as a liner for your airtight container. You need a liner to prevent the food's fats from sticking to the plastic or nonreactive metal walls instead of making their way into your pet as intended. You will want to store the food in opaque containers out of the sunlight, in a cool, dry, dark, clean place and away from heat sources such as heat registers, ovens, or car exhaust, chemicals etc.

3. When reusing plastic containers for food storage, make sure they are food grade plastic. (reusing cat litter bottles won't do.)

4. Don't mix new food with the old. Finish the old first then open the new bag. Its not worth the risk of contamination. Note! If your pet is refusing to eat their food, especially when they are very hungry or to the point of starving themselves, there is a good chance something is wrong with it.  Replace it! It could have become contaminated in the processing or shipping phases. Or your pet could have developed an allergy to some of the ingredients. Keep an eye out for those recalls. They are coming fast and furiously.

ANIMAL FOOD RECALLS AND ALERTS

5. Keep all opened canned foods, and refrigerated foods Refrigerated! Keep frozen Raw foods in the freezer and thaw them in the refrigerator. Its a good idea to keep extra dry food in the freezer. Pets can and do die from food poisoning.


References:
5 Dog Food Storage Mistakes You DON’T Want to Make