Taste of the Wild Giveaway Winner!

Wow, guys, we had 38 entries for the Taste of the Wild giveaway! That's very exciting.

What's less exciting is my pictures of the winner selection. Elka, you see, was focusing very hard on this freaked out looking squeaky chicken that I got her from Wal-Mart. I figured, "Okay, she can do that while I write down all of these names, then I'll throw the names on the floor, per usual, and she'll pick one up and go back to chicken squeaking."

Taste of the Wild: review and giveaway!

I used to feed Elka Taste of the Wild. When the voluntary recall happened back in May, though, I jumped ship for the time being. My most recently purchased bag of food had fallen in the recall, and I was just squidged out, frankly. Well, as it turns out, no Taste of the Wild actually tested positive for the Salmonella. Which is a pretty rad thing.

Interestingly, when I was contacted by a rep to see if I wanted to sample Taste of the Wild's new flavor, Southwest Canyon, and do a (very generous, I feel) giveaway for my readers, it was exceedingly good timing. Elka, though she'd previously been happy with the Blue Buffalo switch, appears to have become disillusioned with it. Overall, Elka is not a picky eater. Back in November, I groused about how she only wanted to eat from puzzle toys, but after I'd put them away for awhile, she returned to the bowl well enough. Poking around in her mouth, she doesn't appear to have developed anything wrong in there which would make eating kibble aversive, either, so I wondered if it was time for a switch. And then I got the email.

Diamond Pet Food Recall part deux: Missouri plant

On Friday, April 18, Diamond Pet Foods announced another recall, this one for foods manufactured from a plant in Missouri. Once again, it was one of those "drop and run" recall announcements.

So,

The recall announced Friday applies to samples, 6-pound bags and 18-pound bags of Diamond Naturals Small Breed Adult Dog Lamb & Rice Formula dry dog food manufactured on Aug. 26, 2011.

For bags with codes:

-- DSL0801, 26-Aug-2012
-- DSL0801, 27-Sept-2012
-- DSL0801, 18-Oct-2012
-- DSL0801 (samples)

Here is the link to the updated information on the Diamond Pet web site. 

Something that weirds me out about this one? "Product manufactured on Aug. 26, 2011 and packaged on Sept. 27, 2011" I am obviously ignorant about factory and manufacturing settings but...if you're making food, wouldn't you package it when you made it? I thought that was the last logical step on the assembly line: food comes in, kibble forms, feeds through, gets into bag, bag seals.


I guess I should stop making assumptions. I end up looking foolish, more often than not.

Tasty Tuesday May 8, 2012: Where the buffalo roam

So, after last week's Diamond Pet Food recalls, including their Friday "as we go out the door" announcement of recall expansion, we aren't doing Taste of the Wild anymore. I'm not saying that we're dropping it forever, necessarily, but definitely for the foreseeable future.

What have we gone with, you ask? Blue Buffalo Wilderness.

I actually had to sing the first verse of "Home on the Range" to remember the line about the buffalo. I hope you appreciate me. Elka did not.

One Year Blogoversary!

Funny to think that it's been a year already!

And yet, here we are. I thought it would be fun to kind of do a "year in review" roundup (though different from the New Year's  post!)