Buddy is my elderly golden retriever companion, and a living testimonial for homemade natural pet food.

In 1989, Buddy wandered into my life halfway through his own, and in spite of being starved, battered and exhausted from having been lost in the high Sierra Nevada mountains for what must have been a long time, he seemed quite healthy.

I welcomed him into my home, fed him a diet of the best commercial kibble, and had him neutered and vaccinated.  Life was good . . .

Until the skin problems began . . . and many trips to the Vet resulted in multiple presciptions of cortisone drugs for the itching, antibiotics for the secondary skin infections, antihistamines for systemic allergy control, and medication to regulate his thyroid, which had collapsed at that point.  He even lost control of his bladder . . . What would come next?

It was obvious that I needed to do something really different or I would lose my dear friend. A homeopathic veterinarian advised me to change his diet to homemade food, and gradually the drugs were eliminated.

Buddy's improvement was immediate and dramatic, continuing at a steady pace until I was no longer worried that I would lose him.  In addition, after a few months of homemade food, his breath (which in the past had driven me out of rooms!) became sweet and his teeth looked amazingly clean and white.

Today, Buddy is at least 14 years old, quite healthy and active, and is the official "taster" for every batch of food I make.  And I have seen his story repeated many times over, as people change their pets' diets to natural, vital, live nutrition.