Vegetarian dog food?

Some friends of ours had an Italian greyhound, and ended up getting a second one from another family. The other family was completely vegetarian, and had been feeding the dog on a vegetarian dog food. There was a big difference between this Italian greyhound and our friends', even though they were the same age and weighed the same. The vegetarian greyhound had a very flaccid muscle tone, and there was a definate difference in coat texture. Changing foods fixed the problems

Was this an isolated case? Are vegetarian dog foods really healthy for a dog? I know they're gaining in popularity, so I thought I'd ask.

I am sort of against vegetarian and vegan dog foods. As far as I'm concerned, a dog is a carnivore and NEEDS meat.

It's not really the best for them, being as they truley are designed to eat meat and get all their vegetable matter pre-digested, while humans can go either way or do well enough getting alternative protien sources.

Sometimes it can't be helped though. Daniel's old collie had liver and kidney problems his whole life and ended up eating a veggie dog food because he simply couldn't digest meat products anymore. He was such a small, skinny collie (around Sawyer's height but always around or under 30 pounds) but oh was his coat gorgeous!

i agree with zoom,, it's certainly not the best choice to feed a dog a vegetarian diet, but sometimes it's necessary for health reasons. but even then, a properly balanced home prepared vegetarian diet will surpass any veggie kibble you can find on the market.