Food Friday: Alternative Protein Roundup, Rabbit Edition

Brisbane's Bark Blog has been around for close to two years now, and in that time we've reviewed a lot of food and treats that use allergy-friendly alternative proteins like rabbit. Since Brisbane is allergic to poultry, I don't normally consider turkey and duck to be alternative proteins. I also know that beef is a common allergen, and that buffalo and bison may not be different enough for dogs with beef allergies. Lamb was considered alternative a couple of decades ago but has become increasingly more common since then. For the purpose of this blog post, I'm going to stick with the more exotic choices.

Rabbit is a high-protein, lean meat that, frankly, should be cheaper and easier to find in the grocery store. Those little buggers are everywhere, on the trail one even leaped into Brisbane's mouth. I bet giant bunny feedlots in the middle of California would smell way better than the legions of cows currently occupying that space.

This picture has nothing to do with this post.
Photo by Erin Koski

Rabbit Food

I think our favorite rabbit-based food is Stella & Chewy's Absolutely Rabbit, freeze-dried is always a winner around here. Wysong Archetype was also a winner until Brisbane's allergy test revealed his barley allergy. Raw is also quite popular, and Brisbane and Sisci both loved the Primal Nuggets we tried. The place where I work used to carry Wild Calling Hoppy's canned dog food, and that was what we tempted picky dogs with until our vendor stopped offering it. Instinct also offers a rabbit-based canned food. Our least favorite was Natural Balance Limited Ingredient Diet Potato and Rabbit, which is high in carbs while being low in protein and fat. Mostly it's just widely available and worth trying if you're not sure what your dog is allergic to and can't get something like Wysong Anergen 2 instead.

Rabbit Treats

In addition to rabbit-based diets, we've found a bunch of bunnymeat treats. Some are made almost entirely from rabbit meat, like Wysong's Dream Treats and Barkworthy's Rabbit BonBons. Others have some additional ingredients, like the Etta Says Crunchy Rabbit Chews that also contain rawhide. Zukes offers a couple of different rabbit-based versions of their semi-moist treats. Their Lil' Links Rabbit and Apple Recipe are still safe for Brisbane's ever-growing list of allergies, but their Mini Naturals are full of barley so those are now off the menu for us.

Have you found a rabbit-based product we haven't tried yet? Please share in the comments!

Treat Tuesday: Etta Says Crunchy Rabbit Chew and Barkworthies Rabbit Bon Bons

Rabbit rabbit is our theme this Treat Tuesday, with Etta Says Crunchy Rabbit Chews and Barkworthies Rabbit Bon Bons. Mmm, rabbit.

The Etta Says Crunchy Rabbit Chew arrived in our December BarkBox and was a quick snack rather than a gnawing project. This is a mixture of ground rawhide and rabbit meat, so it should be digestible but also a little tougher than just plain jerky.

Good For: A nice treat for a special occasion, or when I am walking out the door and wish to stave off separation anxiety by keeping Brisbane busy for a few minutes.

Not Good For: Dogs with beef allergies, since it contains rawhide. Keeping dogs busy for a long time.

How Much We Like It: One of our local independent pet stores just started carrying these, and they are sold individually so I might as well grab a couple whenever we're there.

The Barkworthies All Natural Rabbit Bon Bons came from that same pet store. Barkworthies makes a wide variety of goodies, from bully sticks to antlers and jerky. They did have a recall a couple of weeks ago, for chicken jerky treats potentially contaminated with salmonella. That seems to be an ongoing issue with chicken jerky in general, but at least Barkworthies chicken jerky is made in the USA and not China. These rabbit bon bons, however, are a product of Australia, where the surplus of rabbits is infinite.

Good For: Stuffing in size large and bigger Kongs. Treating dogs with allergies, since rabbit is the sole ingredient.

Not Good For: Training treats, though tasty they're also huge.

How Much We Like Them: They just fit so perfectly through the hole of the Kongs, like they were made to go there. "This is my hole! It was made for me!"