A Path With Paws

Those of you that follow my writing know that I am not a huge supplement pusher. I believe that whole good quality food goes a long way in our cats and dogs and if you feed a great diet you really don’t need a lot of powders and liquids.

That being said I often get questions about what are the best supplements and you will notice in my homemade food recipes that I often add supplements. See Diets for cancer in cats and dogs. By the way these diets are great for animals without cancer as well.

So for those of you out there that want to add in a little extra to your dog or cat’s food here are my favorites. And yes there are only three.

• Healthforce’s Vitamineral Green Powder is one of those truly great supplements. I first learned about this powder after getting an amazingly good smoothie at our local Chaco Canyon cafe. Everytime I would order it I felt like I had a little more energy and my digestion was a little better. It contained this product and I soon ordered it and not only took it myself but also added it to the homemade cat food I made instead of kelp. My cats’ digestion also improved and the volume in the litter boxes decreased. Clearly they were utilizing their food better. I highly recommend this for any animals with digestive issues or as an extra health tonic in healthy animals (or humans)



• I often get questions about medical mushroom supplements for our companion animals. Fungi Perfecti is my favorite company by far. They have a great reputation in the holistic community and really know their stuff. They also make a great companion animal product called MUSH.If you have a breed that is prone to cancers adding in a mushroom supplement can be highly beneficial. Mushrooms are also a wonderful immune booster and unusual that they can be safely used in animals with autoimmune disease or on immune suppressing drugs.



• Not all fish oils are created equal. In my opinion all liquid products should be refrigerated once opened, if they aren’t that is a problem. I don’t trust many of the animal fish oil products and prefer going with companies that also make human products that regulate for heavy metals, contaminants, and quality. My favorite company, Nordic Naturals, makes a pet products which has the same high quality of their human grade oils. I prefer their Cod Liver Oil for Pets above all other products. Fish oils and cod liver oils help with skin issues, support immune help, decrease joint inflammation in dogs and help with weight loss in older and sick animals. They can also be an added health booster for healthy dogs and cats and because of the stinky fishy taste are usually not only tolerated but liked by our animals.

My cat clients have long had the benefit of being able to use my specially made herbal tinctures. For the first time they are now available on etsy! While any of my herbal mixes can be made into a tea for the kitties, the tinctures come made to give. All my tinctures are made with love and with glycerin instead of alcohol so they are not too strong on the tongue. I can’t say that cats like my tinctures because they do still have a herbal taste and let’s face it, cats don’t like anything that is put in their mouths by someone else. However, they go down easier than most of the medications out there.

I am starting with offering my four most commonly used tinctures in the one ounce size.

• Kidney support is also available in powder form to tea. It is the traditional formula, Liu Wei Di Huang Wan and is one of the main herbals I use for older cats with kidney deficiency. Also see my article Kidney failure in cats – how Chinese medicine and diet can help
• Constipation support combines cascara which promotes gut motility with licorice root and ginger to prevent painful spasms in the colon.
• Anemia support contains two herbs, dang gui and huang qi that promote the production of red blood cells in the body
• Heart, brain and blood pressure support contains hawthorn and ginkgo which help regulate blood pressure, improve blood circulation into the brain to help with memory and support healthy heart muscle.

I often times combine kidney support and anemia support for cats with both kidney disease and anemia. Many cats with kidney disease also have high blood pressure, so sometimes kidney support gets combined with the hawthorn/ginkgo combo. I can also make either of these combinations. The constipation support I always use as a separate tincture.

I hope these tinctures additions are able to help more of the kitties out there! And I’ll be adding more formulas and sizes as we move along.