We hope that you and your four legged friends are enjoying the delights of 2015. We are already hard at work creating some very tempting recipes for the year ahead that we’re sure your pets will love! It’s not always easy to stick to a healthy diet ourselves, but there are some easy peasy ways to keep your pets happy and trim;

we’ve included some tips of the trade to help give your pets the most nutritious start to the year. Finally, we’d like to introduce three new members of the team who have recently joined us; Jodie on the customer care team, Fathila on accounts and Ben in our sales team. Soon the humans will outnumber the pets...

www.lilyskitchen.co.ukSpring 2015

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Healthy eating for 2015 – start as you mean to go on!Healthy feeding strategies for your pet include first and foremost cutting out any unhealthy ‘human’ treats that they get! This includes the digestive biscuit before bedtime and the left over roast dinner that they beg for every Sunday! Try offering sticks of carrot and apple or healthy ‘Lily’s Kitchen’ treats like our Bedtime Biscuits instead. Don’t forget that attention and a game are all that some pets want – so don’t automatically give them foods as rewards.

Delicious low fat treats & recipesWhy not try our Lovely Lamb with Peas & Parsley recipe for any dog that needs to lose a few pounds? This wholesome, grain free dry kibble is great for dogs with allergies and sensitivities, it contains freshly prepared grass-fed lamb, fruits

and vegetables as well our vet-selected botanical herbs. Lovely Lamb is naturally low in fat but also contains L-carnitine, a natural additive to help promote fat breakdown, which makes it ideally suited to hounds trying to lose the pounds! Have you tried our Truly Naturals Fish Skin Chews? These treats are naturally low in fat and a very tasty way to start your dog’s health kick.These chews contain only sustainably fished, line caught stock that is naturally air dried and completely additive free. They are easy to digest and are a great source of omega 3, so will keep your dogs coat looking shiny and glossy.

Come and meet us!As ever we will be out and about over the coming months with our award winning trade stand. Please do come and say hello at one of the biggest dates on the doggie calendar, Crufts (5 March-8 March). We’d love to see you and we’ll have a great range of special treats and tasters to give away in Hall 1 Stand No. 85!

Recovery Recipe to the rescue!We all know how tough it can be to see our canine companion under the weather, which is why Lily has come to the rescue with our new Recovery Recipe! It is as gentle on the stomach as homemade chicken and rice but with a whole host of added nutritional goodies to have your favorite friend bouncing around again in no time. This grain-free recipe is made with freshly prepared chicken, soothing potato and yummy banana, perfect to keep in your cupboard for those ‘just in case’ days. By lowering the meat content and adding white potato we have achieved the right energy balance for recovering dogs that require less energy whilst they are taking it easy. This recipe is also 30% lower in fat that the rest of our tinned food, which will help your dog to keep to their ideal weight during recovery periods or in their elder years. What really makes this recipe special is our use of prebiotics moS and FoS which are essential in supporting a healthy digestive system, helping to avoid upset tummies.

Happy Tilly – the staffy that stole our heartLizzie manko contacted us to tell us about ‘Happy Tilly’ and how our foods helped to clear up her skin complaint. “After rescuing Tilly (staffy/labrador cross) 4 years ago from Ardley Kennels in Oxfordshire, we put her on a diet of chum and mixer thinking she’d be alright on that as she consistently had skin problems. But she wasn’t! Since starting on Lily’s Kitchen, which she absolutely loves, her skin problems have completely cleared up and her coat is so soft she gets compliments all the time.”

Stripy Dog in the salubrious suburb of Bristol was started two years ago by Dasha and her mum Olena Syrpis. Their lovely high street shop was born when they saw a gap in the market for a pet shop that sold good quality, stylish and locally made pet products. Before this they could only source what they wanted for their lovely Eurasian, Lex, online. Their skills and care speak for themselves as the waiting time for a grooming appointment is months ahead! Lily’s Kitchen is the runaway best seller of their foods – with regular customers making it their one stop shop.

Stripy Dog61 Westbury Hill, Westbury-on-Trym, Bristol Bs9 3ad or online at www.stripydog.co.uk Telephone 0117 962 8989

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This newsletter was written by Holly Mash holistic vet www.hollymashvet.com

We would welcome your comments and suggestions, please let us know what you think of our newsletter and what you would like to see profiled in future editions.

ideas@lilyskitchen.co.uk

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Create your own feline friendly gardenGetting out into the spring sunshine to tend to the garden is one of the joys of the new year. For all you cat owners out there it only takes a bit of extra thought to make your garden truly ‘feline-friendly’! This will give your cat a huge boost to their mental as well as their emotional wellbeing, and also of course benefits their physical health. There are simple but effective ways of making your garden as relaxing and rewarding a place for your cat as it is for you. Cats need to be able to hunt, stalk, chase and explore, and a garden is the perfect place for them to be able to express these natural instincts. Stimulate all your cat’s senses with a range of plants of different heights, scents and textures. Make part of your garden like a mini-jungle, so that your cat can stalk and track butterflies and insects. Trees with low, flexible branches, such as birches, can provide sticks and twigs that make fun chase and pounce games for cats. They can of course also be excellent for climbing, as well as being nature’s very own scratching posts to help keep your cat’s claws strong and healthy. Happy gardening!

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On their own some minerals are more difficult to absorb from the diet than others – that’s why these tricky to absorb minerals are attached to, (or ‘chelated’ with), another molecule such as a protein, in order to make them easier to absorb. The process of attaching an inorganic compound (such as the mineral) to an organic compound (such as a protein) – is called ‘chelation’. Chelated minerals are easier to absorb and is why we use them in all our recipes here at Lily’s Kitchen. We want your precious pets to get the full benefits of their foods after all!

unique breeds- The eurasianThis is a lovely little spitz type dog that is very rare to see in the UK. Eurasians are calm, even-tempered dogs that are around 50-60cm tall with short coats and tails that curl back over their backs. These dogs were originally bred in Germany in the 1960’s as a cross between a Samoyd, a Wolfspitz and a Chow Chow.If you have a photo of your own one of these super fellows please email bark@lilyskicthen.co.uk – we’d love to see them!

Fresh fruit salad for fidoFruit contains valuable minerals, vitamins, enzymes and fibre so why not give your dog a healthy fruit salad every so often? Fruit is easily digested, and most fruit is alkalizing, cleansing and cooling. Combine one ripe banana, one apple (chopped and peeled) and about 100g blueberries and there you have a fantastic fruit salad!

For this and more tasty home made recipes check out Henrietta’s bestselling cookbook Dinner for Dogs. We suggest home cooking for your dog once a week.

all abouT ColiTis

our vet’s adviceColitis is a relatively common condition in dogs and is due to inflammation of the lower bowel and colon. It can result in symptoms that include passing of loose, mucussy stools that may have blood in and be of variable consistency. Common causes of colitis include: food allergies or dietary intolerances, stress, parasites (worms) and in some cases the cause is unknown. Having enough fibre in the diet is one of the key nutritional factors involved in management of this condition because of its wealth of beneficial effects on the colon. Our recipes help to provide natural fibre and support a dogs digestive system in this way. Our diets at Lily’s Kitchen may be suitable for animals that are recovering from colitis because of their high digestibility, optimum fibre content and because they contain sources of omega 3.