Almost 2 years on and I still recieve  a tremendous volume of mail from people all asking if and how we can try to protect our dogs.  Well I'm afraid I don't have the answers you all need and want, that's why we desperately need MORE RESEARCH into this dreadful condition!  

Lets Feed More Safely! 
NO exercise 2 hours before feeding
NO exercise 2 hours after feeding
NO water straight before food and again none directly after food.
In this heat just now water needs to be given regularly if it's not freely available, little and often is best.
***Raised feeders, ah well some go for raising the feeder others say don't so when I have something a little more accurate I'll be sure to get it to you***.
DRY KIBBLES MUST BE SOAKED THROUGH!!! Dry must be completely soaked through especially if the dog is noted to be a "gassy" dog this one's VERY important.  NEVER soak any food containing citric acid!
Feed 2 to 3 times a day, smaller volumes, dog won't feel as hungry so hopefully won't gulp either.
If your dog is a gulper slow him down any way you can, he's taking in extra air when he's gulping and it could cause big problems.
Supervise feeding times and watch the dog of unusual behaviour after feeding.

Always feed a high quality dog food too, know what's in it, find out if it doesn't tell you on the packaging if it's "highly digestible"  You can always do a kibble test too, take a cup of kibble and cover it with water, check at 15 minute intervals to see what happens, I've done this test myself on many, many foods and I've found that some are completely moistened after only 15 minutes, some however needed more water and took up to 12 hours to soak through!  Of course I can't name products here but believe me it really is worth taking the time to do this test, it's also noteable that some breed specific foods are very highly digestible and really don't need water adding BUT you still need to feed regularly and restrict the exercise both before and after feeding.

One theory of moistening a dry food first is allowing it to expand before entering the stomach.  However most accredited sources recommend the avoidance of feeding low quality commercial diets because they tend to be more bulky and over a period of time “stretch the stomach ligament attachments thereby increasing the possibility of rotation and twisting”.  Low quality diets are also more likely to cause low-grade inflammation/dysfunction of the digestive system, and unfortunately one may not expect to see outward (clinical) signs of a problem.

For breeds prone to bloat it is always advisable to feed a diet which is easily digested to avoid irritation of the digestive tract and to lessen the likelihood of bloat.  It should not matter then whether you soak the food or not.   Recommended feeding amounts are that you may feed 20% - 30% less than you would of other foods.  Feeding a lesser volume of food helps to avoid distension of the stomach.

More to follow

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