Insect protein gets talked about a lot and evidenced rather less. If your dog has a sensitive stomach and you are weighing it up, the useful question is not whether it sounds promising but what's actually been measured in dogs, and what has't.
This article sticks to that, so where there is a trial it is named, along with how many dogs were in it and how long it ran, and where there is no evidence it says so.
Is insect protein easy for dogs to digest?
Yes. This is the best-evidenced thing on this page.
In a 28-day trial of 56 adult dogs, apparent total tract digestibility of protein ran between 87.9% and 89.6%, and fat between 96.0% and 96.7%, at black soldier fly larvae inclusion levels of 5%, 10% and 20%. None of those figures was significantly different from a control diet containing no insect protein (Freel, McComb & Koutsos, Journal of Animal Science, 2021).
A separate cross-over trial in six beagles compared the same base diet made with either poultry meal or black soldier fly larvae meal. Protein digestibility was higher on the insect diet (82.3% against 80.5%), and fat digestibility higher too, 94.5% against 91.6% (Abd El-Wahab et al., Animals, 2021).
Worth being precise about that comparison: the control was poultry meal, a rendered by-product, not chicken breast. It is a fair comparison against what is actually in most dry dog food, and we are not going to describe it as anything grander.
Does insect protein help with loose stools?
Partly, and the evidence is mixed enough to set out properly.
In the six-dog cross-over trial, faecal consistency scored 2.25 on the insect diet against 2.71 on poultry meal, on a five-point scale where 2 is the optimum: closer to ideal on the insect diet, which the authors describe as a clearly positive effect. But faecal water content was higher on the insect diet, and total wet output was higher too. The authors note this and do not fully reconcile it (Abd El-Wahab et al., 2021).
In the 56-dog trial, faecal scores held at 3.3 across every group on a different five-point scale, with no difference between the insect diets and the control (Freel et al., 2021).
So it is comparable to conventional protein meals and better than poultry meal on the scored measure, with one objective measure pointing the other way. That is where it sits.
A third trial, in twelve beagles fed larvae meal at 200g/kg for five weeks, found it well tolerated with no effect on blood counts or any immune measure (Kröger, Heide & Zentek, Animal Feed Science and Technology, 2020).
Why might my dog's stools change when switching food?
Because you changed the food, almost always, and not because of the protein in it.
Any change of diet shifts stool volume and consistency for a period while the gut adjusts, particularly where two foods differ in fibre content. We put it down to the switch rather than to insect protein specifically because if the protein itself caused looser or more frequent stools, a 28-day trial feeding it at 20% inclusion would have shown it, and it did not: faecal scores were unchanged against control.
Move across gradually rather than overnight, and give it time before judging the food. We go into this in more detail in why is my dog pooping more after switching food.
What is a novel protein, and why does it matter for a sensitive dog?
A novel protein is simply one your dog has not eaten before.
A dog cannot become sensitised to a protein it has never encountered, which is why novel proteins are a standard tool in veterinary elimination diets. Black soldier fly larvae qualify for almost every dog in the UK, because practically none have eaten insects before.
That is a point about exposure rather than about insects being incapable of causing a reaction, and novel is not the same as non-allergenic. No protein is allergen-free, and insect proteins are still being studied for cross-reactivity with house dust mite allergens. What novelty does is make a pre-existing sensitivity very unlikely. More on novel proteins here.
What insect protein has not been shown to do
Three things, each of which you will find claimed elsewhere.
It has not been shown to improve the gut microbiome. The one trial that examined faecal microbiota in dogs found that replacing 20% of dietary protein with defatted larvae meal shifted bacterial populations in ways its authors viewed with caution, and reduced protein and organic matter digestibility at that inclusion level. Their conclusion was that long-term feeding at 20% may have adverse effects (Jian et al., Frontiers in Microbiology, 2022).
It has not been shown to be anti-inflammatory in dogs. The trial that measured immune markers directly found no effect at all (Kröger et al., 2020).
It has not been proven hypoallergenic. No controlled trial has fed insect protein to a group of dogs with confirmed food allergy and measured clinical reactions. One small, uncontrolled four-week trial in eight dogs with diagnosed food reactions found they stayed stable, with one withdrawn after its itching worsened. That is early evidence, not proof.
As background rather than dog evidence: black soldier fly larvae are genuinely protein-dense, at roughly half their dry weight. That is a fact about the larvae, established in insect nutrition research, not a finding about what happens in a dog.
Sustainability is a real benefit of insect farming, but it is not the subject here and it has nothing to do with your dog's stomach.
Where our packaging says “hypoallergenic”, we mean the recipe leaves out the ingredients dogs most commonly react to. Here’s exactly what we mean by that.
Where Grub Club fits
Good Gut Grub is our complete dry food for dogs with sensitive digestion. Black soldier fly larvae are the only animal protein in it, at 30% of the recipe. The carbohydrate base is tapioca starch and sweet potato, with fava bean as the secondary protein, and it contains no pea and no potato. It includes psyllium husk at 1%, chicory FOS at 0.1%, brewer's yeast at 4% and a tyndallised Lactobacillus helveticus culture. Analytical constituents: 21% crude protein, 10% fat, 4.5% fibre, 347 kcal per 100g.
All-Day Buffet is the everyday alternative, also 30% insect protein, with sweet potato, potato, whole lentils and pea protein. A dog that reacts to pea or potato can eat Good Gut Grub but not All-Day Buffet.
Neither is a prescription diet, and neither has been clinically tested as a treatment for food allergy, chronic enteropathy or any other condition. If your dog has persistent diarrhoea, weight loss or blood in the stool, that is a vet visit rather than a food change.
Shop gut health · What the research shows about insect protein and digestion
References
- Freel, T.A., McComb, A. and Koutsos, E.A. (2021). Digestibility and safety of dry black soldier fly larvae meal and black soldier fly larvae oil in dogs. Journal of Animal Science, 99(3), skab047. https://doi.org/10.1093/jas/skab047
- Abd El-Wahab, A., Meyer, L., Kölln, M., Chuppava, B., Wilke, V., Visscher, C. and Kamphues, J. (2021). Insect larvae meal (Hermetia illucens) as a sustainable protein source of canine food and its impacts on nutrient digestibility and fecal quality. Animals, 11(9), 2525. https://doi.org/10.3390/ani11092525
- Kröger, S., Heide, C. and Zentek, J. (2020). Evaluation of an extruded diet for adult dogs containing larvae meal from the Black soldier fly (Hermetia illucens). Animal Feed Science and Technology, 270, 114699. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.anifeedsci.2020.114699
- Jian, S. et al. (2022). Effects of black soldier fly larvae as protein or fat sources on apparent nutrient digestibility, fecal microbiota, and metabolic profiles in beagle dogs. Frontiers in Microbiology, 13, 1044986. https://doi.org/10.3389/fmicb.2022.1044986
