this is a good topic!
WHAT YOU FEED A DOG===> effects their
HEALTH...Sooner or later.......
It is amazing how few people seem to understand dog nutrition.
Ppl, if you are buying your dog food in a grocery store, it is crap. Sorry, but that is the sad truth, pure crapola!!
and it does contain actual crap. ("animal digest")
Grocery store dog "food", no matter how much you paid for it, or even what your vet says-------
is mostly corn(undigestible to dogs, merely a filler, mixed with carcinogenic preservatives that have been
banned for
human use---
but i guess it's okay if our dogs get cancer???
and, "byproducts"----that is like hooves and beaks!!!! soy, wheat, brewer's rice (which is just like peanut shells) or even "animal digest" , they even put actual CARDBOARD
"cellulose" in many grocery store dog foods!!
YOu say---but, the 1st ingredient says "chicken" or whatever, BUT, the ingredients are listed by WEIGHT, and the meat is weighed prior to being dehydrated, when it is
80% WATER.....so once it IS dehydrated, the meat falls wayyyyyy further back in the list. "Meal" is good thing, is partially dehydrated meat. Also, all meats should have specific name, like "turkey", not the word "meat".
THE PROTEIN % ON THE SIDE of the bag, ALSO INCLUDES PLANT PROTEINS, and even leather would have protein, SO DON'T BE MISLED BY THAT NUMBER, and think, geez, must be lots of meat in here.
and once you get to the fat in the dog food ingredient list, after that, most other ingredients listed AFTER the fat, are pretty small amounts/not main ingredients at all.
Back in the day, i did not know any better, and i too, fed my dog grocery store dog food. I
cringe about it now,
but, i just did not know any better. I figured, if 1st ingredient is meat, it must be
mostly meat, and if it costs a lot and has well known name, well, it's a good dog food! OH I SO REGRET what i fed previous dog...i just didn't know.
I learned a lot when i rescued a "life threateningly" malnourished dog, who was too weak to run, or even stand up more than moments, had fur like dried straw, weak weak weak.......so i studied dog food, and wow,
it can be a little overwhelming when you are starting from scratch like i was.
Whenever we raw fed him, he got worms, the kind you get from raw meat. He "seemed" fine, but i
do bring in stools for worm tests, and i dislike having to give him more drugs than i have to.
Plus, honestly, we are broke.
I tried several top shelf brands,
the grain free kind,
but, instead of oats or rice, they tend to put in
POTATOES, (nutritionally, potatoes are a starch, almost identical to rice or oats anyway) in much larger amts than my dog can handle, and he always gets gas on the grain free kinds of dog food. I know ppl whose dogs digest all those potatoes just fine, though.
so we settled on "Chicken Soup For the Dog Lover's Soul"--there ARE better dog foods, but, we either can not afford them or give him worms,
or,
*my* dog can not digest them--too many POTATOES in the bag...
We make each meal 1/3 to 1/2 cooked meat (fish, beef, chicken, turkey, pork, whatever we have, he gets some, and 1 egg a week,)
He does not just get straight kibble.
Also this dog food is a tad low on fats for a dog as active as mine, so i add in a dab of cannola oil for his coat about every other bowl or a few times a week, depends on what meat he got on the kibble, and occasionally i bust a fish oil capsule into his food.
because it is only about A DOLLAR A POUND!!!
And it has FOUR meats on top of list, (
very hard to find, only Orijen list more on the top) and 2 of those are already in "meal" form.
and it contains
NO CORN, (is indigestible to dogs, is only a filler)
no poisonous preservatives,
no proven carcinogens,
no byproducts (that is like, beaks and hooves)
no animal digest (you do not want to know what THAT is!) contains
no brewer's rice,
no soy
no wheat,
no fillers!!
No cardboard either, “cellulose” it’s called on the label.
and does contain quality grains, many fruits and veggies, antioxidants, omega 3s and 6s, flaxseeds, probiotics, etc etc.
~~~~~~~~~~~`IS MADE IN AMERICA,
never gets recalled after you've already fed it to your dog.
SO IF YOU ARE BROKE, or, if your dog can't do lg amts of potatoes,
THIS MIGHT BE A GOOD KIBBLE FOR YOUR DOG.
IF YOU ARE FEEDING
GROCERY STORE DOG FOOD,
YOU SHOULD RECONSIDER continuing to do that...
If you DO choose to change your dog’s food,
SWAP OUT DOG FOOD SLOWLY, only a few kibbles at a time, over one or 2 weeks.
Rapid swap outs of dog food can give some dogs diarrhea and all kinds of problems, but, if done slowly, works out fine.