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Great Dog Food Site

I've been on that site before, it is very informative and clears up a lot of questions about what food is best for our dogs.
 
Thanks for posting that site -- it is really good.

I was happy that "Taste of the Wild" which I have recently started using ranked as 5 star (2 varieties) or 4 star (salmon variety). I actually use the Salmon variety, but I may switch to one of the other 2 flavors that made the 5 Star list. It looks like their only reservation on the salmon variety is whether they use Ethoxycin (sp?), a preservative that they don't like that is commonly used in fish meal.

Was surprised to see Royal Canin as only 1 Star. It kind of confirms my frequent reading of the package ingredients that always makes me put it back on the shelf.

I also found out the calories of the dog food Daisy used to always eat and it is very HIGH! I have always looked on the package but it was never listed. I won't be buying that any more. It had 50 more kilocalories per cup than the Taste of the Wild Salmon! And Daisy needs to lose weight. That's great information. Thanks again for posting it!
 
That's why I loved the site. I was told that a certain brand was good at Pets Mart & when I read this site, it was among the poorest. Quality not price matters when it comes to the health of Hali. I thought others would enjoy this site as there are always so many questions as to what to feed our dogs. Debbie
 
I am hugely depressed now! :confused: We feed our two Royal Canin thinking it was one of the top dog foods, and Royal Canin Mini 27 is now rated only at 2 stars!??:eek: 2 out of 6 is NOT good enough. Now the search starts for a new food. Artemis small breed looks good.
 
Well now I'm really torn.

We feed Royal Canin. I've seen this web site before, but never bothered to look up the Royal Canin Mini. We have always gone by the Whole Dog Journal list that comes out once a year. Looks like the 2 lists disagree. :confused: I may have to spend some time researching the reasoning behind the ratings of this other list.

Having said that, this year the WDJ didn't list Royal Canin this year, not because they were a low quality food, but because they didn't disclose their protein source after the contamination problems last year. In fact, there were several foods that were listed previous years, but not this year for the same reason.
 
I prefer the WDJ list to this website myself. I know who the WDJ reviewers are and their qualifications. Th website is anonymous and therefore -- who the heck are these people? Why should I believe their judgements and what personal biases might they have? Why won't they put their names to their reviews? That's my own personal take -- I just don;t like anonymous sites. It also does differ from the WDJ list many times.

Given that most dogs never have a single problem with corn or wheat, and that most allergies are to beef, chicken, egg and dairy as well as sometimes, grains, I also take recommendations based on certain ingredients with a pretty big grain of salt (so to speak!).

If breeders and trainers have had consistent good results with a food over many years, I prefer that recommendation to opting for a food based on the latest trendy ideas and ingredients. There are a lot of self-appointed experts on what is in dog foods now especially on the internet --- and oddly most people eat all these ingredients themselves even though similar things cause allergies in humans. And daily, we eat plenty of preservatives etc -- and do not think twice. Look at what is in your typical cookie/biscuit, chocolate treat, or pizza, or ready meal, or soup, or the preservatives in any packaged meat product you eat -- sausages, bacon, ham, lunch meats -- you and your children and partner are eating regularly all the stuff you won't feed your dog. :rolleyes:

A recent extensive study showed as well that in 70% of cases where parents were sure their children had allergies, they did not. I would say the same holds for dogs.

Given that in the wild, canids eat rotting meat and carrion crawling with god knows what (few canids actually hunt and take down healthy animals -- they scavenge old dead things or cull the sick, the aged and the young) , I think a quality kibble of any type is a perfectly healthy option. I do like to avoid preservatives just as I do in my own food. I like adding some real food and not relying totally on a kibble and sometimes make homecooked. Very few wild dogs that I have heard of ever hunt down or scavenge rosemary oil, potatoes, salmon oil, dried kelp, dandelion, rosehips or many of the things that it says are in the food I am feeding at the moment. :rolleyes:

Common sense is very useful when looking at animal foods, go with what you can afford and is of a quality you prefer but don;t get all wound up about it. :lol: And while we are this inspired we should all improve our own diets to our dogs' levels. :lol:
 
Karlin -- I know what you mean about how we stress out about our dogs' food and analyze ingredients, nutrition, etc. and then we go out and have a Big Mac and fries for dinner! I am definitely guilty of this. I should worry so much about my food and the foods I make/buy for my kids!

My parents fed Kibbles and Bits (grocery store brand) to our poodles growing up, and when I was in my 20s and still lived with or near my parents and so still spent a lot of time with our dogs, I switched them to Iams thinking I was doing them a great service. Despite all of this, Misty lived to 15 and Sydney lived to 16 and they were both very healthy all their lives!

I don't know much about the source of the Dog Food Analysis website, other than it seems to be tied to a Boxer dog group. But having said that, I will say I think their reviews have some logic to them, just in the points they make, they logic they present, and the way they are written, I guess. They definitely seem to be very picky about the ingredients in their rankings and reviews.
 
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Glad this subject came up and find all the comments helpful, especially the website you reccommend Karlin. I too have become overly paranoid just recently about commercial dog food preperations, additives etc etc. There are some really scaremongering sites around right now stating that we are literally shortening our dog's life by choosing commerical dog foods, also saying that if we knew what went into the food we would be terrified to use it! One goes so far as to say that even Vetinaries are reccommending foods which were originally suggested to them by visiting dog food producers during Vet College training and went on to state that Vets knowledge of animal nutrition is very basic. On the other hand we are told that unless a home cooked meal is totally balanced with the correct amount of protein, vitamins and minerals that we can do more harm than giving a commercial brand!!!! How confusing for people. I would not have a clue as to where to purchase a dog food that is totally without additives or chemicals of some kind, so what I have always done is to feed the best I can possibly afford and mix it with all the organic reccommend fresh food I can, making sure to avoid the foods that are toxic to dogs. As you so rightly said Karlin, dogs ate so differently in the wild and the smellier the better it seems. Some of the aforementioned sites also maintain that diseased animal carcasses are used in the production of kibble, and say we should be concerned about the level of chemicals in the prior medications in the animal's system, especially anaesthesia and so on. It just goes on and on and one does wonder if some of it is contrived in order to encourage us to buy their 'totally organic specially prepared food' I for one was totally confused by the whole thing and began to feel guilty about what I was feeding my dogs, even though they were always full of health and energy and had glistening coats right up until the end of their happy lives. Who really knows what is best any more? One has to keep a balance I guess and use common sense. One poor lady told me that she responded to one of these sites and gave her opinion only to receive a response to the effect that the respondee's own dog died early because of his commercial diet and that since receiving her letter he had a dream that her dog was sitting next to his and asked her could this be a message to change her ways. She made the unfortunate error of having told him her dog's name and breed in her original post. Poor lady was so distraught and I feel the perpetrator should have been reported. He is an Australian guy living in the US and claims to be an expert on dog food. More likely out to scare people into buying his brand of who knows what! So I guess we all need to be aware of these people and their scaremongering tactics too. They really know how to get to pet lovers.
 
One thing to keep in mind is that while price can be an indicator, the most expensive food isn't always the best! I never like Royal Canin based on ingredients personally, but know others that love it, I also believe there's no one perfect dog food!!! Before I switched to raw I did a rotation diets of the foods I personally felt where best, with the exception of one called Blackwood, it's a good food, but not a great food based on ingredients - But the formula I used is a very high nutrient food, I'd use that one when I needed to put weight on a dog, never found another food that worked better!!!! If a food is working for you, and your dogs are healthy, in good body condition, and have a good coat, while trying something else won't hurt, it also doesn't mean you need to dump your food!!!
 
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