The Best Dog Food – Learn How to Choose the Best Food for your Dog
March 20, 2009 by admin
Filed under Dog Food Tips
When looking for the best dog food there are many variables to consider. No matter what breed of dog you have, there are hundreds of dog food options available. This can provide a significant amount of difficulty when trying to choose the best dog food to meet your standards. There are some simple steps that you can take to help choose a high quality dog food that will best help maintain your dog’s good health.
BEWARE OF PRESERVATIVES
Due to the process involved in creating commercial dog food, some dog food companies will add different preservatives to increase shelf life. However, some of these preservatives can be very harmful to your dog’s well-being, and may cause serious health conditions. Examples of dangerous preservatives for Labrador Retrievers include: Potassium Sorbate, Ethoxyquin, BHA, and BHT. Ethoxyquin in particular has been a subject of debate, with some veterinary studies linking it to potentially serious liver damage. Natural preservatives that are not harmful to your dog’s health include Vitamin C and Vitamin E, though these natural preservatives give your dog food a much shorter shelf life.
PROPER NUTRITIONAL RATIO
A generally applied ratio for your dog’s nutritional needs is a formula that contains 50% vegetables, 40% meat/protein, and 10% (or less) carbohydrates (sugars, grains, starches, etc). However, this guideline has been modified by some dog nutritional specialists, instead suggesting that a dog food contain 70% meat, 30% vegetables, and no carbohydrate ingredients. This is the nutritional philosophy behind dog food companies such as Orijen Dog Food, who have developed their formula using absolutely no grains or starches. If your dog consumes a diet that is high in carbohydrates, this can cause diabetes, as well as obesity. Because your dog’s digestive system is not fully equipped to handle a high-carbohydrate diet, use caution when choosing a dog food that has a high carbohydrate content.
AVOID “FILLER” INGREDIENTS
A filler is something that has been added to your dog’s food to help him feel “full” but contains little to no nutritional value.
Examples of filler ingredients include:
- Citrus pulp
- Corn and wheat
- Seed Hulls
- Soy
- Animal Digest
Some fillers can actually irritate your dog’s digestive system. So, if you have an older dog or an animal with health problems, feeding a food without fillers may improve his or her health.
To avoid fillers, look at the ingredients on your pet food. While some companies may list real meat as their number one ingredient, they may actually have more fillers, which reduces the ratio of quality ingredients to useless ones.
DIETARY VARIETY
Just like humans, dogs will respond well to a small amount of variation in their diet. Some veterinary experts recommend that you switch between two or three different dog food brands about once every two months. You should maintain a quality standard for all of your chosen foods, and be sure that each dog food is compatible with your dog’s digestive system (i.e. no regurgitated food!).
There you have it. I hope that these tips have been helpful. Are you familiar with the ingredients in your dog’s food?
Who wrote this and where did you get your definition of “meal”? It does not agree with the AAFCO definition of meal and I have never seen any other rating that agrees with this definition of “meal.”
Ditto on Robert’s comment. In actuality, meal is the denser form of a given meat protein. For instance, the ingredient chicken includes all of the moisture content in chicken meat. However, chicken meal is the meat minus the moisture. Therefore, on a dry matter basis, chicken meal is considered to be a better protein source than chicken. You want a food that has a named meat meal as the first ingredient or at the very least the second ingredient.
It is only if it is listed as by-product (as in chicken by-product meal) that the meal would consist of the leftover bits.
I’m new to this web site and because of this article I will not read further. For a dry food, you want meal as first ingredient. I agree with Robert and Bill and please do your research before writing an article like this one.
I have done extensive research and “meal” is actually from rendered animal tissues where the actual muscle tissues have been processed, most likely, for human consumption. Actual meat(chicken, fish, lamb, beef, venison, etc.) is the preferred first ingredient to look for when reading labels. Poultry and meat by-products actually rank higher on the preferred list of ingredients before ANY type of meal. If you’re looking to provide your pet with a wholesome diet, there are several books regarding canine nutrition and feeding available, check out authors; Lowell Ackerman, Sandy Agar, Donald Strombeck, and Henry Lu, to name a few.
I’ve read this article 3x and I can’t find the word ‘meal’ anywhere. I like to see meat as the first 4 ingredients. Never any brewer’s anything. No corn or wheat. Ethoxyquin is listed as a carcinogen.
This new idea that meat meal is not only an acceptable source of protein for dog foods but is actually superior to whole meat ingredients is baffling to me. I typically feed a homemade diet to my four dogs, but I occasionally supplement it with commercial foods, and the staff at the store have begun parroting the same idea – that it is preferred because, being a dry ingredient, it contains more protein than real meat, which, because of naturally occurring moisture, is inferior. This is patently false, and after speaking with the very well-meaning staff at this very good store, I have come to the conclusion that this rumor is coming directly from food manufacturers trying to pass off their meat-meal-containing foods as being as good as or better than true premium foods.
I’m not a vet or a food scientist, but simply reading through this definition of what a meat meal is (published by and for the meat processing industry and therefore pretty much from the horse’s mouth) makes it very clear to me that this is not a substance that I will ever choose to feed my own dogs.
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Meat and bone meal, meat meal, slaughterhouse by-product meal
Description:
Meat and bone meal is prepared from the wastes materials associated with slaughtering operations (carcass trimmings, condemned carcasses, condemned livers, inedible offal (lungs) and bones) and also from the rendering of dead animals. There can be a wide variation between plants and batches in what goes into the meat and bone meal that is being prepared. If the ash content is high, this indicates that it contains a higher amount of bones and is referred to as meat and bone meal. If the ash content is lower it is referred to as meat meal. Typically when the phosphorus content is above 4.5 % P, then it is called meat and bone meal and when it is below that level it is referred to as meat meal or some other term. In addition to the protein (amino acids) meat and bone meal is an excellent source of calcium and phosphorus and some other minerals (K, Mg, Na, etc.). The ash content of the meat and bone meal normally ranges from 28 to 36 %; calcium is 7 to 10 % and phosphorus 4.5 to 6 %. When using meat and bone meal as the primary supplemental protein source the mineral levels may limit its use in some diet formulations. Meat and bone meal like with other animal products is a good source of Vitamin B-12. Like other animal protein sources meat and bone meal has a good amino acid profile. Digestibility of the protein fraction is normally quite high, ranging from 81 to 87 % (Kellems, 2000). Its protein quality is lower than fish meal or soybean meal for applications in feeding swine or poultry when used to supplement CP in cereal based diets. In ruminant it can readily be used to replace most other supplemental protein sources. The CP is less ruminally degradable, and will pass thorough the rumen without being degraded when compared to many other supplemental protein sources. Processing temperature will also effect the availability of the protein fraction. Often pepsin digestibility of the protein fraction is used as a means of determining the extent of processing and availability of the protein fraction. Excessive heating during processing can reduce the digestibility of the CP.
“This is the nutritional philosophy behind dog food companies such as Orijen Dog Food, who have developed their formula using absolutely no grains or starches.”
This is also inaccurate. Orijen contains no grains but it DOES contain starches (carbohydrates) – RUSSET POTATOES are starch and russet potatoes are no better than the best grains (brown rice). Somebody should start doing better research.
I think the article provides useful information for dog owners, and the posirive comments bear that out. I worked in a beef packing plant and personaly saw what goes into “meal”. It is far from a healthy main ingredient whether it has moisture content or not!!! If it’s “meal” you want, then start saving yourself some money and start feeding your dog roadkill. I’m wondering what dog food company “Robert”, “Bill”, and “J” work for, and if they’re not the same person altogether???
Robert, who do you work for? I have never read anything that Orijen or Champion dog food states they are starch less and I am sitting here with a bag of Orijen right in front of me. Only that they are grain less.. Everyone knows potatoes are starch’s. So what is your point???? And how many potatos do you think are in a 30 pound bag of Orijen, 5 maybe. That would equal 125 grams of starch, TOTAL, according to the site I was just on, russet potatoes.
Meal of specific origin costs more for manufacturers to use than Meat of specific origin as meal contains more weight of product.
Jess
Following is the quote by the reviewer. It is not my statement.
“This is the nutritional philosophy behind dog food companies such as Orijen Dog Food, who have developed their formula using absolutely no grains or starches.”
– I never said that Orijen said that it was starchless. I was responding to the quote by the reviewer and I put it within quotes to show that. The reviewer has revised the review so that it does not now appear in the review. That is why I copied it in my response. The reviewer did the same thing to my response to the claim about meal and I hadn’t copied the quote, hence the remark by someone that he didn’t see the word “meal” anywhere.
Sheila,
No one said that chicken meal is superior to chicken. It only indicates that if chicken is listed as the first ingredient in one food and chicken meal is the first ingredient in a second that there is more protein in the second because “chicken” is about 95% water and chicken meal is merely chicken with the water removed and ingredients are listed on the bag by weight and in the end most of the moisture is taken out anyway. So chicken meal is not superior to chicken, there is just more of it.