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Best Dog Foods

Discussion in 'Dog Discussion' started by Zerotec, Jan 28, 2022.

  1. Zerotec

    Zerotec Pup

    I'd love to feed raw. I just have to find some type of plan on what to feed for a balanced raw diet. I have no clue where to even start
     
  2. ben brockton

    ben brockton CH Dog

    Simple way to start. Go find you a top shelf kibble grain free. Then reverse engineer the the ingredients. Go get the book eat to win and anything wrote by Bob fritz. Study how wolves eat and sled dogs. Then you can tweak your feed program around the lifestyle of your dogs. They mammals and very similar to humans as far as nutrition goes.
     
    Zerotec likes this.
  3. phoenix walk

    phoenix walk Big Dog

    . http://dogsfirst.ie/ try here loads of info for beginners and experienced raw feeders
     
  4. Zerotec

    Zerotec Pup

    Sounds good. I'll check into both of those!
     
  5. wicked13

    wicked13 CH Dog

    Anyone feed Victor's multi pro dog food.. I have mine on the Victor's professional but wanna know if the multi pro is still decent or not
     
  6. bamaman

    bamaman GRCH Dog

    I got mine on the purple bag also
     
  7. I'm goin through the same thing now. it maybe a yeast infection due to the yeast. I switched feeds for now to experiment but also try ACV & coconut oil
     
  8. F.W.K.

    F.W.K. CH Dog

    Go with kibble for a food without artificial fragrances, colors and flavors.
     
  9. curious to know, how did your pit do on the pro plan?
     
  10. bamaman

    bamaman GRCH Dog

    Pro Plan is just freakin awesome for kibble . All life stages Pro Plan is good stuff .All my dogs do really well on it. Anyone who gone drop cash on higher end kibble Pro Plan be my number 1 choice.
     
    APBT_Fan100 likes this.
  11. Anybody tried the merrick raw infused kibble? pretty expensive but my pup seems to like it
     
  12. Pullingcovers

    Pullingcovers Top Dog

    haven’t tried it but all animals are different what works for me might work for you health wise and financially! If you’ve gone over the ingredients and got the money for it and only have to worry 1 dog and he looks good I wouldn’t change anything!
     
  13. GrChHaunch

    GrChHaunch Top Dog

    Good suggestion...having said that, the academic consensus is now that 100% grain free is not necessarily the best, some grains (of course in limited quantities) are OK, as long as your first ingredient is a whole meat. I've had good results with Blue Buffalo Life Protection.
     
  14. GrChHaunch

    GrChHaunch Top Dog

    Yeah...Origen will bankrupt you.
     
  15. slim12

    slim12 Super Moderator Staff Member

    The grains and carbs in dog food really serve no purpose nutritionally. If the dog lives outside they are helpful in maintaining weight in the colder months. The gut works really hard to digest them which generates heat. The body can off-set the 'shivering weight loss plan' with that generated heat. The only return on that gut work is the heat. (And the honking turd the next day)

    The grains and carbs and what nots in the bag foods pretty much serve two purposes. First and foremost, they are fillers and they are cheap fillers at that. Second, they give us the warm fuzzies because somewhere along the line we placed the human nutritional needs when feeding dogs. Based on that there is a billion-dollar dog food industry.

    I grew up on a yard where corn flakes and cabbage were chunks of the working dog diet. The meats were mostly chicken necks and chicken backs. The fat content was a fairly low percentage per feeding.

    I spent a number of years where I used this time every Sunday morning for reading and research. If it fell under the topic of canine athlete, I read it. I had a large notebook where I took notes and made references between their working dogs and our working dogs. How I fed working dogs began to change and now it is just about a million miles from what I knew was 'the way' back then.

    Granted the dogs have not evolved to the point that the old school means of feeding won't work as these dogs are amazing. Believe it or not they will overcome the majority of our shortcomings.

    When I work a dog the fat content (depends on the individual dog as well) can be as much as 40%-50%-60% of their feed pan. The rest are proteins such as cow cheek, chicken backs and chicken necks. I use other parts of the chicken if they go on sale, or I see a "Manager's Special".
    I buy 4-5lb bags of straight beef fat which is the trimmings off briskets, ribeyes, etc, etc. The chicken backs have a pretty good fat to protein ration and also gives some bone content.

    I try to bring dogs inside when working but I don't do enough work early in their lives for them to have a lot of 'inside the house' manners. Some don't do crating very well at all. For the dogs that are working and living outdoors I do use some brown rice and some greens a couple times per week. I cook the brown rice, let it cool and then cook it again so it splits/comes apart. The greens often will add some color to the turd and I can kinda sort of judge digestion times.

    Mushing.com, "Rendering the Sense of Fats" is a really good article to read. Dr. Stevens also has several youtube videos of his research and findings. Those dogs get a lot of fish/fish type proteins. They live and work in much harsher conditions than in the rural south. I like using fish proteins in the winter for the non-working dogs. Fish is a nutrient dense source of protein. It is more 'labor intensive" in the digestion process. I won't say all, or even a lot, but I have seen several that run hotter earlier in the work when fed a heavy portion of fish protein.

    But I am a huge fan of it in the winter. I use to buy 5-gallon buckets of Menhaden fish oil and 10/lb bags of fish meal. it is a pretty cheap way to add calories and maintain a few extra pounds in the cold.

    Another is at Sportsvet.com, "Feeding the Canine Athlete".

    From there is is trial and error until it is dialed in for the bulldog. There are no clinical trials in the billion-dollar food industry that is directed to the needs of a bulldog. One has to read/research then pick and choose what applies to a bulldog. At some point the bulldog will need to use the speed of a greyhound, the strength of a weight pulling dog and then muscular endurance of a sled dog. The biggest difference is that once the track meet starts there are no rest periods, no time limits nor are there pre-determined distances. All other athletic endeavors have their times and distances pre-set.

    Where the science turns to the art is getting just enough of all three so the dog can check 'all of the above' on his resume.

    Two rules of thumb, the feed pan has to match work plan and the work plan has to match the feed pan. You can even flip flop the phrasing if you like.

    Again, apologize for the Sunday morning babbling. On nights this weekend and I use the site to wind down before I crash for the day.

    S











     
    kdm, Michele, Zerotec and 4 others like this.
  16. GrChHaunch

    GrChHaunch Top Dog


    Great thoughtful reply. What I was referring to was the new, state of the art scientific articles that conclude (pretty overwhelmingly) that limited grains (corn is almost always bad) are in fact good for dogs. The logic is that digs have indeed evolved to a modest degree from being completely wild animals. The old logic was simple, yet elegant (as most good scientific theories are): There are really few grains in the wild that canines eat. In grain free diets the grains are replaced usually by peas, lentils and sweet potatoes which are usually, but not always OK. There have been DCM (heart) concerns associated with grain free diets, but only 515 recorded cases. The old consensus was that grain free was ALWAYS better but the new paradigm is not always.

    Most of the articles I read posit that ideally the best diet is, as so many of your argue here, raw, and you are able to custom design exactly what works best for your dog. However the margin for error is small, which is why I simply go for a very high quality kibble. Since I only have one dog, doing so is highly affordable.
     
  17. ben brockton

    ben brockton CH Dog

    Feed them whatever you want. However show me a dog with flat teeth and that's when I start to listen to these vegan quack scientists lol
     
  18. GrChHaunch

    GrChHaunch Top Dog


    Another concern is that the major dog food companies often fund research and it is more profitable to sell food with grains. Having said that, there has in fact ben some evolutionary change due to domestication.
     
  19. slim12

    slim12 Super Moderator Staff Member

    I don't have the scientific background nor expertise to refute the evolving of the dogs.

    What I do see is it being another marketing attempt by the dog food industry to sell cheaper fillers.

    The grains and vegetation a dog needs must be broken down for it to be of nutritional value. They can eat those things to til the cows come home and it will be a pass thru item.

    Now like must meat eaters. If they eat a killed prey they start eating from the ass forward. The very best thing for the animal doing the eating is the guts and what not. The grass and vegetations and grains have been digested for them.

    If you add raw green tripe to your dog's diet there is enough there to suggest the tripe will help the dog digest some grains and vegetation he ate himself.

    I am going with the thought that it is simply not natural.

    S
     
    GrChHaunch likes this.
  20. slim12

    slim12 Super Moderator Staff Member

     

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