What’s the best food for dogs? I believe this is a personal choice and how your dog responds to particular types of foods. Whatever dog food you choose, it should primarily fit into your budget, your dog needs to like it and he should’t react to it.
When it come to feeding the best food, nothing comes close to homemade cooking, raw or quality kibble. Preparing a healthy dinner for your dog symbolizes your love for him and he’ll feel more part of your family. Cooking your own dog food though can be time consuming, especially if you own a handful of dogs, have children and work full-time or even a part time.
Cooking kilo’s of dog food each day for me wouldn’t fit into my schedule. However, I do cook extra food when cooking family meals, any leftovers are given to my dog. I use a quality dry dog food as a base, then add raw or cooked foods depending what’s handy at the time. Furthermore, variety is the spice of life so adding different foods keeps your dogs taste buds happy and healthy.
There is no such thing a complete dog food, not even in the kibble range. However, the closest to a complete food would have to be Orijen, which has a 5-6 star rating. The best food for dogs is a variety, all animals need a diversity of foods just like humans do.
Feeding your dogs the best food
There are three categories to feeding your dog best:
1. Raw dog food – checkout What’s the fuss about raw food for dogs?
2. High quality dry dog food – checkout: Choosing the best dry dog food
3. Homecooked food – checkout: Getting to grips with the best dog foods
There are two advantages to dry dog food:
Photo by OnyxDog86
1. It’s cost effective
2. It takes two minutes to prepare.
Kibble ingredients vary from one manufacturer to another, checkout:
‘Dog Food Ingredients Debunked‘.
This article will expose everything you have always wanted to know about dog food and brands; and what should and shouldn’t be added in your dog’s food.
There are many benefits to preparing your own food, these are:
- Your dog will never eat contaminated foods.
- You’ve fewer worries of your dog becoming seriously ill.
- It’s a myth that your dog will become overweight.
- It’s a healthier way to feed your dog.
- You know exactly what you’re choosing.
- You know precisely what your dog is eating.
- Finally, your dogs will love the taste of their dinners.
Buying the best food for dogs
The best food for dogs is ‘meat’, dogs need meat, they’re not vegetarians or vegans. However, it’s easy to see why some owners choose to feed their dogs a vegetarian/vegan dinner. The quality of some meat in kibble is not high quality. The vegetarian dog food diet is a grey area. Most owners wouldn’t ever consider this type of food for their dogs; however, there are a minority of owners that will . There are some advantages and disadvantages to this diet, which I will go through in a non-bias manner in this article ‘Is vegetarian dog food advisable?
The supermarket is the worst place you can buy dog food. Behind the cellophane trays are toxic remains of all the drugs and contaminants such as: herbicides, pesticides, steroids, heavy metals and much more.
Photo by OnyxDog86
Consider buying your meat from a local farm, you and your dog will be healthier for it.
Animals raised at your local farm have been raised on clean grass and will not have been given steroids. Most farms can’t certify their meat is organic; but honestly, their meat is far superior to organic supermarket meat.
Every dog is dissimilar and requires different food types. It is important you find out if your dog is prone to any health issues and then study what your dog should eat.
Many dog owners are now adding supplements to their dogs meals. The best dog supplements aren’t easy to find, and quality appears to be scarce. The nutritional industry for humans and for animals is a multi-billion industry and they all want your money, this is nothing new!
When trying to buy the best dog supplement, the key is to make sure they are as close to their original food state as much as possible. This is covered more in this article ‘The best dog supplements that work‘.
How much to feed your dog
If your feeding kibble always follow the label. Regularly weigh your dog until you’ve found what serving size fits your dog.
For cook meals, the ratio should be 40% meat (predominantly organ), 30% vegetables, and 30% grains. Fruits can be used, but should be used sparingly because they could give your dog diarrhoea.
As another guideline of how much to feed your dog is 12 ounces per 15 pounds of dog weight per day. This means 0.8 ounces per lb, so one of my dogs would have to eat 66oz of homemade dog food per day.
When feeding take into account your dog’s activity levels.
If you’re adding cooked or raw food to the dried formula, always omit a small amount of dried to compensate for the additional food.
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