which dry dog food is best in your opinion??

NOISYGIRL said:
http://www.barkingheads.co.uk/

I've recently changed to above range, you can mix them if you want, spoke to the bloke from there and he said they were all compatibale if you needed to mix

Mine had the Tender loving care and the Bad hair day ! she preferred the tender loving care and she likes the fusspot one as well

JWB is often on offer 3 for 2 by me, Cardiff
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I'm loving this brand (barkingheads) looking at the ingredients for the senior dog range- Tassy loves Chicken and carrots and tomatoes never tried potatos with her or salmaon- though she loves her sardines.How quick is the mail order as they are 17miles away from me as the nearest supplier :(
 
shadowboy said:
I'm loving this brand (barkingheads) looking at the ingredients for the senior dog range- Tassy loves Chicken and carrots and tomatoes never tried potatos with her or salmaon- though she loves her sardines.How quick is the mail order as they are 17miles away from me as the nearest supplier :(
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I didn't order from them direct, chatted to the chap first then decided to go and get some from local Petwise store and my local Pampurred Pets store stocks it as well.

He said he'd send me some samples which he did and they arrived in a couple of days so I don't think it would take too long if you ordered from them
 
Generally the stuff you can get off the super market shelf like Bakers and Wagg are terrible.

Mine is on Autarkey, took a lot of research to find the right one for our dog. Protein levels, additives etc.....
 
bex1984 said:
I am reading this with interest as my dog is coming up to 1 yr old and will therefore 'outgrow' his puppy food....he has always been on Purina ProPlan Puppy and we're wondering whether to move him onto the adult version, or something else...any thoughts on the purina??? we've also looked at wainwrights??
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Yes please move him on to something better. Purina is rubbish.

Try fish4dogs.
 
Sorry I can't recommend any dry food as I don't feed it but I will say you really need to research dry foods very carefully there are guides on the internet and a bit on the stickied raw fed page 2 about researching meat content and some of the additives to avoid at all costs.

Don’t ever take anything for a feed merchant or rep says as gospel, they are there to sell it and will tell you what they think you want to hear. I have real fun with them and when I get bored I tie them in total knots and walk off back to my Butcher and around £10 a month for 2 dogs!!! Ask them some difficult questions!!

But with processed foods you should bear in mind that ingredients and often harmful additives can be hidden very easily, you just get someone else to supply you a preparation with the nasties in it and then add it to your feed and you do not have to declare.

I am disgusted by feed companies being able to describe their food the way they do, in most instances it is very clearly not Chicken and Maize for example but actually “ more Maize than I would dare feed a horse and an undisclosed part of chickens, plus of course additives preservatives and flavourings” I should add that some of these will be organic in origin and some not!!!! But hey with very few restrictions and money to be made who would not describe their “food” as holistic or natural! You wouldn’t get away with what they do with baby food!!!

As these companies are out to make a profit, often intolerances are blamed on meat sources because they are expensive and it’s easy and cheaper to blame them, high protein being the favourite. They never look to the unnatural cheap cereal or vegetable bulks that they may use to make to food cheaper, the shelf life enhancers to make it last months on a shelf, or the synthetic vitamins that are added which are often destroyed by their cooking processes. In many dried foods it is questionable if the dog can effectively use most of the food content it is fed.

To me anything that is cooked cannot really be called natural for a dog, it does however sound good to the owner and just as they add herbs and dried carrots to horse food the considerable effort of marketing is aimed at the owner. So it is up to owners to research and asks some very searching questions before buying it.

Personally I would not put any food down my dogs throat that I did not know all of the ingredients of and just as importantly the source of those ingredients. Unfortunately dogs and house cats are really one of the only companion animals that suffer heavily from inappropriate cheap nutrition, most horses and cats can supplement the processed foods with grass and cute little animals, guinea pigs/rabbits get hay but dogs have to rely on what we give them alone apart from grass and what they can grab on a walk!

So please do your homework and pick the best you can afford, but at the end of the day meat is expensive to add and process so those with higher meat content will be more expensive.
 
Mine is on James WB lamb and rice - tried many quality brands (including raw for a few months - but that was really awful for her) without success. She has a very sensitive tummy and can't cope with variety of any sort. So after 6 years of trying everything we've had a further 6 with JWB - adult at first and then about the last 3 1/2 yrs she's been on the senior. I'm very pleased with it. I think any of the quality foods are worth a shot. Not a huge fan of raw unless you have an enormous freezer and a huge capacity for being organised as you must work out exactly what you are feeding to ensure dog gets everything it needs etc..
 
ladyearl said:
Mine is on James WB lamb and rice - tried many quality brands (including raw for a few months - but that was really awful for her) without success. She has a very sensitive tummy and can't cope with variety of any sort. So after 6 years of trying everything we've had a further 6 with JWB - adult at first and then about the last 3 1/2 yrs she's been on the senior. I'm very pleased with it. I think any of the quality foods are worth a shot. Not a huge fan of raw unless you have an enormous freezer and a huge capacity for being organised as you must work out exactly what you are feeding to ensure dog gets everything it needs etc..
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You don't have to work out nearly as much as you think you do.
 
I have to say since the big panic about Dax's food intolerances and faffing around getting her on a raw diet, I really couldn't find it easier now - she just gets chucked a bit of whatever's in the fridge, i.e whatever I've been able to buy on the cheap (:o) and has never looked better for it.

I only have a tiny freezer, could probably do it a bit cheaper if I had a big chest freezer (butcher offered me sacksful of turkey wings and carcasses at Christmas!) but as it stands it's still comparable or cheaper than a good quality dry diet, with the added bonus of not causing bum explosions.
 
I pay £6 for one of the small bags of JWB and £35 for the big bags, I cant believe people are paying £50 for it!!

Shop around, the small bags have been on offer for about 6 months in different shops up here.

Do fish for dogs do a small bag?? B is quite picky and is barely eating the kibble if given it alone now so I'm thinking of changing her over to this.
 
My deaf dog is one sickly puppy who seems to be allergic to air. He can't eat JWB, Barking Heads, Iams or even Bonio's (what is in those? he throws them up within 30mins!) The only dry food that he can eat is Burns, which also agrees with me and picking up what comes out the other end :o

We tried a similar thing to Fish4Dogs from Pets at Home called Fishmongers (I think) which he absolutely loved, but I was too scared to give him a whole bowl, so just mixed a bit with the Burns. I hope it's not as bad as Bakers! :eek:
 
Ansiscool said:
My deaf dog is one sickly puppy who seems to be allergic to air. He can't eat JWB, Barking Heads, Iams or even Bonio's (what is in those? he throws them up within 30mins!) The only dry food that he can eat is Burns, which also agrees with me and picking up what comes out the other end :o

We tried a similar thing to Fish4Dogs from Pets at Home called Fishmongers (I think) which he absolutely loved, but I was too scared to give him a whole bowl, so just mixed a bit with the Burns. I hope it's not as bad as Bakers! :eek:
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Thats exactly the type of dog who would do well on Raw :D
 
Ansiscool said:
My deaf dog is one sickly puppy who seems to be allergic to air. He can't eat JWB, Barking Heads, Iams or even Bonio's (what is in those? he throws them up within 30mins!) The only dry food that he can eat is Burns, which also agrees with me and picking up what comes out the other end :o

We tried a similar thing to Fish4Dogs from Pets at Home called Fishmongers (I think) which he absolutely loved, but I was too scared to give him a whole bowl, so just mixed a bit with the Burns. I hope it's not as bad as Bakers! :eek:
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I doubt it, I think this is one of the worst- bakers is full of sugar -This is the rubbish in Bakers-Cereals (minimum 4% rice in the green and orange kernels), Meat and animal derivatives (Minimum 4% fresh meat in the moist meaty chunks, minimum 4% beef in the moist meaty chunks), Vegetable protein extracts, Oils and fats, Various sugars, Derivatives of vegetable origin (0.5% beet pulp in the brown and red kernels), Minerals, Vegetables (minimum 4% vegetables in the green and orange kernels). With antioxidants, coloured with and preserved with EC additives.
 
blackcob said:
They do sample packs for £1 or I'd be happy to send you a bowlful in the post! :)
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Sample packs sound ideal! Knowing my luck I would buy a big bag and madam would turn her nose up!

A teeny petshop in the village is listed as a supplier to I'll see if they do the diddy bags this weekend. I'll have to man up a bit before I venture down there.... I do NOT live in a nice area, even the toddlers wear hoodies and carry knives :o:rolleyes:
 
i feed my two on redmills tracker/racer..approx £11-£15 per 15kg bags
raw if and when i can..we only have a small freezer space

have tried skinners which the dogs like(only as my currant feed hadnt come in due to the bad weather and im still waiting for the delievery)

keepers mix conditioner fed with barf diet from dorwest herbs
 
shadowboy said:
I do the sardine too- i found some on offer in Tescoes the other day 21p for a whole tin of finest whole sardines- so we bought 20 of them but now running low- where do you get yours from?
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21p! That is an absolute bargain! Netto's have them at 37p a tin. Sainsbury's are 42p a tin but you do have a choice of olive oil, sunflower oil or spring water!
 
We used to feed ours Orijen after doing a lot of research/reading about the various foods out there. They did very well on it but it is expensive and after I lost my job we changed to CSJ. I truly believe it is a good food but just not as good as Orijen and my girls started to look awful within a few weeks.
I have now gone on to a BARF diet, mostly bought in from Landywoods with eggs and anything else we have over added in. They also have chicken/turkey wings on a weekend when we can watch them eating. I can honestly say that in 2 months they are absolutely blooming, coats shining, mouths fresh and energy levels the best! We do flyball with them and the first competition we did after changing to BARF our older bitch dropped her time by over a second...that is a massive amount!
We call Bakers etc smarties for dogs as it makes them hyper...not that I feed it but someone gave me a box and we used it for training treats.
 
Just weaning my Jack Russell onto raw food diet,my son has not been shooting lately so no rabbits (she wants to play with them not kill them herself) so my butcher gets in offal for me & she seems very happy on that mixed with the odd bone or stick to clean her teeth.We are all so easily led to buy what we are advertised & forget what are natuarlly meant to eat sometimes!
 
Dr johns silver, all my dogs do really well on it.

Can i ask everyone who buys JWB why do you go for that? i find it expensive i know a dog on it and if anything both my dogs look better condition.

I pay £8.49 for a 15kg bag.
 
dingle12 said:
Dr johns silver, all my dogs do really well on it.

Can i ask everyone who buys JWB why do you go for that? i find it expensive i know a dog on it and if anything both my dogs look better condition.

I pay £8.49 for a 15kg bag.
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The people i know who get it do so because they don't want or can't have all the cereals in dog food and want some actual meat content. Dr Johns first ingredient is cereals. Not something i would be happy with my dogs eating.
 
Ooo other people on here who feed Barking Heads - I thought i was the only one :)

My spangles thrive on their "Bad Hair day" (lamb&rice) not so keen on the chicken.....our local little pet shop stocks all of it which i found through calling the company direct. They apparently used to all work for Nutro choice but set this company up to offer high meat, no wheat dry food :)

I have to agree that I have never considered JWB because it seems so expensive :eek:
 
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