which dry dog food is best in your opinion??

[Maesfen]

Thank you my dogs do well on it so will keep with it.

I'm the same! Mine get various different brands but mainly, shock horror, Wagg Worker (more in the bag!) or Chappie Dry. They all look well, have great coats and are as fit as fleas. If they are happy, I'm happy so I see no reason to change what I feed because it obviously suits them.

 

[soloabe]

I'm the same! Mine get various different brands but mainly, shock horror, Wagg Worker (more in the bag!) or Chappie Dry. They all look well, have great coats and are as fit as fleas. If they are happy, I'm happy so I see no reason to change what I feed because it obviously suits them.

And thats totally your choice.

For me its not just about what my dogs do well on its about whats healthy for them to.

After all my cousin gets chicken nuggets and chips every single day and he looks just fine but we all know its not healthy for him.

 

[trina1982]

I used to feed skinners field and trial maintenance to my collie and collie x GSD. Then got recommended CSJ Wheat and Gluten free lamb and rice from a collie rescue.

Really happy with it, dogs shiny and don't seem to shed so much, and we also noticed that my collie x GSD stopped scratching as much (never a huge problem but we often called her flea bag because she scratched much more than our other dog). They deliver really quickly too and are reasonably priced.

Don't trust JWB, fed it to my cat (the cat version obviously) and he went really downhill suddenly (£300 vet trip!) and has never been the same since. Exactly the same happened to a friends cat too.

Trina x

 

[carousel8703]

I depends how much money you want to spend!!! Proplan is one of the best but at approx 50 pound a sack its also one of the most expensive. Skinners is a good quality food at a sensible price and they also do a hypoallergenic range if your dog is sensitive type. For a cheap option i find chappie is one of the best. I tend to avoid foods that are brightly coloured, colours are only added to make them look nice to us humans!!!!

 

[soloabe]

I depends how much money you want to spend!!! Proplan is one of the best but at approx 50 pound a sack its also one of the most expensive. Skinners is a good quality food at a sensible price and they also do a hypoallergenic range if your dog is sensitive type. For a cheap option i find chappie is one of the best. I tend to avoid foods that are brightly coloured, colours are only added to make them look nice to us humans!!!!

Eeeek chappie has horrible ingredients.

 

[littlemisslauren]

I know that at the moment alot of us are on tight budgets but I dont think that is any excuse to feed low quality food.

I know I feed one of the more expensive feeds but price had nothing to do with my choice, when I got the dog I worked out a budget around the most expensive feeds and went from there.

I would rather go hungry than feed her something like chappy.

I do understand there are some dogs with dicky tums that will only settle on some of the lower quality foods, one of my family dogs was poor on everything but bakers! But she was never fed that because it was cheap, she had it because the bottom explosions stopped!

 

[red marksman]

Have tried quite a few dry foods over the years- from the cheap and cheerful to the hideously expensive. My 3 borders are now on Wainwrights (Pets at Home's own best brand) and are looking fab with loads of energy and shiny coats. It's £33 for a 15kg sack and that lasts the 3 of them for a fortnight. The 7+ age range includes glucosamine for joints and there is a wide variety of flavours too. Highly recommended!

 

[stevieg]

Would like to feed Orijen but cant quite afford it atm. They did well on JWB for a while but we have now gone back to Arden Grange.

What's CSJ btw?

 

[willhegofirst]

Our young spin was on JWB when we first got her, she always was a bit loose, sometimes really runny, we changed her on to Wainwrights and she did improve a bit, but I was not totally happy, the older Spin seems to eat anything ok. We changed them onto a raw diet a few months ago and Skye has been much better ever since.

 

[trina1982]

Would like to feed Orijen but cant quite afford it atm. They did well on JWB for a while but we have now gone back to Arden Grange.

What's CSJ btw?

Hi! If you google CSJ dog food you'll find them They are quite a small company i think.

Trina x

 

[stevieg]

Thanks for that Trina. Always interested in finding out about different dog foods

 

[soloabe]

The ingredients look pretty awful for CSJ too!

The second being wheat.

 

[stevieg]

Has anybody tried Simpsons?

 

[soloabe]

Has anybody tried Simpsons?

Ingredients don't look great. No real meat and very expensive for the quality.

 

[CorvusCorax]

StevieG I would have stayed on Arden Grange if I could have, it was originally designed by and for GSD breeders and is the best of the bunch IMO for sheps.

 

[stevieg]

Yes as I recall it wasnt cheap. They had a stand at the LKA show at the NEC recently

 

[dingle12]

And thats totally your choice.

For me its not just about what my dogs do well on its about whats healthy for them to.

After all my cousin gets chicken nuggets and chips every single day and he looks just fine but we all know its not healthy for him.

My old dog was very healthy on it too we lost him april at 18 years old due to old age, everyone always said he never looked his age. I always fed him Dr johns, my other dog jake is now ten and other then a few lumps ( fatty ones he is a lab x ) he out runs any dog and people ask me what do i bath him in lol because his coat is so good lo truth his he never gets a bath and sometimes gets a brush.

 

[soloabe]

My old dog was very healthy on it too we lost him april at 18 years old due to old age, everyone always said he never looked his age. I always fed him Dr johns, my other dog jake is now ten and other then a few lumps ( fatty ones he is a lab x ) he out runs any dog and people ask me what do i bath him in lol because his coat is so good lo truth his he never gets a bath and sometimes gets a brush.

But that's still how well they did on a food not how healthy it is for them.

 

[k9h]

I use csjk9 & dog love it, they also have chudleys working crunch & cobby dog hunt kennel mix.

CSJK9 is abot £15 a 15kg bag very good quailty stuff & their fish skin treats!

Chudleys £16 a 15 kg bag

Cobby dog £8 a 20kg bag.

I always have comments on my dogs coats how shiny they are.

Personnaly I think it is duvet polish rather than the food but dont tell anyone that!!

 

[soloabe]

Genuine question.

Do people here actually research what should and shouldn't be in a dog food and where on the list ingredients should be?

Because i see a lot of people say stuff is great quality (RC, CSJ ect) when in reality its full of crap.

 

[Puppy]

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.

Out of interest, do your dogs always have responsibly farmed meat? how do you ensure that when sourcing it?

 

[foreverhorses]

these threads make intresting reading & have got me thinking too.i have fed beta active for quite some time as my 3 look good on it + easy to source + good value,but if i were to swop to raw how would i know how much to feed for an active 18kg collie ? is chicken wings + eggs (have our own hens) enough to provide all nutrition they need? and where is the cheapest place to buy such meat?

+ unrelated but katielou what breed is your lovely dog is that a collie or pyrenean sheep dog? stunning picture

 

[olop]

After having a few problems with my girl (she had to have her anal glands done-enough said!) & her hyper-active behaviour after feeding her bakers, she is now on James Wellbeloved & doing great on it.
I think Bakers is really falsely marketed which is the problem & the fact it is is so easily avaliable to buy.

 

[KarynK]

Out of interest, do your dogs always have responsibly farmed meat? how do you ensure that when sourcing it?

As it happens they do. I source the vast bulk of their diet from a dying breed the local butcher, who sources responsibly farmed quality and largely local produce. I do buy bits and pieces from the reduced section of the supermarket but the dogs eat better quality meat than I do!!!! My eggs come from a firends rehomed battery hens!

The only pet type food they get is the frozen green tripe which I cannot source locally.

 

[KarynK]

"... if i were to swop to raw how would i know how much to feed for an active 18kg collie ? is chicken wings + eggs (have our own hens) enough to provide all nutrition they need? and where is the cheapest place to buy such meat?"

If you look up on the top of the forum there is a sticky on raw and there are some good tips on nutrition and getting started on raw on there including various sources that people use.

 

[Gladioli]

Genuine question.

Do people here actually research what should and shouldn't be in a dog food and where on the list ingredients should be?

Because i see a lot of people say stuff is great quality (RC, CSJ ect) when in reality its full of crap.

I have to be honest I am quite ignorant in relation to this, when it came to feeding my horse I knew every ingredient and what it did, with dogs I am not so sure (I am embarrassed to say that) I feed Supadog Sensitive, the ingredients are Lamb Meal (min 26%), Rice (min 26%), Beet Pulp, Poultry Fat, Salt, Vitamins. As animals are scavengers would they really eat beet pulp, possibly not... def food for thought. (pardon the pun)

 

[soloabe]

I have to be honest I am quite ignorant in relation to this, when it came to feeding my horse I knew every ingredient and what it did, with dogs I am not so sure (I am embarrassed to say that) I feed Supadog Sensitive, the ingredients are Lamb Meal (min 26%), Rice (min 26%), Beet Pulp, Poultry Fat, Salt, Vitamins. As animals are scavengers would they really eat beet pulp, possibly not... def food for thought. (pardon the pun)

No they probably wouldn't but thats the least of your worries.
Lamb meal is all the bits that people don't want. Fur, feet, some organs (although not much really because its commercially viable) its all the crap and not a good meat source.
You want real meat as the first ingredient not meat meal.

 

[soloabe]

+ unrelated but katielou what breed is your lovely dog is that a collie or pyrenean sheep dog? stunning picture

He's Australian shepherd x Akita.

 

[Scranny_Ann]

In my opinion, the best dry food - Skinners. I have working dogs all with different needs and Skinners cater for each and every one, perfectly.

Can't praise them enough.

 

[stevieg]

Yes as I recall it wasnt cheap. They had a stand at the LKA show at the NEC recently

I was talking about Simpsons here btw. Didnt realise someone had posted in between