Comments on: Is it ok for dogs to be fed commerical dog food or should they be fed specially formulated home-made food?

By: ♥Friends with Everyone♥

♥Friends with Everyone♥ — Mon, 22 Jun 2009 17:17:37 +0000

Homemade food is good, but some commercial dog foods are just as good.
Here is a site that will show you which dog foods are the best and the worst. I suggest that you get any one of the dog foods that are top rated.
Most of grocery store dog food formulas, like IAMS, Pedigree, Science Diet, Purina,and etc contain “meat and bone meal” which has been known to contain dead dogs and cats that were euthanized in animal shelters. Their bodies are picked up and bought by the truck load by “rendering plants” , that also pick up road kill, dead live stock, and etc. They are shredded, and boiled. They skim off the fat on the top of the “soup” and collected it and sell it to pet food companies as “animal fat”, the rest of the animals’ remains are crushed up, dried and sold to dog and cat food companies as meat and bone meal.
You can read more about it here.
Here is an article where the owner of a rendering plant talks about it. He says that cremating the dead shelter animals would cause pollution, and that rendering them is good.
Here is further information on what you shouldn’t see in the ingredients list in your dog’s food.
Top rated dog foods like Canidae contain good healthy ingredients.

The raw diet, which is also known as the B.A.R.F. diet is another good alternative to the grocery store crap dog foods.
Here is information on getting started on it.

By: nitesead loves you!

nitesead loves you! — Sun, 21 Jun 2009 04:53:43 +0000

Kibbles and Bits gave my dog urinary tract infections. That cheaper stuff is just not carefully formulated and dogs can have reactions to them.

Miscellaneous, slightly unrelated note: IAMS, the company, tests its products on dogs and cats (we’re not talking taste tests) so you might think twice about supporting that company. Just sayin’.

By: Coronas Mom

Coronas Mom — Thu, 18 Jun 2009 06:20:30 +0000

That would depend on what you feed your dog.

Ours is ALWAYS Nutro. It’s healthy and organic…

By: Poor Pearl

Poor Pearl — Tue, 16 Jun 2009 00:19:51 +0000

From my own personal experience of having had both pure breeds and mixed dogs from the pound I think it depends on the dog. Our schnauzer needed expensive high quality food and if he got into anything else he usually had a trip to the vet. Some of our dogs could eat anything. Two lived until they were 17 and one was 20 years old. I have had another dog that only lived until he was seven and it was because of a kidney problem. I am old and have had about ten dogs total through out my life. Right now I have one street dog that likes to eat anything he can find but we try to only give him his organic mix. My suggestion is to talk with your vet about the breed of dog you have.

By: kate c

kate c — Sun, 14 Jun 2009 23:01:08 +0000

I acidentally gave baby a good rating, kibbles and bits is crap!

Raw bones and meat diets are the best for your dog, I put my dogs on a raw diet and they are doing so much better compared to when they were eating kibble and they were eating Innova, a high quality kibble.

My dogs diets are made up of mostly chicken, but they also get egg, turkey, and fish(only tilapia, and without bone for fish).

If you want more information about what you can feed your dog, a great place to look, and ask questions, is.
the place is dedicated to dogs of all sizes.

I decided to put my dogs on a raw diet after researching it, I didnt have to do much, even though I did, it was so disturbing, I discovered for myself the relationships between vets and their associations, the vet colleges and the pet food companies, and the vet associations and the pet food companies, along with the scams behind repeating vaccines.

If you go to other alliances on purinas website you can directly read that they combined with the american college of veterinary nutrition to form the american college of veterinary nutrition CURICULUM, yes…vets are taught by purina’s standards, yet purina sells dog food for profit. …

Tom Lonsdale is one of the few vets that support a raw diet, and they that do take their business in their own hands, every thing they walk on is risking their livelyhood, vets are under vet associations and those associations follow the money, when a vet threatens the money, they tend to loose everything, and fighting back is not posible with a multi-billion dollar industry. His website is

The three most common companies, the ones in vets offices, that give financial kickbacks to vet associations and vets are Iams, Purina, and Hill’s Science diet.

Pottenger study is not about by products, but it is about raw versus cooked. Please look into it to learn more about our carnivorous animals.

Bigdogsporch.com can give you ancedotal experiences with raw and if you read some of my other post on yahoo You will find some info too.

Owner of three raw fed dogs. ,, and

If you want to know my top three kibbles are: Orijen, Evo, and Innova, but even those cant stand up to the ultimate diet, raw.

By: lovemypups3

lovemypups3 — Sun, 14 Jun 2009 14:16:03 +0000

I prefer to feed my dogs only the higher quality grain free kibbles and I have noticed that my male Shih-tzu no longer suffers from chronic ear infections nor is not scratching all the time like he was doing before on the kibble with grains. I also add about a Tablespoon or 2 of canned food to their kibble (I only get the canned dog food that is 95% meat that is made to add to the kibble like Evangers and Wellness brands).

The brands I feed them now are Wellness CORE, Orijen, Horizon Legacy and Timberwolf Organic Wild and Natural. I like to rotate their food every 2 months or so.

If I had the space and a bigger freezer I would probably feed them a raw diet, but since I don’t I feed them the best quality kibble that I can and sometimes will get them the dehydrated food as well and I do try and cook for them at least once or twice a week as well.

By: tystie7743

tystie7743 — Sun, 14 Jun 2009 06:46:35 +0000

there are a lot of things that dogs need that would be so hard to include in a homemade dog food. i am a vet tech and a certified science diet rep and i can tell you that while science diet is good
i like royal canin…you can get it at a petsmart store
they do things like use cranberry for preservatives and they inject nitrogen in the bags instead of oxygen so it stays fresh longer and they included vitamins for hair and teeth and they have speical foods for different breeds. yorkies have such bad teeth the yorkie food is for them and their teeth, bulldogs with bad joins and skin, german shep with bad joints rottweilers with bad joints pugs with tongues that are hard to eat the food so its shaped different….so many diff kinds of foods for diff dogs and its considered a super premium food and iams and science diet are just premium foods…i cant say enough good about it….they eat less of it cause there is less filler and so they poop less…it does cost more but they eat less and its so worth it

By: Buie NRT

Buie NRT — Thu, 11 Jun 2009 13:41:39 +0000

You don’t have to get all scientific about it because it is very simple feed your dog good mix table scraps and dog food together the dog will live a long and happy life just as long as you let him be a dog good keep fed good. Make sure that he gets to run and have fun do not keep him locked up in the house or chained up. Remember a dog is a animal not a human.

By: Kate M

Kate M — Wed, 10 Jun 2009 10:46:29 +0000

It depends on the quality of the food. A generic food or grocery store brand like Iams, Pedigree or Beneiful and full of fillers and by products. There is little or no meat in them.
By-products are the non meat parts of an animal. It includes feet, feathers, ears, snouts, beaks and other non digestible parts. Dogs need meat to thrive. By-products are not meat and should not be the main meat in a food.

There are some very good commercially available dog foods. These contain several meats for various sources (chicken, fish, beef etc) and are in meal or regular form. Some are grain free and good for dogs.

Home made meals can vary as much as commercially available foods. But a home made food may be better as there would be no chemicals and the sources can be controlled. Not all of the methods of feeding are the same.

By: ithacagrl

ithacagrl — Tue, 09 Jun 2009 03:27:42 +0000

I too have worried about this question. I have a great vet who broke it down for me. Each dog food company (the big names) spend money for researching what exactly each mineral and vitamin does for the dog. If it was so toxic how did our dogs when many of us were younger ever survive? How do dogs survive today- not everyone who owns a dog can afford to pay a dollar a pound for dog food.for the specialty organic food- and yet the dogs live on. While foods are engineered to make the poop more solid and less gross for owners to pick up- it also has minerals that can’t be gotten in your kitchen. If you decide to do your home made food make sure you get good balanced recipes from a book and know what supplements you will need to add to that food.

Know that ‘natural’ on the food means nothing. I am not even sure how regulated ‘organic’ is for dog food by the FDA.

Also know that what you feed your dog should be more solid than mush- if your dog has teeth. Kibble creates a friction that helps with tarter build up.

Good luck.