[Chris H]

I have 6 dogs..4 pugs, 1 Staffie and a terrier. They have biscuits in the morning Royal Canin (the pug one for the pugs) and a carton food in the afternoon I use the one made by 'pets at home' the low fat one for the pugs as one of them gets pancretitus. normal for the staffie and terrier. I keep looking at a more 'natural' diet, tripe or similar...................what makes a good diet that also saves a bit of money, advice please. What about fish??they do get a carrot a day, they are all a good weight and even my vet says the pugs are perfect and not the norm which is a big sausage on little legs

[Sandy]

I saw a good link to a dog food rateing site a while ago, depends on the type of dog but in general, a lot of the cheapest foods have more additives but then again, some dogs do not tollerate too rich food.....I am not sure our dog food is the best but they seem well on it and are never sick unless they eat some rubbish...we use Dr John gold for working dogs and do not usualy use anything else except sometimes a bit of fish or scrambled eggs as most complete foods are what they say....I did buy some pets at home stuff and was told its not that good and noticed they withdrew and reduced some products and changed the recipe so its not so bad now.....I know some feed raw but to me thats confusing and I worry about food poisning etc......expensive is not necessary best!!!!! we also use cobby dog for when we have pups, nearly forgot, they are both reasonably priced but not bad quality wise!!!

[kingnigel]

we feed BARF, we do add a very small amount of dried kibble. we try to avoid food that is preserved with ethoxyquin, bht and bha (think they are right but so long since we had to check). unfortunately dog food suppliers dont even have to tell you what is in the food if it is added before they receive the meal, so many of them now get suppliers to add these antioxidant (poisons)  before delivery.

can you tell i dont trust commercial pet food manufacturers.
kn

[YorkshireLass]

Lumps of raw animal here  Pets at home do frozen bags of beef/bone/tripe chunks, plus supermarket frozen chicken legs, heart, liver...

[Chris H]

Food for thought! bit of a wuss when it comes to the 'lumps of dead animal' we are both veggies, i appreciate the dogs like meat but I am better once it's processed, yeah I know makes no sense. Have seen the tripe and the like in Pets at home, is it best cooked? or raw??

[YorkshireLass]

The frozen stuff I just give to her still raw (well, still frozen!). Oddly enough she completely turned her nose up at some prepared (for humans) tripe from the supermarket? I prefer feeding big chunks so she gets the exercise and stimulation and tooth-cleaning benefits of chewing and gnawing

[colliewoman]

Please for the sake of your nostrils don't cook green tripe!
We feed raw and are veggie, but having said that I don't bat an eyelid if something needs plucking and gutting for someone else's table, I'm not squeamish at all .

(in fact if I could kill it myself, I would eat meat, I just need someone to hold my hand the first few times!)

[Chris H]

Not sure the puggies would manage anything to lumpy one has no teeth and the others are a little spare in the teeth department

[tazbabe]

we have 5 dogs... a german shepherd, a belgian shepherd, a collie, a westie, and a border terrier.

we have a local feed merchant nearby, and use their own dried food, dressed with raw tripe. all are fit and healthy, ages range from 6 months to 11 yrs. the pup still gets breakfast, the rest are fed in the evening.

[Fronhaul]

Keeping weight on Pointers can be a nightmare but our problems came to an end when someone suggested we try CSJ and now I won't go anywhere else for dried food.  The Pointers have CP-21 which is a dry food made with salmon and our old Vallhund has one of their more standard formulations.  All of ours have raw minced tripe, which they love, and we usually keep a few tins of Butchers tripe in reserve for emergencies when we forget to defrost or run out or can't go out for some reason.  No need to cook the tripe and as has already been said the smell is dreadful if you do.

[Sylvia]

Not sure the puggies would manage anything to lumpy one has no teeth and the others are a little spare in the teeth department

I have pugs, all pugs have "all over the place" teeth but mine are all, from the tiny Yorkies to the Deerhound fed exactly the same. Raw meat, bones and biscuit plus vegetables and fruit.
The first pug I had, years ago, I had to put in a crate for an hour,I forget why now but I put a big dog sized Bonio in with her thinking,she won't get through it but it will keep her occupied. It lasted about 20 seconds!!
People say that toys always have bad teeth but, I think, it may be because they also think that small mouths can't manage bones, chunks of raw meat etc. I say, let one of those dogs bite you and you will see how strong their teeth and jaws are
So they are fed these tiny tins of mush and "small bite" biscuit, hence the rotten teeth! Just watch my toys with a marrow bone bigger than them and see how they stand their ground if a bigger dog looks interested in it
This(you may realise) is one of my soap-box rants. ; People are making huge profit from others thinking this crap food is the best thing they can do for their dog---or cat!

[Chris H]

Thanks for the 'rant'!  I appreciate what you are saying about toy breeds, I was only concerned as mine are all rescues and two have no teeth at all from neglect. They love food of course as they have been starved in their past lives and do tend to throw everything down their necks with out any chewing even with gums!! They are big dogs in small bodies and my staffie willl not come near when they have a biscuit...................

Pugs I am sorry to say are in fashion and many are not getting the life they should. Mine are ex puppy farm breeding animals and the conditions they came to me in were dreadful.

I will try the raw tripe................just need to find a decent biscuit meal?

I have to say mine all have lovely breath.................unless they have just made a raid on the catlitter box

[lachlanandmarcus]

I have recently started getting Symply dog food as it came out one of the top in the analysis of ingredients etc. Altho there isnt a supplier locally they delivered to me no problem and without a surcharge, just the normal £3 ish delivery charge which is less than it costs me to get to the store to get rubbish food.

One advantage (apart from the high grade nutrition and lack of rubbish) is that it has MSM/glucosamine/chondroitin in the light/senior one I get so bad hip dog doesnt need her separate supplement. Which makes it quite good value.

The dogs (Doberman and Border Terrier) are fed this plus fresh mutton from our cull sheep and some Bonio biscuit. The mutton is I have to admit cooked, but only lightly and only cos neither will touch raw meat.

[Chris H]

Will check this out as I have one with hip problems, thanks.

[CameronS]

we are feeding skinners musli at home for the adult dogs - high fish oil so is giving them extremtly good coats! , and the pup is on chudleys, all dry but get bones etc every so often.