Hi all,

I've just got my first puppy (golden, nearly 13 weeks) and i wanted to know what the best food is for her. Her breeder has had her on on predigree puppy small bite and the puppy meat mixed which I'm continuing until I find her something else. As I understand it this food isn't the absolute best  but there's a lot of different types of food out there (in a lot of 'formats'!!) so I just wanted to get some opinions or advice. I know that we'll have to introduce gradually when we do decide.

Thanks in advance.

Karen

Karen the first thing to decide is if you want to feed wet or dry food. 

Wet food is messier to prepare and wash up after but probably tastier for most dogs.  Dry food is easy, convenient, clean and most dogs will eat it with no complaints.  If you feed dry you'll see that she drinks more water than when fed wet.  Generally speaking it's more expensive to feed wet than dry also.  If you want to have little training sessions at meal times, dry is also a good idea because you can then use her food to train with (not possible with wet food unless you want to make a big mess!).

I don't think there are any perfect foods out there, but I do think that all of these are good and you wouldn't be going wrong with any of them:

Dry -

www.wellbeloved.co.uk
www.ardengrange.com
www.burns-pet-nutrition.co.uk

Wet -

www.naturediet.net

There is no absolute best food :D just the ones that suit your dog.  Pedigree completes and in particular the puppy formula is often spoken of in very good terms and personally I would always consider what the breeder of your puppy has to say about what suits their breed and, indeed, their lines, after all you would not have bought a puppy from a breeder whose stock you did not admire and whose puppies were not in good robust health, would you? ;)

In my opinion the best food for any puppy is BARF :)
Tink is 17 weeks old and BARF fed and she is coming on in leaps and bounds and towers over her litter mates,when they come to visit. :)
I started feeding Callah (Tinks mum) BARF when she was about 12 months old and the difference in her was fantastic.
Her coat,eyes,breath,everything really, much improved. :)
When her litter was born in September I knew I would wean them straight onto a BARF diet. Unfortunately though out of her 8 puppies,only 3 have been kept on BARF.

Do ckeck out the BUAV recommendations if you're feeling at all ethical though - IAMS and a lot of the big names test on animals.  I believe there's a company called OSCAR http://www.oscars.co.uk/
which has local deliveries in most areas which has its heart in the right place.

We're due to get a pup in April and obviously I'll pay heed to the breeder myself, but I need to know that the food in question hasn't been doggedly tested (no pun intended) on suffering animals.  There's a thread on lrrse forum whci details the IAMS scandal:
<a class='url' href='http://www.iamscruelty.com/'>http://www.iamscruelty.com/</a>
and aonther link to a website where you can check the credentials of your dog's dinner:
<a class='url' href='http://www.uncaged.co.uk/'>http://www.uncaged.co.uk/</a>

Hope this hasn't thrown too many cats among the pigeons, but I think you ought to get your pup off Pedigree Chum asap!!!

Interestingly, I was in Waitrose today lookign at what they sell - loads of Pedi and iams puppy food; no BUAV approved puppy food - one brand that was, they only stocked in adult diet.  I do intend to tackle them head on next time I'm in there, I;m embarrassed to say that my one year old and her diet was takign precedence at the time!!!

HTH

Kerri

Ethics is not always the motive behind these stories put out about these large companies.  I think I would also question the ethics of some of these anti-groups that put them about.  They, of course, have their own scandals involving intimidiation, desecration of graves etc.
  Personally I would not care to give my dog any food that had not been tested and found safe and appropriate, of course I would not expect this to involve sinking chunks of metal into animals heads as these web sites would have you believe but would involve much more cost effective methods such as blood and skin tests and customer satisfaction surveys.
I'd be surprised if Waitrose are interested in what the BUAV thinks, despite adopting an official sounding title they are an unaccountable, self appointed group.  All you have to do to not appear on their list is refuse to allow these unofficial people to traipse through your premises, anyway haven't they suspended all list making?

Personally I would not care to give my dog any food that had not been tested and found safe and appropriate
yes, but surely that can be done without battery farming dogs?  I do think that we are accountable in what we do with regard to feeding our children and our pets and although I'm not involved in Buav and neither would I condone some of their extreme methods, I'm glad that there are organisations out there that bring the plight of some of these animals and actions of some of these bigger companies to light in order that we can make informed choices.  I dont' pretend to have all of the answers at all as I have only just found out about it all through the Labrador Rescue South East and a topic thread there.
Ethics is not always the motive behind these stories put out about these large companies. What are their motives, then, do you think?  Surely outrage is a good one? And even if list making has been suspended, there must be some reason why the lists were made in the first place?
I don't think it's a bad idea to have interested parties allowed through your factories either; you must have nothing to hide.  When I was teaching it was quite interesting to get inspected from time to time and have open doors to allow inspectors or prospective parents to 'traipse' through our premises and see that as professionals we are accountable ourselves.  Surely it's a similar principle . . .

Yes, outrage would be a good one but anticapitalism is a very bad one.  Not sure what the outrage is about though never heard of battery farming dogs, do you mean puppy farming?  Yes most of us feel outrage about that but haven't seen the anti brigade getting too involved, maybe not bit enough business to catch their eye :rolleyes:  If you mean something to do with testing, as I have said it would seem very strange to keep dogs in "batteries" a very expensive business running that sort of scientific testing, excluding all outside contamination, paying technically trained staff etc.  It really doesn't make economic sense when much simpler data collected from actual pet dogs would be entirely satisactory bearing in mind these large companies don't tend to cater to the niche market of strange new ingredients they will generally only be looking at new formulas and wishing to see that the animals are living long and healthy lives in general.
Of course inspections are good that is why we have government food agencies that inspect these sort of premises.  I doubt you would have welcomed an extreme group traipsing through your school making sure you were teaching in line with something they had a hobby horse about something along the lines of fathers4justice wishing to draw up a list of schoolds where mother is not spoken of in too glowing terms perhaps :D

This subject has been done and dusted many times over, at the end of the day it is free choice.

You can choose a dog food like Iams and others, who we know were highlighted with regards to animal testing.
(But ironically you know your dogs are safe to eat these brands and will get everything they need from it, because of the testing that was done.)

Or you can choose not to buy Iams and other brands, stick to your principles of not agreeing with any animal testing and buy another brand.

It's simple and no-one should be made to feel guilty about their choice of dog food.

There is good and bad on all sides, but we would still be in the stone age if no testing at all was allowed.

**Shield Up***:-D

I would just add that if I thought there was any truth to the "cruel" testing stories I would not touch a product but there is testing and there is testing :)

much simpler data collected from actual pet dogs would be entirely satisactory bearing in mind these large companies don't tend to cater to the niche market of strange new ingredients they will generally only be looking at new formulas and wishing to see that the animals are living long and healthy lives in general.

No, that's fair enough, but as I said it's all new to me - I'm getting a pup in April having not had a dog since I was at home with my parents and I've just been trying to gather information so that I can make the informed decision that I feel fits in with my principles, just as I consider carefully what goes into my children's mouths.  If this means boycotting a food in order to do my bit, as it were, in the hope that testing is through family pets and customer satisfaction, then that suits me fine!  I completely agree with you that there needs to be some method of testing, but the stories of dogs in pens left to die that one reads of in the Iams cases is disturbing to say the least, and seems more than a little extreme.

But if you are a teacher you will understand fully that when researching you need to ensure your information is coming from quality sources, single interest web sites can hardly be regarded as that. 

Why are they single interest?  What is in it for them? 

Do you work for IAMS?

With regard to sources, there are people whose opinions I have grown to trust on the LLRSE website who advocate a similar line.  Better safe than sorry I think - it's like buying fairtrade coffee - if one can contribute to the greater good in the choice of products we buy, than so be it. I may be being completely mislead, but at least I'll feel I have a clean conscience.

Maybe it's best if we agree to differ rather than clog up this board further, when we clearly do not concur here.  AS someone else in the posts said, it's a personal choice, I'm just expressing what mine will be.

They have only one side of the debate to support, they are not presenting a balanced, impartial view.
No I don't work for Iams. I am as impartial as you are and like you I have a great interest in animal welfare and human welfare, big companies employ lots of people perhaps another greater good is served in not allowing the antis to try to put them out of business.  You are entitled to buy whatever food you like, I certainly do :) but offering stories about individual companies gleaned from other websites when there has never been any evidence offered in a court of law (as opposed to the anti's activities :rolleyes:) is a different matter.

What balanced view can there be if there's doubt over the treatment of animals?  And I originally saw the article in a Shelter and asked the LRRSE people who knew what about it.  And if you're criticising me for limited reserch, what is there other than your opinion against the information that I've been reading.  You point out that as a teacher I should read the whole story - if there's any doubt in my mind that something is wrong, surely I have a duty to bring the opinions to bear here and invite debate so that we can all be awaer of our options?  When training to teach, you're taught to 'enable' and 'facilitate discussion'.

Furthermore, why have the Uncaged people (or the newspaper which ran the story) not been sued by IAMS and why has IAMS battoned down its hatches as far as this is concerned?  It just doesn't add up.  And I don't believe anyone's trying to put them out of business, Uncaged is asking that IAMS proves its moral fibre like those companies whom are listed as ethical (some of which are named on this board).

And if their side of the debate is to highlight the plight of the animals kept apparently so horrifically by IAMS, then surely there's some mileage there?

By means of education, having read the thread here, the raw meat diet looks really fascinating - just to add another line of contentious debate!

BTW - how do you get all of the emoticons that you use?!!!??  Just to be flippant . . . I only have five displayed and can't get the smilie:rolleyes: . . .

You said yourself that this is all new to you and so far you have only looked at the anti Iams information.  It is all well and good to facilitate discussion but it is also important to teach the value of good research from quality sources. 
Asking someone to prove they have not conducted cruel testing is rather like asking when did you last beat your wife!  Producing evidence that you have not done something is harder than producing evidence that you have and Uncaged know this, just to get them into court would serve their purposes very well though and there are many, many people in the world that work on the "no smoke without fire basis" :rolleyes:
Why do you think a raw meat diet would be contentious?
You have to do the other smilies manually
: ) without a gap = :)
; ) = ;)
: p = :p
: o = :o
: ( = :(

Thank you for the smilie tips :)

Oh no, I was just being facetious really about the raw meat trying to poke some little bit of fun at our wranglings about IAMS :p - I do just feel more enlightened about the BARF diet as an option given the information on this site, which then provokes web links to the more natural diets like these.  I know that the breeder we're going through uses lots of fresh meat in her dogs' diets - not sure what she feeds her pups though . . .

Back to our pet subject . . . surely you can see that it is a bit different to prove that they are not testing than beating a wife?  If they allow visitors in to see their 'kennels' or whatever it is that they call them, they can show off how well kept their dogs and other animals are, then advertise the newly improved IAMS premises on Uncaged and add them to their list of responsible companies?  Whereas you could invite someone into your home and just not hit your wife that day.

I do go for the no smoke w/o fire line really - why stir up a storm about a dog food company unless you have an axe to grind about it?  But we're just going around in circles now.:o

Shall we shake hands and bow out graciously?;)

My goodness, whatever did I do before I knew how to use these smilies?  I know - I got an early night with a good book!

What is your breed BTW?

I think you have not heard the wife beating saying before :) it means, we think you are quilty anyway and just want to know the details. 
Yes we are going round in circles, as I have previously said I really can't see any reason why Iams should have self appointed groups come round their premises.  For a start every visitor to a food premises is a hygiene threat and with the history of these groups they are also a security threat!  They are already subject to inspections from the food agencies and experiments involving animals, if they were doing them in a laboratory setting, are also subject to the licensing bodies.  Would you have a nosy neighbour perhaps, already, with a dislike of you over your capitalist successes in life inspect your home and childrens' bodies for bruises?  Well, why not if you have nothing to hide? 

>why stir up a storm about a dog food company unless you have an axe to grind about it?

Most of the "anti" sites reveal their axes very readily :) with the inevitable comments about large company, large profits, globalisation etc etc.

We are never going to persuade each other of our respective points of view here, so it's better, I think, if we just call it a day and - as I said before - agree to differ, respect each other's rights to our opinions and live our lives our own ways happy with our own choices.

And for the record, I don't have any capitalist success whatseover and neither do I begrudge it anyone else - and yes, I know it was an allegory - I'm not completely stupid, blonde yes, but naturally so! ;)

Oh, and don't get me started on real nappies . . . :rolleyes: (I do use them on my little one)

she is coming on in leaps and bounds and towers over her litter mates,when they come to visit

Isn't one of the main points of feeding barf to pups to ensure they grow slow and steady? I would be very worried if your dog is towering over her litter mates,perhaps this means she is growing too quickly?

Fluff i agree with onetwothree's recommendations,pedigree is not a good food IMO.

I love the lazy mans solution to BARF I feed Nature Menu it is the frozen fee flow minced food with lamb heart Tripe,all the dodgy bits and Veg, or the chicken veg and rice, it worked miracles when Bo=aborka was in kennels and Barbie has raised her 9 puppies and look in prime condition.

I would highly recomend it.

Lynn

Actually Tink is growing at the correct weight and height for her breed on BARF and it's her complete dry fed litter mates who are behind.We dont see the BARF fed pups as they moved to the other end of the country.We will be visiting in the summer though :)
Myself and my breed club are over joyed with her progress.

And just to let you know,3 out of the 4 dry fed pups are fed on pedigree so it obviously is not a good food IMO

For preference, I would rather my puppies grew very slowly so that their joints weren't under any undue strain.   My male Munster took over 15 months to reach his adult height, we were wondering if by 6 months he'd meet minimum height standard.  He does and is a correct height for the breed, with lovely solid bone.

All my puppies are fed on complete after having had a dog fed a more  'natural ' diet as a youngster & then  suffer with growth plate problems due to that diet, I won't leave anything to guess work now.