I am horrified by some of the ingredients put in dog foods, and you should be too. While we are actively encouraged to look at what we are feeding to ourselves and our children, we are not looking at what we are feeding to our beloved companions, who are entirely dependent on us for their dietary needs. Below is a list of some of the ingredients to avoid, and what impact on your dog they will have. It makes for startling reading. A survey carried out on one of Britain’s most popular dry foods a few years ago actually found that incredibly, there was more nutrition in the bag than there was in the food!
Get out your dog food packet and see if any of the ingredients listed below are in there. And please don’t assume that just because your dog food is expensive, or vet recommended, that it will be any better than those that aren’t.
Cereals:
Cereals such as wheat, maize and corn are used in great abundance by most manufacturers. They will inform you that they are an excellent source of necessary dietary fibre and carbohydrate. Of course this may in some cases be true, but some dog foods contain up to 80% cereal.
The use of cereals in a pet food is an alternative to more expensive ingredients. Cereals are generally described as “bulking agents”. A bulking agent is an ingredient that provides a lot of bulk but often has little nutritional value and is very cheap for the manufacturer to buy.
Our dogs have gone mad. Behavioural problems in dogs have gone through the roof; more people are being bitten by dogs than ever before and large numbers of dogs are going into rescue because owners can no longer cope with their intolerably bad behaviour.