#my parents were SHOCKED when I told them science diet is garbage

[deansmom]

here’s a quick and easy shortcut for figuring out if you’re using a good dog food: how high up on the ingredients list is corn? dogs can’t digest corn and gain almost no nutritional value from it whatsoever and it’s generally used to hold the shape of the kibble. it’s high in calories, not very filling and high in fiber so your dog eats more because they’re going to the bathroom more but the only nutritional value they’re gaining from it is calories they probably don’t need. 

and good dog food isn’t always expensive but yeah, going up to a higher quality food isn’t cheap because they have to use other things to help the kibble maintain its shape. for example this is a huge gigantic monstrous jump in quality of dog food but look at the difference between beneful and pedigree’s ingredients list and wellness core’s ingredients

beneful (~$25-30 for 30lb bag)

pedigree ($25 for a 50lb bag)

wellness core (~$65-70+ for 18lb bag)

and just for giggles here’s one of rachel ray’s foods (which I call the “decent supermarket food” bc while it still has corn too high on the ingredients list it’s significantly better than the other garbage) (~$10-30 depending on size/sub-brand)

and then there’s the foods we feed my dogs which are good foods but not as expensive as CORE is

nutro farm’s harvest (lamb) (~$43-56 for 24lb that lasts around a month and a half for two large dogs)

and nulo (lamb) (~$60 for 22lb bag that lasts about a month and a half for two large dogs)

remember how I said that decent food doesn’t always have to be super expensive? authority is a great option for a decent quality of food for a decent price (somewhere around $30-35 for a 30/34lb bag of food)

I get it, it feels ridiculous to spend $60 on a bag of dog food every month or it may just be out of your price range. but when you feed them a higher quality food, you also don’t have to feed them as much of it because it’s more nutritionally packed and satisfying.

tl;dr look at the ingredients on the bag of dog food you have sitting in the pantry/kitchen/garage and if corn shows up in the first twenty ingredients (you really want it to be out of the first ten but if it’s closer to twenty that’s okayish), do some research and see if you can find a better food that’s within your budget. and yeah, you may have to go to a pet store to buy the food or order it online (chewy and amazon have automated delivery services and they’re generally at least a little cheaper than the brick-and-mortar stores). if you can buy your food at the supermarket (with like two exceptions), walmart, target, a gas station, etc, it’s probably not a very good food.

also don’t bother wasting your money on

royal canin (dog or cat) - is this a bad food? no. is this a food that is worth the price they’re charging? absolutely not.

science diet - [jpad voice] trash trash trash trash

iams - GARBAGE

kibbles ‘n bits - GARBAGE

puppy/dog chow - GARBAGE

there are (obviously) other important things that make a good dog food a good dog food but the fastest cheatsheet is: does it have corn in it and can I buy it at walmart? if the answer is yes, your dog deserves a better food. 

p.s. cats are carnivores so there should be little to no carbs in their food