The Truth about Commercial Dog Foods

It is no shock that most canned dog food found in the local grocery store aisles are not the healthiest of choices for dogs. With claims of being scientifically formulated for best nutrition it becomes very confusing for the consumer to know what really is best for the pet they are trying to provide a quality and healthy life. The confusion increases when remembering there was a time that science played no role in the nutrition of dogs and yet they still thrived.

Dry food, wet food, dog treats, puppy food, dental bones; the variations on nutritional vehicles for dogs can be overwhelming. Add to that the various claims made by any given brand and the abundance of recalls do to harmful results, and the pet owner is hard pressed to know what is best for their animal.

Fortunately there is a simple answer. Find an all natural dog food. It can be as easy as reading a label. Due to domestication, dogs, as a rule, no longer have scavenge for food. But if they did, they could survive quite nicely on scraps of meat, hunks of bread and the occasional vegetable. They would choose these things because they know instinctively what is good for them. When choosing a food, pet owners need only to look for foods that have ingredients they recognize as being natural. Chicken, lamb, rice, grains and vegetables are typical in all natural dog foods and are even things that could be prepared at home with little effort. A good rule of thumb is that if it is not something that would be good for humans, it’s probably not good for dogs.

Of course dogs can’t eat everything a human would eat. Some foods people take for granted are toxic to dogs; like chocolate. There is also no reason to add seasonings like salt and pepper to homemade dog food. They’ll eat it just fine without those things and it’s not good for them.

Ideally, if the desire is to provide optimum nutrition for dogs, making all natural food for them at home is the best answer. Combining boiled meats and bones for protein with rice or grain for energy should do the trick for man’s best friend.