Making Sun Dried Tomatoes

9 Comments

1. 

   Comatose May 19, 2014

   Second, fourth, and fifth ingredients should tell you that it’s junk right there.

   I prefer grain free foods. If you don’t mind foods with grain, try to avoid corn, as they’re low-grade fillers. Also avoid by-products. You want meat and meat-meals (but named meat meals, such as lamb-meal or chicken-meal) within the first five ingredients on the list. If it just says ‘meat-meal,’ avoid it, as you don’t know the source of the meat.

2. 

   just an opinion May 19, 2014

   No. It contains byproducts and corn, and a lot of grains.

   Take a look at the 5 and 6 star foods from this website. These are much better, quality foods. Many are also grain-free, which is more natural for dogs.

   http://www.dogfoodanalysis.com/

   Or, you could always check into a raw diet, which is the most natural food you could feed a dog. I’ve been doing it for over a year, and will never go back to a commercial food. Here’s some great resources to get you started:

   http://www.rawmeatybones.com/petowners/whatisrmb.php
   http://www.rawmeatybones.com/diet/exp-diet-guide.pdf
   http://www.ukrmb.co.uk/images/ww.pdf
   http://www.rawfed.com/myths/
   http://preymodelraw.com/how-to-get-started/
   http://pets.groups.yahoo.com/group/rawfeeding/
   http://dogfoodchat.com/forum/raw-feeding/

   Hope that helps!

3. 

   sisu May 19, 2014

   Iams is not a good dog food.
   To learn about dog food:
   http://www.dogster.com/forums/Food_and_N…
   http://www.dogfoodanalysis.com/dog_food_…
   Some quality dog food brands are:
   Orijen, Acana, EVO, Blue Buffalo Wilderness, Taste of the Wild, Canidae grain free, Wellness Core.
   Quality dog food may seem more expensive but you feed less.

4. 

   Audrey May 19, 2014

   “The first item in this dog food lists chicken. Although it is a quality item, raw chicken contains about 80% water. After cooking, most of that moisture is lost… reducing the meat content to just a fraction of its original weight.

   After processing, this item would probably occupy a lower position on the list.

   Which brings us to chicken by-product meal… the second and (more likely) the dominant meat ingredient in this dog food.

   Chicken by-product meal is a rendered product of slaughterhouse waste. It’s made from what’s left of a slaughtered chicken after all the prime cuts have been removed.

   In a nutshell, chicken by-products are those unsavory leftovers usually considered “unfit for human consumption”.

   This stuff can contain almost anything… feet, beaks, undeveloped eggs… anything (that is) but skeletal muscle (real meat).

   On the brighter side, by-product meals are meat concentrates and contain nearly 300% more protein than fresh chicken.

   The third ingredient is brewers rice. Brewers rice represents the small grain fragments left over after milling whole rice.

   This is an inexpensive cereal grain by-product and not considered a quality ingredient.

   The fourth item includes corn meal. Corn meal is a coarsely ground flour made from dried corn. Now, contrary to what you may have heard, corn isn’t necessarily a bad ingredient.

   On the other hand, although there’s no way to know for sure here, the corn used in making many pet foods can be similar to the kind used to make feed for livestock.

   And that can sometimes be problematic.

   What’s more, corn is commonly linked to canine food allergies1.

   For these reasons, we rarely consider corn a preferred component in any dog food.

   The fifth ingredient is sorghum. Sorghum is a starchy cereal grain with a nutrient profile similar to corn.

   Since it is gluten-free and boasts a smoother blood sugar behavior than other grains, sorghum may be considered an acceptable non-meat ingredient.

   The sixth item is barley. Barley is a starchy carbohydrate supplying fiber and other healthy nutrients. Unlike other grains with a higher glycemic index (like rice), barley can help support stable blood sugar levels in dogs.

   The seventh ingredient is chicken fat. Chicken fat is obtained from rendering chicken… a process similar to making soup in which the fat itself is skimmed from the surface of the liquid.

   Chicken fat is high in linoleic acid… an omega-6 fatty acid essential for life. Although it doesn’t sound very appetizing, chicken fat is actually a quality ingredient.”

   Taken from: http://www.dogfoodadvisor.com/dog-food-reviews/iams-healthy-naturals-dog-food/

   To put it simply, this food is garbage. I recommend considering Taste of the Wild, Blue Buffalo, Innova, or something similar. Or, better yet, go raw.

   Dale A: People are happy with this foods’ results because they do not know any better. Very few individuals are actually educated on canine nutrition. No educated pet owner would purchase this cheap product.

   Any dog can survive on Iams. Very few, if any, can thrive on it, though. Dogs on quality diets are healthier. Dogs on poor quality diets are unhealthier. Plain and simple.

   You should not feed a diet to your dog, just because it appears to work for your dog. Most people do not know what to look for, when evaluating their dog’s health. They do not consider switching diets, until their dog has actually developed a problem. It seems to me that people choose food that works for them, not their dogs.

   And, you are a vet student?

   For those who do not know, most vets receive very little nutritional training, and what they get in school is funded by the pet food companies (i.e.: Hill’s Science Diet, Purina). Vets and their staff are also given kickbacks, free food for their own pets and other perks for pushing their products in their office.

5. 

   Holly May 19, 2014

   It’s much better than regular Iams, but there are many much better foods out there. You don’t want things like corn and grains in your dog’s food.

   Some good options are Orijen, Acana, Wellness, Taste of the Wild, Blue.

6. 

   Dale A May 19, 2014

   You’re going to get a lot of people telling you its awful.

   The fact is, a very large number of people feed it, and are happy with the results.

   The thing is, someone, in their infinite wisdom divined a set of ‘rules’ by which they thought a diet should be evaluated. They didn’t necessarily know anything about nutrition, but their message was well delivered, and it stuck, so people start repeating it, and anything that doesn’t live up to those rules must be a bad food. (its the rule of the popular).

   Couple comments I have on this diet: I don’t like the fact that Chicken is listed as the first ingredient. Its an obvious ploy to ‘play the label game’, and frankly I’m disapointed in the company for doing this, but I guess it sells dog food. (If you list “Chicken”, it includes the water fraction, but when it gets in the kibble, its dry so who knows where it will sit on the list).

   Chicken by product meal doesn’t (by itself) worry me. A by-product is just anything that is produced that isn’t the primary product. This doesn’t mean that its bad nutritionally, just that this wasn’t the primary market. Examples might be things like chicken livers, eggs which haven’t been layed yet. I happen to know that the chicken by product meal that is used in Iams products is relatively high quality, and goes through a refinement process, so I’m reasonably happy with it. In something like “Ol’ Roy” on the other hand, I have less confidence in the chicken by product meal in there.

   In general though it does have some good ingredients that I like to see on the list (dired beet pulp, dried egg product, flax meal, fish oil, fructooligosaccharides are all good things to see in the diet).

   My recommendation is — feed it, evaluate the results, and make your decision is its the right food for *YOUR* dog.

   Here is a video I put together about picking a good diet
   http://www.youtube.com/ibycus314#p/a/u/1/VgQTVj0c2Hk

   edit
   @Sarah — re. iamscruelty.com . There is a whole heck of a lot I can say about this, but honestly the whole site is full of crap. The video was taken by a PETA ‘investigator’ who had been hired by Iams to assure animal welfare was being adhered to at an off site testing facility. (i.e. it was her job to make sure that these people were obeying good animal welfare). Rather than report her findings, she decided to make a video about them and release them
   Re. The specific content of the video, I’d say 99% of what is in there is taken very out of context and delivered for ‘shock value’ rather than to demonstrate a true breach of animal welfare, which anyone who has spent any time in the animal health field should be able to recognize.
   One example of this would be the shot of dogs waking up from an anesthetic that are claimed to be ‘too weak to stand’.
   Other examples are routine problems that are seen in any sufficiently large population of dogs. (including pets in homes), and are videos of treatment of these problems.

   Try doing a little research on PETA before you post their nonsense around.

7. 

   Sarah May 19, 2014

   No. It wont kill your dog but that by product meat means anything and everything scraped off the side of the road or wasnt deemed edible for human consumption. There are plenty of brands like Blue Buffalo, Halo, Nutrish, Sojo’s, Natural Balance, Newmans Own, Wellness, and many more that are made with actual real edible meat. However these do cost more, but you will have a happier pet and more than likely one that will live longer too.

   Check out IAMS cruelty, their experiments have been shown to be ruthless and cruel treatment. I personally feed my dog Eukanuba Sport which does have by products but since he is underweight he needed the highest calorie food and that was it. He gets cans of Blue Buffalo though.

8. 

   Danielle May 19, 2014

   Keeping this short and sweet:

   I feed my puppy, Wally, Orijen. Its grain-free, and I have been told by many people that it is the healthiest kibble there is. They make it for all ages. I suggest you look into it. Many of the name brand “naturals” that are sold in nation-wide stores are not as natural as the food from companies whose goal is to make very healthy dog food. This food is generally priced about the same as “regular” dog food. I hope this helps!!

   Good Luck!

9. 

   Proud owner of a maltipoo May 19, 2014

   Not the absolute best of grocery dog food but it’s not the worst out there either.I wouldn’t feed it as a steady diet but maybe if it was a emergency although I always stock up when my dog only has a pound left.

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