**DOG FOOD - The Owners Tell All**

Haha, you want ALL of the foods I've fed??? Because that's going to be one crazy list!

ETA: This should be a fun read.

Pro plan puppy for darci  did ok on it, but had increased wt gain and a few itchies.
Eukanuba ( sp) wouldnt eat it.
Lifes abundance severe case of screaming blow sh*ts.
Solid gold worked well but increased poo and bad gas
Natural balance worked well
Eagle pack currently is what we are feeding and working very well.
 
ETA Now feeding Timberwolf Ocean Blue, great poops, They love the taste, coats look good etc.
Will rotate between Eagle Pack holistic and Timberwolf.

Twin,
I think you have a wonderful idea. This should be a good thread. I know i certainly would like to hear everyone's opinions. . .good and bad.  I'm going through the "right" food stage now too with my 6 month old toy poodle, Sophie.
 
I started Sophie out on Purina Puppy Chow due to the breeder. First dog. . .had no other experience to compare it to. Guess she did ok. At the time i really didn't know any better either way and i didn't know what to look for.
 
Switched Sophie to Nutro Natural Ultra Puppy. It seemed ok. Still not real sure what to look for but her poo was a little soft. . .or so it seemed to me. of course, i don't want it to be to hard either. LOL! But she wouldn't eat it all either. I'd leave the food down and she'd only eat half of it most of the time.
 
She's now on Royal Canine (for like 2 days) and she LOVES the taste. It doesn't take her long to eat it. that's about all i can say right now. Not sure about her poo or coat or anything else. But i'll add later when i get a little more experience with this brand.

When we got Ollie as a baby, his breeder said feed Iams.   After vaccinations he developed skin problems and illness. We investigated why his health had gone down so and ended switching food to premium...starting with Canidea.  He stopped eating it after a bag or two...so we needed to switch again.  We swithched to Eagle Pack Natural,. or Eagle Pack Original. He loves it, and he is shiny black and beautiful,,,people stop us to ask what we feed him because his coat is so beautiful.  Because of this,,when I got Bubblegum 2 years ago, I started her right out on EP,but stayed mostly with Natural because I wanted the Glucosomine that is in it.  She came to me with ear problems (she was fed Diamond) but has been healthy after clearing that up. I now feed her mostly any of the holistic formulas and occasionally Natural.    Why!!!   It is a food on the list made by Great Dane Lady. It is the only food trial tested on giant breed dogs.  I feel experience is the best and after raising many generations of Danes,,,and telling us what works best for her,,,is good enough for me.
She loves it.
She acts like a puppy,,so her energy level is pretty high.
She is beautiful.
Her stools are infrequent and firm.
WE LOVE IT!

I had two dogs, Shy who is currently 12 I#%92ve had since she was 1. Rotten is 9 and I#%92ve had her since 6 weeks. They ate Purina One Sensitive Skin mostly, with occasional other bags of grocery store food thrown in. They never went to the vet other than yearly visits, and emergency injuries, but never an illness.

Last year I found Boomer. He was 6 weeks old and had a broken jaw so I fed him a case of Mighty Dog pouches that someone gave me. He loved them.

It had been so long since I#%92d had a puppy that I started researching the best things for them. Someone gave me a sample pack of Beneful in the store one day, and the dogs really loved it. I Googled ‘Beneful#%92 and for whatever reason, fate I guess, I-dog popped up as one of the first few results. Since then life has never been the same. I want to do the healthiest thing for all my babies.

The girls can, and will, eat pretty much anything. Boomer on the other hand has a terribly sensitive stomach and gets skin infections. Practically nothing agrees with him. But I wanted them all to be on the same food. Our succession:

Innova – horribly bad gas, soft stools for all the dogs
California Natural (chicken & lamb flavors) – nobody liked it, didn#%92t agree with Boomer#%92s stomach
Timberwolf Organics (Wild, Ocean, Elk, Lamb)– Boomer#%92s stomach again, serious problems with the company, good stools, very high energy levels, none of the dogs liked the lamb
Canidae – best results so far, Boomer#%92s stomach still not great, suspect sunflower oil sensitivity, good stools, all had good coats etc…
Eagle Pack Fish - Shy & Boomer didn't like it, no special results
went back to Canidae then
Sensible Choice by Royal Canin – no stomach problems, all dogs like it, good stools, good coats etc…

LOL, you said tell all so I did. Sorry for the long post [&:]

Iams Puppy - what a mistake.    I bought it because the breeder was feeding it, but Louise hated it and getting her to eat was a chore.

Performatrin Ultra Puppy - It was fine, not a big hit.

Solid Golden Hunchen Flocken - a great food, but Louise hated it.   I tried to transition her from the Performatrin to this and she would pick out all the Solid Gold and throw them on the floor, then eat the Performatrin.

Innova Puppy - I like it, she likes it.   It's what she currently eats for breakfast.   I mix it with Tripett.   Sometimes she gets some canned Solid Gold or Innova mixed in as well and she loves those.   She also liked Merrick's, but it did not agree with her stomach.

For dinner she eats Nature's Variety Raw or Healthy Paws raw.    I would feed her all raw, but I cannot afford it.    Since starting on a half raw diet she's finally put on some much-needed weight and she has so much energy.   Her coat is also softer, she's so excited about eating and her poops are FINALLY good almost all the time.

She also gets chicken necks and sardines  a few times a week.  The sardines definitely make her coat nicer and she loves them.

9 yr old Brittany who was on Bil-Jac for the first six months of his life.  Gained way to much weight and switched to Purina Pro Plan for 6 years.  Now I mix Purina One Senior and Pro Plan Senior and he eats it dry, or inhales it is more like it.  He is almost 10 and his coat is beautiful, shows no signs of his age.  My next puppy will probably be put right on Pro Plan Selects because I do want a better diet for my next dog.  I like the ingredients in that product best.  But I do not advocate switching a senior dogs food when he is doing fantastic on it.  I am a Purina fan.

Pete (sheltie, age 2) was originally on Chicken Soup, but it didn't agree with him (runny poop). Then he started on California Natural, he did well on this. I have also fed EP holistic, which I like, but I can't get it in my area any more.
He currently eats Cali. natural with a little plain yogurt in the morning and Prairie Nature's variety raw in the evening. I also feed him some fresh vegies and fruit (cooked) on occasion.   He does really well on this diet- maintains his weight and has a beautiful coat.

Alright, looks like ALL the foods want to come out to play.

Maxximum Nutrition Puppy is what I fed, when I brought Emma home. She hardly ate it. I realized, through an elimination diet, that she was allergic to chicken.

Then, we went to home cooked. She did well, for a bit, then a vet convinced me to try

Pedigree Puppy-- Huge, orange poops. Emma LOVED it. Her skin and coat went to crap, in weeks. She was red, and peeling, in huge hunks. She was HYPERHYPERHYPER.

I switched to Solid Gold HundchenFlocken. She did well for a bit. She started looking fat, so I switched to

HundenFlocken and she looked a little better. She was throwing up a lot, and having a lot of seizures.

She was diagnosed with her liver issues, at this time, so we switched to Homemade, vegetarian. She did fantastically well, for almost a year. She smelled incredible! Vegetarians really do smell better than meat eaters. Her seizures started getting more intense, and closer together, so I read up, and decided to go grain free.

Natural Balance Sweet Potato and Fish-- Good poops, good skin and coat. Emma was too skinny. She ate a lot. Teenie improved in appearance, very much, on  this food. I don't know what she was fed before, but she lost the pounds, and her ears and skin cleared up. The doggy smell went away.

Homecooked, with some raw. Emma had issues with bones, so she no longer gets raw. Both dogs continue to do fantastically well, with this diet. Their skin and coats are great. Poops are compact, and not smelly. They have clean, healthy energy.

We do get various canned foods-------
Evanger's had grain in a grain free formula. They had an oopsie with cleaning their equipment. They offered no replies, to emails sent after a short explaination, and no replacement, for the contaminated food.

Merrick gave them diahrrea every time I fed it.

Natural Balance is always fine. They eat it, and seem to enjoy it.

Tripette makes them the happiest dogs in the world. It reeks, but they get it once a week.

Iceland Pure fish pouches are wonderful. They love it!

Evolve was unremarkable. They ate it. They don't refuse much. The poops were fine.

Oh, and....

Timberwolf Organics made them both itch like crazy.

Teenie loves Nature's Variety canned food, but it hasn't been offered to Emma, b/c of the kelp and high protein.

When I first adopted Bernie he had been on Science Diet. His coat was brittle, sparse and he had really loose stool.

I had done a lot of research prior to adopting him and new I didn't want to keep him on SD- but hadn't found a good source of premium brands of dog food in my town, yet.

I new that Nutro Natural Lamb & Rice was a big step up from SD, so I kept him on that while I continued my search for the right food. While on this food, he put on great weight (he was a good 10 pounds underweight when I adopted him), his coat started to come in nicely- he even grew feathering which he had no evidence of before.

In the meantime, almost a year from the day I adopted him- Bernie developed severe kidney problems and needed emergency surgery which took a month or so to recover. The vet put him on Royal Canin's Kidney formula. I couldn't believe from reading the ingredients that this was supposed to be a dog food- it looked like a rabbit formula!! I researched what he needed to keep his kidneys healthy and began the food search anew.

I settled on Blue Buffalo which can be found at PetsMart. Bernie has done awesome on this food! His coat has become super dense, feathered and shiny. Despite the extra density he sheds very little. His teeth look great (though I do give him recreational bones and compressed rawhide). His stool is small and firm, smaller than my Mom's 25 pound dog's stool (Bernie is around 50 pounds). He eats very little of this food per feeding, so a 30 pound bag lastsa long time. This food also fits well in my budget, and the store is located very close to me so I have to waste very little money on gasoline. ( A BIG plus, nowadays)

I did find a small pet store (it doesn't sell animals) that carries almost all of the really nice premium brands of dog food I see recommended regularly on most dog forums. I am glad that I have this resource local to me- but I haven't yet needed to use it.

Oh I forgot wet foods

EVO nobody really like it, very dry texture

Canidae Platinum the best canned, easy to mix, everybody likes

Neura Meats didn't go over well, nothing special

Iceland Pure Pate the absolute favorite food over anything else

no changes in stools with the addition of any of the cans

I adopted Penny, so I can't tell you all the foods shes been on, but I can tell you the ones I know she's been on. When we adopted her, the rescue lady told us she had been on IAMS. I can tell you she did not do good on it. When we got her, she was overweight and just not over all that great. The rescue lady was a Nutro distributor, so she gave us lots of Nutro samples, coupons, etc. So, we kept her on that. We started her on Nutro Natural Choice Lite, mixed with Nutro ULTRA Puppy. She did okay on that, but we only had on that for about 3 months. Then we put her on Nutro Natural Choice Lamb Meal & Rice. Her coat was rather dry and dandruffy. We had her on this for about a year, with the odd "other brand" canned or pouched food tossed in. Then I got into researching food and found out that Nutro wasn't actually that great. I found an awesome store near us that sells premium foods like Innova, Eagle Pack, Merrick, Natural Balance, etc etc. After lots of researching, I decided on Innova EVO. Her coats GLISTENS! I've never seen such a good looking and FEELING coat in my life! (Not to brag or anything. Hehe.) It's so soft, velvety and smooth. It's not dry or dandruffy like it was on Nutro. I love it! She has been on Innova EVO since about January now. I'm very happy with it. She does get "other brands" mixed in, too. Mostly Natural Balance canned. I also gets non kibble meals, just as raw meats/bones/organs, cooked chicken, yogurt, eggs, etc. Once this bag of EVO is done, I'd like to switch her to Canidae, which the store just started carrying. It's not that I'm not happy with Innova, I think it's just time for a change. Plus, I'll never know her peak of excellence if I just try her on one food. If does good on Canidae, I'll keep her on that for a few months. If she does bad on it, I'll either switch her back to EVO or try a different brand. I do think the "bad old table scraps and people food" has played a huge role in her health, though. My family is the old fashioned type, where when they were kids, "dog food" didn't even exist. "Table scraps" and raw meat where the dog(s) meals. So, Penny gets lots of cooked vegetables, meats, etc. No cooked bones, of course. And I feel comfortable with this. Some people just go nuts "OMG! You should NEVER feed bones or raw meat!" or "You should NEVER feed people food to dogs! It's harmful!" My dog is healthy as a fiddle. She has never been to vet for health reasons, other than for being spayed, vaccines, yearly check ups, etc. Her coat, energy, eyes, etc are great. I get lots of comments on her coat. To see if a food really is healthy and working, I look at my dog. If she was in poor condition, yes, I'd cut out the "people" food. But she's health and fit. Well, those are my two cents! SORRY FOR MY RAMBLING! []

Iams:  He could take it or leave it, stool was firm, coat was coarse, energy normal
            and skin was itchy.
 
Natural Balance:  He loved it, stool firm, no change in coat but not on it long
                               enough, energy normal.
 
Solid Gold : Didnt like the Bison , loose/soft stools, impvd softer coat, energy
                     normal, less itching.
 
Chicken Soup:  He likes it, med to firm stool, soft coat, norm energy. less itch.