WHAT is with the Purina people?

I'll try this again on a different tack (old sailing term). Sandra has been on this board a long time (she changed id when the forum went to the new format). And for years, she has listened to choruses of NB, Innova, Canidae, etc., all the while hearing how her food is fit only for dusting a dancehall floor.
 
So, for once, she decided to let Purina answer the claims made about them or inferring them and relayed what their side is. And others here who feed a food not considered premium are tired of being told that they are harming and malnourishing their dog(s), even when they have documented proof to the contrary.
 
You don't feed Purina and neither do I. And that's okay. This cannot deny others the right to say that they do. For every person who wants to rave about TWO, there can be another that raves about Purina. That's just being fair.
 
I would also ask what they original intent of your post was, other than to complain about people posting their positive experiences with Purina.
 
FWIW, I'm one of the "Nutro People." We are borg.
 

Is rice really better than corn??  maybe for some dogs, maybe not for others, is Chicken Meal a better source of protien than Chicken by-product meal??

 
Is Chicken better than Poultry meal?  Is Beef fat better than Animal fat?  Is more meat better than more grain? Are more chemicals better than fewer chemicals?
 
I guess if you don't have the ability to make those distinctions, any dog food will do.  Heck, why even bother with an ingredients list?  Just ask a neighbour what he feeds and be done with it!  In fact, why not just list anecdotes on the panel? I may be on to something here...
 
Introducing new PURINA SUPER GREAT DOG FOOD!
 
Specifically formulated to provide every known nutritional requirement for your dog.  But don't take our word for it..ask a stranger on an internet forum!
 
We don't bother with naming our ingredients, or listing them in order of quantitative presence...why should we?  It doesn't matter!  Try our brand and see the results for yourself.  We guarantee that your dog will not specifically die from malnutrition or starvation.  How can we guarantee that?  Your dad's dogs didn't die, did they?  So why would yours?!
 
Still don't believe us?  Our technicians' friends all use Purina SGDF and they show their dogs in competition.  One of their dogs lived to be 47 years old!*
 
(*by our best estimations)
 
So try it today!  Available in your local grocery store.
 
Science.  What a waste of time.

yes, but the purina people have to realize that there are innocent browsers like myself that they may be irresponsibly encouraging to buy purina, and thereby pollute my dog.
 
we received a coupon for a free samll package of Purina One...Sparky tried it yesterday and gobbled it up...i will be buying a large package today....if i hadn't read this thread, i might have not.
 
 

ORIGINAL: ron2

Purina is competing in the holistics market. With this food, they can make the same claims as other brands. So, if another brand says this, that's just their wholesome goodness. If Purina does this, it's just shameless advertising.

Actually it is shameless advertising, because their claims are misleading. Other products that make similar claims are able to back them up. Some examples about Selects: "Real turkey is the #1 ingredient" Well, not exactly, because that turkey is water inclusive, so after cooking turkey is not the #1 ingredient. Or "Formulated without ground corn" but it has corn gluten meal.

Jenn makes a good point; the gimmick for Selects is "Everything you want in a dog food. Nothing you don't" They then go on to list no by-products, no ground corn, and no artificial anything. Those things are in every other Purina formula, so they're telling you right there that they aren't something you want.

ORIGINAL: sandra_slayton


I can't see where this means they have a problem with their food.  It could very easily mean they are trying to cater to those who do not wanthitems in their dog food---

You're right, what it does mean is that Purina doesn't give a flying fig about the ingredients in their food or the health of your dog, as long as they have a market share in each consumer group, which they do very well due to their brilliant advertising.  Gee, sounds like a company I want to rely on for my dog's health!

ask a stranger on an internet forum

And get a load of attitude to go with it.

Science is not a waste. And the big food companies employ scientists particularly for their skill and knowledge.

The ingredient list is nothing more than a list by prevalence of weight, which is not a guarantee of presence by volume. A volume of meat may weigh more than an equal volume of grain. But, bioavailabilty also comes into play. When they say that a food has apples in it, what parts of the apple? Apple seeds are toxic. Are those in the food. Or are they just using apple skins (apple pomace? Remember the flap over tomato pomace)? Some fruits don't have protein, providing mainly just carbs in the form of sugar. Would that be a particular dog might like a premium, because of the sugar in from apples?

As for kcal density, it can be shown that by-product has more, specifically organ meat. Your hair and nails are all protein, though currently in a hard-to-digest form.

Most people I have known haven't spent any thought about dog nutrition. They figure on trusting the makers to know what they are doing and look at me kind of funny because I go to a dog forum and they wouldn't be caught dead in one of these discussions. They buy what they buy and that's the end of it.

Science is not a waste.

 
Ron, I'm sure the sarcasm didn't escape you.  You seem like a bright guy.
 

The ingredient list is nothing more than a list by prevalence of weight

 
No argument here.  However, it's the only quantifiable source of information that we have.  Someone with your obvious knowledge of how the ingredients list is actually put together should be able to make an informed decision on what to feed your dog...agree?  Without the list, how would you make that choice?
 
If people want to trust Purina, or any other manufacturer, without thinking, no problem. Nobody is denying that stupid people exist.  A fool and his money...stabilize the economy.

I caught it and I'm laughing, on the inside.[]
 
Let me also state that I wasn't referring to you about a load of attitude. But I do think a newbie could be a bit bedazzled by the barking matches that go on here, sometimes. OTOH, it may lead them to a choice of food that they and their dogs can be happy with.
 

You're right, what it does mean is that Purina doesn't give a flying fig about the ingredients in their food or the health of your dog, as long as they have a market share in each consumer group, which they do very well due to their brilliant advertising. Gee, sounds like a company I want to rely on for my dog's health!

 
It doesn't bother me in the least if my dogs eat animal digest or by products in their food, but it bothers others.    I see nothing wrong with animal digest or meat bi-products, but  others do,. If my dogs were in the wild and they killed an animal or came upon a dead animal, they would eat most, if not all of it.  Fine with me.  Some here think their dogs should eat as dogs were intended to eat---but that means only the chicken breast or the rump roast off a dead deer or cow.  No guts, not fur or feathers, no feet, no head, etc.  So what is wrong with Purina making a food I want to feed to my dogs, but also making one that others who do not like animal digest, etc would want to feed their dogs.
 
I keep reading about food coloring in the dog  food.  I just went and got  my box of food coloring and looked all over the box  and did not see a single warning about using to much of it will cause cancer, etc.  In fact, there is no warning at all.  Somehow I doubt  what food coloring there is in my dogs food is going to kill them.  I also ehcked the bag and the only coloring listed is carmel coloring.
 
Apparently my dogs must digest most of what they eat as they do not have large poops---the fox terrier down the street leaves much larger poops in my front yard than my 70-75 pound goldens leave in my back yard.
 
And yes, I trust my dogs health to Purina as it has always done right by my dad's dogs and my dogs.
 
And just to keep things straight, since my dogs have never been on Iam or Eukanuba and only on Science Diet Rx for a few months (2 of them), I can only say how my dogs do on Purina.  But even tho it appears i am defending Purian, I am actually trying to point out that dogs can and do  do great on foods other than premium.  I can only give Purina expamples as that is the only one I have used.

If people want to trust Purina, or any other manufacturer, without thinking, no problem. Nobody is denying that stupid people exist. A fool and his money...stabilize the economy.

 
Okay, so now I am stupid.  That is okay.  I have been called uneducated, and true, I only have one year of nursing school after hight school.  I h ave been called to old to change and true i am 61 and I look at things from every angle before I consider changing something that has worked for me for decades.  I have been told I have my head in the sand (as does Glenda) because we don't go much for studies that are not totally independent.  I have been called brainwashed by Purina's ads, and that is wrong--seeing Purina dogs for 50 years is what brained washed me.
 
I have been told i didn't truly love my dogs or I would feed them something else.  I was told maybe my Hunter may not haved developed AIHA& dying liver from the ProHeart6 injection if I had had him on something else.---even tho it ws rpoved the drugs did it.  I have been told maybe my 12 1/2 year old irish Setter would not have developed bone cancer if he had been on something else.  And I have been told no matter what my vet says, hnot matter how great my dogs look and act, they can not be healthy.
 
So it boils down to I am uneducated, brainwashed, gullible, have my head in the sand, stupid, don't love my dogs enought, are letting them die with cancer and drug induced liver damage & AIHA.  Meanwhile, they are getting great wellness checks every year and great blood panels (maybe my vet  doesn't know his job?), they have beautiful coats, more than enough energy and 2 of the 3 sleep with me at night which would not be allowed if they smelled the least bit bad--and the girls have not had a bath since June.
 
By chance did you have a dog and it was fed Purina and at age 3 it turned into a ear of corn and died?  If so, I would have your attitude towards Purina.

ORIGINAL: sandra_slayton


And yes, I trust my dogs health to Purina as it has always done right by my dad's dogs and my dogs.

If that's the only thing that your dad fed then you don't have a basis for comparison...

I've meant to ask what the other food you once tried was?

Exactly - how could anyone put their faith in a company that makes all these different lines of food of all different grades, and makes contradicting claims that each one is the best for your dog's health? Corn and artificial colors and preservatives are ok for Beneful, because it's the healthiest food for your pet because of all those FRESH VEGETABLES, but Pro Plan Select is the best because it contains none of those bad ingredients like corn, artifical colors/preservatives etc... Give me a break! For that alone, bad ingredients aside, I would not support this company.

Right and Toyota should only make Lexus and GM should only make Cadillacs, and Ford should only make Lincolns, I mean why make all those under powered small vehicles with less features. It's called supply and demand.

I do not remember.  It was a long 7 1/2 years ago but i did get it at petsmart over in Corpus Christi.
 
As to my dad's dogs...and I have owned my own since i was 11..they ate Purina Dog Chow and that was it except for bones (shudder to think of the cooked chicken, quail, dove, duck, etc bones they ate) With a famioly of 7, there were no left overs, and if there were, Mom saved them and ate them for lucnh the next day.
 
No, we did not give them another food to compare  against Purina.  So I go by the fact that their coats were beautiful, tho sometimes a little shaggy looking during hunting season when we had to cut burs out of the setter's tail and leg feathers.  I go by the amount of energy they had, often going for 4-6 hours 7 days a week during hunting season. And they hunted high grass, briars, brambles, thickets, rocky terrian, etc.  It was very hard going, but they never faltared nor gave in because they had the strength and energy to do it.
 
They were not sick.  Most country folks did not take dogs to vets and we treated minor injuries, but an illness was something els to us..  My dad loved our dogs to much and they were to good a hunters to risk.  I lost my first setter, Beauty, 50 years ago this month to distemper.  She was 8 months old.  A few years later I lost another setter, Rascal, age 3 to distemper.  They had both had shots.  When I found my setter Duchess dead and bloated outside her dog house in our back yard , my Dad had a necropsy done because we had to know what killed her as we had other hunters.  Turns out someone had given her ground beef with poison in it (had a couple more cases of dogs dying like Duchess in our little town, but owners didn't have necropsy done.
 
When mack was run over by a truck loaded with fence posts, front and back wheels, my dad rushed him right to the vet.  No broken bones, but for the rest of his life --he died at 15 four years later--my dad had to take him about once a month and have fluid drained from around his stomach.   
 
The point of all this is my Dad took our dogs to the vet if they were sick because he valued them and the lives of our other dogs to much to risk it.  And since most of our dogs only ever saw the vet once a year for vax, they were not sick.We had no ear infections, no allegies, no hot spots, nothing.
 
I put all those things together and know Purina did right by my dad's dogs.  I put together my dogs looks, actions, physicals, and I know Purina is doing right by my dogs.

Okay, so now I am stupid.

 
Um, Ok.  I don't know you, so I can't argue with you on that point. 
 
However, I can say that my 'stupid' comment was directed at people who blindly trust a manufacturer's claims.  That was pretty clear in my posting. Unless you consider yourself one of these people, I'm not sure how you became the victim.
 
It also sounds like you've been told a lot of things.  I've been told some things too.  So I guess you can see then why having a scientific basis for your nutrition decisions is important, something like, oh, I don't know...an ingredients list?
 

By chance did you have a dog and it was fed Purina and at age 3 it turned into a ear of corn and died?  If so, I would have your attitude towards Purina

 
If my dog turned into an ear of corn, at any age, I would have a different attitude towards LIFE.  Dog food would be the least of my concerns.

If Sandra's dogs are healthy and thriving on Purina what does it matter.  The dogs are happy and healthy.  She is going on her own experiences. 
I don't see what the big deal is with what she feeds or anyone else feeds...whose to say which is better for the dog?  If the dog cannot process high end feed then it cannot. 
Why can't the issue of what everyone feeds just be put to rest?  If the dog is healthy on it that is all that matters in the end.
I find the dog food issues to be so heated that it is down right rididculous.  Obviously if Purina or Ol' Roy was that horrible it would not be sold to the public for their dogs. 
The high end feeds are not easily available to the masses and until it is I find this to be a mute point.