Well, mid grade for me I think...

quote:

ORIGINAL: UrbanBeagles

You get the picture Ingredients have very little to do with the success of a food.



WOW! I want whatever your smoking. I do believe I've heard it all now.

 
UrbanBeagles is  smoking the same thing that the editors of the Small Animal Clinical Nutrition book are, which is considered the bible for animal nutrition.
 
 
Sorry. The ingredients list cannot and should not be used to assess the quality of a dog food. Please disregard the self-proclaiming pundits who say you can. It simply cannot be done. In fact AAFCO and FDA guard against it.
 
Rebecca Remillard, Ph.D., D.V.M., DACVN

ORIGINAL: abbysdad


Sorry. The ingredients list cannot and should not be used to assess the quality of a dog food. Please disregard the self-proclaiming pundits who say you can. It simply cannot be done. In fact AAFCO and FDA guard against it.
 
Rebecca Remillard, Ph.D., D.V.M., DACVN

 
Well if what she means by this statement is that the ingredients list ALONE cannot be used to assess the quality, then I would have to agree.  I mean, obviously if it isn't balanced then it is not a quality food to feed every day.  If she means that one should ignore the ingredients list since it is not indicator of quality, then she needs to recheck her facts.  This is straight off of the FDA website:
 
"So how can pet owners choose the right food for their pets? CVM's pet food specialist William Burkholder, D.V.M., Ph.D., recommends examining three parts of the pet food label: the life stage claim, the contact information for the manufacturer, and the list of ingredients."
 
Pet food ingredients must be listed on the label in descending order by weight. However, the weight includes the moisture in the ingredient, which makes it tricky to interpret. "A moist ingredient, such as chicken, which may be 70 percent water, may be listed ahead of a dry ingredient, such as soybean meal, which is only 10 percent water--yet the soy actually contributes more solids to the diet," says Susan Donoghue, V.M.D., owner of Nutrition Support Services, Inc., and past president of the American Academy of Veterinary Nutrition.
Similar materials listed as separate ingredients may outweigh other ingredients that precede them on the list of ingredients. For example, chicken may be listed as the first ingredient, then wheat flour, ground wheat, and wheat middlings. The consumer may believe that chicken is the predominant ingredient, but the three wheat products--when added together--may weigh more than the chicken."
 
Therefore, the FDA encourages the consumer to read the ingredients list to help make a judgment as to the quality of the food.  And it seems that there may even be a subtle reference to (Gasp!) higher meat content being preferable to grains.  It's also important to note that half of the advising committee for the AAFCO comes from the American Grain and Feed Association.  And I'm not saying the FDA is the authority on pet nutrition, I'm just disputing the apparent claims of this Rebecca Remillard, if that's what she meant by that statement.

"So how can pet owners choose the right food for their pets? CVM's pet food specialist William Burkholder, D.V.M., Ph.D., recommends examining three parts of the pet food label: the life stage claim, the contact information for the manufacturer, and the list of ingredients."

 
Now lets finish the paragraph.
 
So how can pet owners choose the right food for their pets? CVM's pet food specialist William Burkholder, D.V.M., Ph.D., recommends examining three parts of the pet food label: the life stage claim, the contact information for the manufacturer, and the list of ingredients.
Pet owners should look for the word "feeding" in the life stage claim (found in the nutritional adequacy statement on the label). This means the food was proven nutritionally adequate in animal feed tests.
Another item to check on the label is the contact information. Pet owners should look for the manufacturer's telephone number. Only the manufacturer's name and address are required, but people should be able to call manufacturers to ask questions about their products, says Burkholder, and manufacturers should be responsive. "They will not tell you how much liver, for example, is in their product, because that's part of their proprietary formula. But they should tell you how much of any nutrient is in the product."
The ingredients list on the label is an area of consumer preference and subjectivity. Pet owners who do or do not want to feed a pet a certain ingredient can look at the list of ingredients to make sure that particular substance is included or excluded.
Some people prefer to pass up animal by-products, which are proteins that have not been heat processed (unrendered) and may contain heads, feet, viscera and other animal parts not particularly appetizing. But protein quality of by-products sometimes is better than that from muscle meat, says Burkholder.
"Meal" is another ingredient that some people like to avoid. In processing meat meal or poultry by-product meal, by-products are rendered (heat processed), which removes the fat and water from the product. Meat or poultry by-product meal contains parts of animals not normally eaten by people.
Some consumers try to avoid pet foods with synthetic preservatives, such as butylated hydroxyanisole (BHA), butylated hydroxytoluene (BHT), and ethoxyquin. Ethoxyquin, in particular, has been hotly debated. Current scientific data suggest that ethoxyquin is safe, but some pet owners avoid this additive because of a suspected link to liver damage and other health problems in dogs. CVM has asked pet food producers to voluntarily lower their maximum level of ethoxyquin in dog food while more studies are being conducted on this preservative, and the industry is cooperating.
Many products preserved with naturally occurring compounds, such as tocopherols (vitamin E) or vitamin C, are available. These products have a much shorter shelf life than those with synthetic preservatives, especially once a bag of food is opened.
Some animal nutritionists recommend switching among two or three different pet food products every few months. Burkholder says nutritional advice for people to eat a wide variety of foods also applies to pets. Doing so helps ensure that a deficiency doesn't develop for some as yet unknown nutrient required for good health. When changing pet foods, add the new food to the old gradually for a few days to avoid upsetting the pet's digestive system.
 
 

ORIGINAL: abbysdad

Sorry. The ingredients list cannot and should not be used to assess the quality of a dog food. Please disregard the self-proclaiming pundits who say you can. It simply cannot be done. In fact AAFCO and FDA guard against it.  Rebecca Remillard, Ph.D., D.V.M., DACVN

 
I would agree that one could be easily mislead by the ingredients list, but lets keep things in proper perspective...the ingredients have everything to do with the success of the feed.  By asserting ingredients have nothing to do with the "quality" or "success" of a feed is simply ludicrous.  Otherwise, how else are you going to make any assesments...by whether or not the picture on the bag is cute?  If it's a pretty bag must be a good food?  If I my comment was uncalled and a bit bold I apologize.
 

Thank you abbysdad  - now can you please point out the section where they are guarding against using the ingredients list to assess the quality of the food? 

By asserting ingredients have nothing to do with the "quality" or "success" of a feed is simply ludicrous.

 
The problem is that there is not enough information to make a definitive statement as to which food is better by looking at the ingredients list.
 
Lets take Nutro and Eagle for example, both foods I personally like.  You can not tell by looking at the ingredients list, which food uses the higher quality chicken meal.  You can not tell which chicken meal is more bio-available to the dog.  You cannot tell which chicken meal has a higher percentage of bone or ash.  Is a Nutro formulation with rice, better and healthier and more bioavailable to the dog than an Eagle formulation with corn or vice versa?  What is the grade of the corn and rice being used, what are the exact percentages of the ingredients used in the formulation, how are these ingredients, stored, processed and distributed?  What research was done on these formulations?  How long were they tested and how were they tested before they were released for sale?  And even if you knew all this, you still could not tell how a dog was going to do on that food, some will probably do better on Nutro and others will do better on Eagle.
 
 As a matter of fact not even the manufacturers can tell that just by looking at the ingredients, that's why the spend millions of dollars doing extensive feeding tests, and digestibility studies.  If they could just look at the ingredients list and predict the success of a dog food, they could get rid of all of there nutritionists, DVM's and not do any testing.

Back to the original posters question.  I agree allergy testing is very costly.   But I do advocate it if you have had to switch foods this many times without seeing a decent result in resolving the issues.  In the end it might be the best $300 you might spend.  Not sure what they charge in your neck of the woods.  But you might get answers and then you can properly find the right diet for your pet.  I hate hearing people switching foods that often.  I feel that can mess a dog up.  Some dogs handle switching fine and others need the consistancy of the same diet.  It depends on your dog.  But you might find out its not food allergies at all.  And then all the switching was for nothing.  Or at least once you know what they show sensitivies too, you can find the right food that way.  I would try to save up for the test and then make a decision based on knowledge instead of guessing. 

I don't see the switching as a bad thing.  I feel variety is very good for dogs..for those that can handle it like mine.  To keep them on one food and only one food is something I would never do...they get soo bored.  Imagine eating only one food your whole life...YUK! 

If I can't find a few good brands, I'll get him tested...meanwhile, he's loving the different flavors [sm=happy.gif] 

When I first got Smokey. I tried all the highly recommended foods that I kept reading about on this forum and another one and the results were as follows:
1. Smokey hated the food and wouldn't eat it.
2. It bothered Smokey's digestion
3. Loose stools
4. Smokey hated the food and wouldn't eat it. 

I finally got a bag of Natural Balance Venison and Brown rice and my problems were solved. I checked the ingredients with several very good articles on this subject and they appear to be first rate.  She loves the kibble and will eat it plain or I mix some NB Roll slices or NB canned in with each cup ( about 1 tablespoon per cup) as an added treat.  After a few months, I now have her on the NB Sweet Potato and Fish and she likes that even better.  Her coat actually glistens in the sun, after about 2 weeks on this food. A friend of mine who was feeding Innova switched to NB, after she heard of my success and now she is an NB fan also.  The part I like the most about it, is that I can buy it at any Petco instead of having to seek out some dogfood specialty shop and hoping they have what my dog eats  in  stock. 

[linkhttp://www.naturalbalanceinc.com/dogformulas/home.html]http://www.naturalbalanceinc.com/dogformulas/home.html[/link]

I have to say I'm also having incredible results with NB Fish & Sweet Potato.  This is one of the first kibbles she will eat and agrees with her (which is saying a whole heck of a lot, Willow has a very limited diet that she can handle).

And, her skin is clearing up nicely on it. 

I have been feeding Nature's Logic kibble and canned with excellent results.

ORIGINAL: jamcony

I have been feeding Nature's Logic kibble and canned with excellent results.

Me too.  Actually, I've tried just about all the quality foods out there, really.  I never knew how good Joey could look until I put him on Nature's Logic.

Firm stools...the cloudiness in his eyes went away...muscle mass is better than ever before...coat looks great.

I do have to say that it is very, very pricy though.  But definatly worth it.  I will not switch from this food.

no one will agree with me on this one im sure, but i love iams. there, thats right i said it, i think iams is great food. my dog has been doing excellent on it. and look at his coat, it is as soft as it is shiny...





 

I have a black lab that I walk.  The first time I went over to meet him and his owner I was on the floor playing with him.  And, I noticed his black coat was super shiney.  I asked what they fed and it was Iams.  It does work for some dogs. 

I think 95% of what makes a coat shiny is genetic, not diet related.  The same goes for humans.  It is more dependent on the shape of the hair follicle and this determines whether the hair shaft will be smooth and reflect light or coarse and be more dull.  The same goes for skin/complexion - it is mostly genetic. Cosuming fish oils/omegas will help to some extent, however.  To be honest, I've never really seen a different in coat shine or texture when switching foods.  The only immediate changes I see are mostly poop related or body odor.