Pet food

The friendliest place on the web for anyone that enjoys cooking.
If you have answers, please help by responding to the unanswered posts.
Nutro Pet Food

I do not know if I have already choosen this product before as I am still in the process of choosing a brand of wet food for my Rottie. At the moment he only eat wet food if I put sharp cheddar cheese with it or when he is really hungry. Otherwise, he'd go for his dry food (Beneful) which he had choosen (through trial and error)...

But thanks for the warning...
 
Cooper's Mom, my vet says it is okay to only feed dry food as long as you keep the water bowl filled. Our 5 yr old german shepard/border collie mix has never had a can of wet food and is very healthy. If you want to add moisture to the dry, try a can of green beans or carrots. This will add bulk and moisture and flavor without calories. My vet also recommended to stay away from store brand dog foods.
 
LadyCook, thanks for the info. Fortunately, I don't use this either. Beneful and Moist & Meaty for my guy.

Those nightmare stories are heartbreaking.
 
Thank you for your reply, Jabbur...I have been raised around dogs almost all my life and we give both wet and dry food. We take care of our next door neighbour's dogs some weekends and they also give just dry food. Hannah was once on a diet so we were instructed to give her 1/3rd of a can of green beans. She is a German Shepherd...

We once tried to give Cooper raw carrots to chew instead of his toys and our vet said, it is not too bad to give him that as a replacement but when we did, that two days was hell for him as he was blocked. Hence we gave up on carrots.

I will put green beans on my shopping list if only to try...This silly dog has a stupid habit of leaving his breakfast for lunch and his dinner for breakfast unless otherwise he likes what's in it.
 
Last edited:
Thanks Ladycook! :shock:

My dogs have eaten Nutro for 10 years at least. Now the beagle has prescription food but the wiener dog still eats Nutro. I recently got a huge sample of Science Diet, so he'll be eating that for the forseeable future.

But you have to wonder about some of those people. One still fed the dog the food even after describing it as looking like it was covered with tiny white bugs?

My dogs eat dry food only now. Sometimes they get some wet (just a taste) , but I stopped buying it during the dog food scare.

Even Opal the greyhound with no teeth ate dry food.

They love carrots. And toaster waffles.
 
Our dogs eat California Natural dry food. Always have. No wet food, per se. Once a day they get Nupro joint supliment with vitamins. At 5 years, thye are healthy active and have shiny coats.
They do get some fresh fruits and vegetables. Carrots, cuke ends, lettuice and some green pepper as I clean and prep fruits and veggies for us. No scraps or anything we would not eat.
 
Jeez, this is scary. My 2 dogs eat Nutro's small bites lamb & rice (dry chow, just like the kind mentioned in the article). I'm not sure what to do, but they'll be going off Nutro this week, as soon as I find a good safe substitute.
 
Thanks for the heads up. My dogs have been off Nutro for quite awhile now, mostly because when I switched to a diet food I went with a friend's recommendation and tried Chicken Soup for the Dog Lover's Soul (though I hate the brand name!).

Up until now I had nothing against Nutro, but the company's behavior as reported in that article is abhorrent. I'm going to start spreading the word to avoid their products.
 
TOTW is one of the top brands of pet food. Allergies were the exact reasons why I've had to do quite a bit of dog food research. My first Aussie was allergic to just about everything, food and airborne allergens. Thank goodness we were able to finally manage his allergies with a variety of things, food being a major one.

There are a couple of sites out there that provide very good information about what's in dog food. Here's one that I refer to quite a bit (as do some trainers and breeders that I know):
http://www.dogfoodanalysis.com/

The thing that worries me most about Nutro is that it's manufactured by Diamond. Diamond was the one that produced all those various pet foods recalled last year. Caused several deaths. Diamond also had other recalls and I just don't like the trend. Recently, Canidae announced that they switched to Diamond, and I made the decision to switch away from Canidae just because I don't trust Diamond based on their history.

Now I feed Orijen kibble and they are doing great. Sorry to be a bit, uh, blunt, but I can see and smell a difference in their stools. All for the good. I still supplement with raw in half their meals. And will soon start buying Nature's Variety raw frozen to fill in when I don't have time to grind.
 
I think I'm going to switch my pups over from Nutro to either Wellness or Enova brand. Its double the price but I can't take the risk of them getting sick, or worse.
 
I feed my dogs raw food. It comes frozen in 2 or 5 lb packages, and is really not a bother/inconvenience at all to feed. I started raw because my rescue, Tessa was either throwing kibble up or having the runs. I must have tried six different foods in a month, to no avail. (Kibble is what I've fed my dogs all my life.)

A friend suggested raw, and I passed on it, thinking it a fad, and an expensive one, at that. Not only did my rescue do well on raw, she lost that extra layer of fat she had - she came to me at 78 lbs and now he is a fit 54 lbs. Her coat is so shiny that her blue merle shimmers like silver, and that's not because I spray some fancy grooming guck on her.

And... sorry - have to say this - their poops are smaller...which is a great thing when you have 4 dogs to pick up after.... (corn and other common kibble dog food fillers "plump" up feces, making it larger/inflated.) I'm VERY happy to have less to pick up in my yard... and a healthier dog - BONUS!
 
TOTW is one of the top brands of pet food. Allergies were the exact reasons why I've had to do quite a bit of dog food research. My first Aussie was allergic to just about everything, food and airborne allergens. Thank goodness we were able to finally manage his allergies with a variety of things, food being a major one.

There are a couple of sites out there that provide very good information about what's in dog food. Here's one that I refer to quite a bit (as do some trainers and breeders that I know):
http://www.dogfoodanalysis.com/

The thing that worries me most about Nutro is that it's manufactured by Diamond. Diamond was the one that produced all those various pet foods recalled last year. Caused several deaths. Diamond also had other recalls and I just don't like the trend. Recently, Canidae announced that they switched to Diamond, and I made the decision to switch away from Canidae just because I don't trust Diamond based on their history.

Now I feed Orijen kibble and they are doing great. Sorry to be a bit, uh, blunt, but I can see and smell a difference in their stools. All for the good. I still supplement with raw in half their meals. And will soon start buying Nature's Variety raw frozen to fill in when I don't have time to grind.

I don't recall Diamond being involved with last year's recalls, but they could have been. They were the ones involved with the aflatoxin deaths from the corn they used three years ago.

Canidae, being an independent co., could not keep up with their sales boost due to all the recalls last year from other foods. They had even expanded their facility. They have enlisted Diamond to produce their food using Diamond's machinery, along with around 20% of the other holistic foods on Whole Dog Journal's "good" list that Diamond also did this for. Diamond has state of the art equpiment that produces a finer grind and will benefit Canidae.
Canidae did not "switch" to Diamond, as they are still buying and inspecting all their own ingredients. It's no different than Welch's running Tropicana's juice through their lines.

I'm not sayiing I like the sound of it, but I've been following all the details closely because that is what I feed and sell.
 
I don't recall Diamond being involved with last year's recalls, but they could have been. They were the ones involved with the aflatoxin deaths from the corn they used three years ago.

Canidae, being an independent co., could not keep up with their sales boost due to all the recalls last year from other foods. They had even expanded their facility. They have enlisted Diamond to produce their food using Diamond's machinery, along with around 20% of the other holistic foods on Whole Dog Journal's "good" list that Diamond also did this for. Diamond has state of the art equpiment that produces a finer grind and will benefit Canidae.
Canidae did not "switch" to Diamond, as they are still buying and inspecting all their own ingredients. It's no different than Welch's running Tropicana's juice through their lines.

I'm not sayiing I like the sound of it, but I've been following all the details closely because that is what I feed and sell.

pacanis, the Diamond recalls that I'm aware of from last year are for Nutra Nuggets when they confirmed that some product may include traces of melamine resulting from cross contamination during manufacturing. No animal deaths were reported for Diamond (there were 2 reported deaths that I can recall under other manufacturers). Diamond also did another volunteered recall as a safety measure when American Nutrition recalled some of their canned foods (rice protein issue).

We have had success with Canidae with our dogs but I switched for 2 reasons, primarily, because I wanted to go grain free. Secondly, Diamond. I've also talked to 2 holistic pet store owners here in San Diego and one of them has already pulled Canidae off the shelves (because of Diamond) and the other one is thinking about it. But as far as I know, the rest who currently carry Canidae will continue to carry it.

I've read in a couple of breed forums that Canidae had responded to several customers regarding their concern over Diamond. The "Canidae team" stated that they still inspect the ingredients. That is good to hear. But I hope they also inspect the process of their food at Diamond because that is where I believe Diamond has had problems in the past.

Again, it's a personal choice I made to not to feed any brand manufactured by Diamond. I suppose this would all be moot if I'd just make the darn switch to 100% raw. :wacko:
 
No problem, Plumies, but I still don't get it. "Because od Diamond"?
Yes, Diamond had a problem with their food.
No, Diamond does not own these holistic foods they manufacture for. They don't inspect, purchase or put their stamp on any of these other companies' foods. It isn't any different than the example I stated. Heck, most things today are made that way; furnaces, AC's, washers, other appliances, namebrand vs storebrand..... As long as it is still made to Canidae's standards, I'm OK with it.

But I've been wrong before..... ;)
 
I understand, Pacanis. And I'm really hoping that Canidae does keep everything to their standards. But anytime something is outsourced, that company is relying on its manufacturing site to follow agreed to process protocols, quality assurance agreements, and standard operating procedures. Unless Canidae has someone at Diamond's site, overseeing the production process, the entire manufacturing process is controlled by Diamond. If a Diamond employee skips a cleaning step or does a mediocre job of sterilizing between Customer A and Canidae's runs, then well, you get cross contamination.

I'm in the pharmaceuticals industry and many of the companies don't manufacture their own products. Not all that different from many other industries. And I have seen a lot of problems, even with overkill training, auditing, inspections, etc. How Diamond and other large manufacturers work are similar in practice. It's Diamond's quality control at the manufacturing site and how they handle cleaning, prepping, etc. between each manufactured batch is the issue for me. The contamination last year is the most recent incident. Another incident from several years ago was with Solid Gold. Solid Gold switched to Diamond years ago and from personal experience as well as MIL, we found dried kernels of corn in the kibbles in 2 differenct bags purchased from 2 different locations. Solid Gold doesn't have corn as one of their ingredients. :huh:

What I do hope, for Diamond's customers' sake, is that they've learned from their past mistakes and incorporated corrective actions on the manufacturing floors. Based on some of the replies I've seen from Canidae team, (and reading between the lines ;) ), I think Canidae is aware of past issues and has committed to keep on top of keeping their quality the same. At least they are not hiding the fact that it's Diamond, which means they are confident. That's great for Canidae. But with the reasons I've mentioned and probably cuz I'm sensitive due to my industry, I'd rather not take that chance with my dogs. Maybe it's a small chance but a chance I'm not willing to take. :) And I've been known to be wrong...many times!
 
Back
Top Bottom