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Location: Surrey
Joined: Jun 2010
Posts: 4,420
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I worked with a lady who used to work in dog kennels and she told me that they soon knew which dogs were fed on Pedigree food as you could spot their "Pedigree chum bum"! Cheap foods like Pedigree are full of sugars, salts and fats that are very, very appealing to a dog (much like a greasy McDonalds burger and salty portion of chips is appealing to a kid) but not too good for a dog's tummy, especially a sensitive puppy. You're wise to look into other foods.
The most important thing to do when looking at dog foods is look at ingredients. It's a bit like feeding yourself or a child. Do you want to be eating something that's got 101 vague ingredients, so you're not actually sure what you're feeding? Or would you rather have something with a short, precise list that tells you exactly what's in the pack?
Look for a dog food that's descriptive - so it says chicken and lamb meal, rather than "animal derivatives" (derivatives are all the scraps of animals - feet, beaks, feathers, etc. - that are chucked into dogfood, whereas "meal" is dried meat), it says maize and wheat instead of "cereals". A decent dog food will be proud of its ingredients! It's quite telling that if you go onto the website of foods such as Pedigree and Bakers, you'll struggle to find a list of ingredients - they stick to vague descriptions such as "full of fresh meat for optimum nutitrition!", because they legally can get away with hinting at being a good food, but if they showed the actual ingredients, you'd realise it's not quite that great. Better brands of foods will be more than happy to post the exact ingredients list, which suggests they've got nothing to hide!
If your puppy isn't keen on dry food on its own, then I'd suggest getting a good quality wet food and mixing it with kibble - this worked well with my GSD puppy who was a little fussy, and we eventually decreased the wet food until she only really had a spoonful to add a bit of flavour. We used NatureDiet, which I've always found fab, but unfortunately it seems they've had some production issues recently and they're currently revamping their packaging or something so you may not be able to get hold of it at the moment. Some alternatives would be Natures Menu pouches, Forthglade packs, Wainwrights (PAH's own version of NatureDiet), stuff like that. A high meat content, describes what meats and in what amounts, and has relatively few ingredients in it - normally just the meat, some veg, rice and then a few bits like seaweed powder or similar.
You could also try soaking the kibble - use warm water (not boiling as this ruins some of the nutritional content) just enough to make the kibble a bit soggy, the texture may be more appealing and it brings out the smell of the food a bit more which may tempt the puppy.
Just take note that switching foods a lot can upset a tummy just as much as a rich food, especially in puppies. I'd advise perhaps settling his tum with a day or two of chicken or fish with rice or potato - nice and bland, easily digested - and do your research on foods, then try to stick to whatever food you introduce next, rather than chopping and changing.