A well balanced high quality diet is vital for any animal to maintain good health. However, most of us have no idea what it is our pets are actually consuming on a daily basis, year after year. You wouldn't feed your child only corn chips at every meal and expect them to thrive. The same is true for our pets. If your pet suffers from ear infections, skin problems, hair loss, itchy paws, voluminous stools, bad breath or runny eyes, then chances are their diet is contributing to their ailments. Marketing companies have become skilled at making awful diets appear gourmet so it's important to look beyond a bag's design. Vet schools have only recently begun focusing on the importance of nutrition, so many vets are uninformed about the new foods available and the new studies about the ingredients being used in the more familiar diets. They tend to recommend the brands they sell in their office. The best option is to become as educated as possible and decide for yourself if the food you're feeding is optimal for your pet's health and well being.

The first step is to look at the individual needs of your dog. Is it a growing puppy, middle aged, or senior? Does he get a lot of exercise, is he overweight, or breeding? Does he have a medical condition? The next step is to read the ingredient list. Ingredients are listed according to weight, starting with the heaviest. A whole meat should be listed first. Two in the top 3 are even better. You should be able to picture in your mind what each of the first 10 ingredients looks like. This means a chicken, cow, lamb, fish, turkey, etc. The generic terms meat, meat meal, animal protein, or meat/poultry by-products are not acceptable. These terms can (and sometimes do) include euthanized animals from vet hospitals and shelters, road-kill and other low quality protein sources. In low quality brands, the protein and fat sources often vary from one batch to another making it difficult to maintain your pet's weight or to prevent exposure to an ingredient they're allergic to. If meat is listed first, but it's followed by 3 or 4 grains, there’s likely way more grain than meat. Some grain in the diet is okay for most animals, but many manufacturers overdo it because grains are a less expensive protein source than meat. Ideally, grains should be whole, like rice, instead of fragments like rice flour, rice bran, or brewer's rice. These are low cost by-products of other food manufacturing processes. Exclude brands that use artificial preservatives, colors, or sweeteners. These are only used to make the food more appealing to pets, but animals don’t care what their food looks like and shouldn't be exposed to a lifetime of unnecessary chemicals.

Optimal nutritional levels for dogs are uncertain and therefore vary widely among brands. Rather than feed one brand of food year after year, try to find 3 or 4 different ones your pet thrives on and then rotate between them every few months. This helps ensure your pet will receive a balanced amount of vitamins and minerals over time, rather than a lifetime of excess or deficiencies. Rotating also helps them avoid developing an allergy towards one specific protein source. Be sure to switch your pet's food gradually over 7 days, adding slightly more of the new food and less of the old each day. A sudden switch can upset their stomach and trigger diarrhea. Quality foods cost more because the manufacturer has to pay more for high quality ingredients. If you're paying $10 for a 40 lb bag of food, you can be sure the manufacturer paid next to nothing for the ingredients. However, your pet will need to consume a smaller amount if it's higher in quality, so the same sized bag of high quality food will often last longer. Keep in mind, there is no such thing as one "best brand". There are MANY wonderful ones out there, and "the best" is one that your dog thrives on! The following are just a few that we like and don't like based on quality of ingredients. Feel free to discover more once you've learned what to look for!

Recommended Brands: (Click on the links below to visit their websites & get local retailers)
The Honest Kitchen (dehydrated food); Canidae; Solid Gold; Castor & Pollux; Natura Pet products: Innova, California Natural & EVO; Drs. Foster & Smith; Old Mother Hubbard Wellness; Eagle Pack; Chicken Soup for the Pet Lover's Soul; Evanger's Super Premium; Merrick; Natural Balance; Wysong; Nature's Variety Prairie or Instinct

Complete Commercial Raw Food Diets (can be fed alone):
Nature's Variety (Raw): naturesvariety.com; Nature's Logic Raw: natureslogic.com; Northwest Naturals Raw: nw-naturals.net; Stella & Chewy's: stellaandchewys.com; Steve's Real Food for Dogs: stevesrealfood.com; Primal Pet Foods: primalpetfoods.com; The Honest Kitchen: thehonestkitchen.com (dehydrated food, supplementing recommended)

Incomplete Commercial Raw Food Diets (added to supplement a complete diet):
rawadvantagepetfood.com; Halshan: halshan.com; Oma's Pride – omaspride.com

Brands Not Recommended:
Beneful; Gravy Train; Pedigree; Iams Proactive & Healthy Naturals; Max Adult; Kibbles and Bits; Ol' Roy; Diamond Original; Purina Complete Nutrition and Purina One Total; HiPro; Science Diet Adult Original and Science Diet's Nature's Best w/Beef; Eukanuba; Cesar; Old Yeller; Mighty Dog; Nature's Recipe "Breed Specifi"”

*For an expanded version of this article and additional information on pet nutrition, please click here.