Does Feed brand matter?

[cmtigger]

Quote:
A quick internet search seems to have conflicting information as to whether the "PMI Nutrition" that makes dog food is a Mars or Purina company. This recall seems to say that it's Mars http://www.fda.gov/Safety/Recalls/ArchiveRecalls/2008/ucm162800.htm

On the actual PMI nutrition website it doesn't name either company http://www.pminutrition.com/main.html . The Labdiet page includes "PMI Nutrition International." http://www.labdiet.com/ It would be interesting to know if this is one company or two companies.

In any case, I think that most people would agree that the Purina Mills livestock feeds are much better quality than things like cat chow.

 

[Katy]

The way I understand it the pet food division was bought out by Nestle, but the livesock division now is owned by Land 'O lakes. Nestle still uses the purina name on the cat and dog foods. And LOL still uses the Purina name on some of their products. I buy Home Grown feed which is also owned by LOL.

 

[WoodlandWoman]

I've fed multiple pet foods over the years that have been sold to some other corporation. Several times the name stayed the same, the price stayed the same, but the pet food quality went way down. It's easy money. Now, anytime I hear that a good food that I'm feeding is being sold, I start looking for a replacement and watch the ingredient labels closely. I also routinely look at the ingredients label for foods that I've been buying for awhile, just to see if they've changed to something of poorer quality.

 

[karlamaria]

Quote:
I am the same way!!! I would never sell my dogs shelf food, and I would not ever feed my dogs science diet. I hear vets tell you its good and or try to sell you that garb age and I refuse. its full of everything buy the good stuff. Dogs do not need fillers, or corn husk and all the other garbage they throw in. I have fed my dogs flint river ranch food or blue buffalo for years and will continue to do so. its baked and its not filled with animal that were ground up to add to dog foods. ( do not get me started on that crap)
Im also looking into organic and good foods for my birds, no filler and crap. glad to find another good pet provider

 

[1muttsfan]

For most people a national-brand diet- for dogs or chickens - will work fine. One of the reasons dogs live so long nowadays is that their food is much better balanced and nutritious than it was before the advent of commercial diets. Homemade diets tend to be woefully unbalanced, heavy on the protein with unbalanced calcium-to-phosphorus ratios and inadequate vitamin and mineral composition. I agree that you are always better off feeding the best food you can afford, but most animals will do ok on good-quality regular diets available at local feed stores. Good manufacturers want you to buy their food because you are happy with it, not because it is cheap, another good reason to avoid cheap foods.
As for vegetarian diets, bugs count as animal protein! My hens gobbled up a mouse in less than a minute last summer (yuck)