When people come to the store and ask what is the best diet I can feed my dog, our first response is to ask a few questions. How old is your dog? Does the dog have any known health issues? What are you feeding them now? Etc. If you have a dog that is healthy and not too, too young or too, too old our response will almost always be a raw diet. A raw diet is the closest thing to what a canine would eat in the wild and what it ancestors ate. Dogs didn’t originally eat cultivated grains and processed animal by-products. Dogs are definitely omnivores and can eat almost anything, but our experience and research studies have shown that they do best when eating fresh raw foods which still contain all the original nutrients and enzymes that are part of a whole food. Raw foods are also more palatable to animals and easier to digest. Better digestion results in better nutrient absorption and over-all better health.
There are many drawbacks to extruded, heated and otherwise processed foods. Raw avoids these drawbacks and delivers live nutrients and enzymes to your dog. On the other hand feeding raw food, especially raw meat, may not be our cup of tea as humans. It may seem too messy, too much work or whatever. Enter the “freeze drying” processing of raw foods. Our strong recommendation would be to serve as much raw as possible but if you find that somewhat distasteful from the human stand point, we would suggest freeze dried raw food as the next best alternative. The following is a quote from an article in Dog’s Naturally Magazine entitled “Why Feed Raw?” We put a link to the article at the end of this post.
“It is this process, water removal with no heat damage, that makes freeze dried pet foods so attractive. Raw pet food, or pet food preserved by freeze drying, has these advantages: nutrient digestibility and is superior to products that have been heated by extrusion (kibble) or boiling (canned). Natural enzyme activity is preserved. Vitamins remain in a state undamaged by processing with heat. Friendly bacteria are allowed to thrive. A freeze-dried product has a long shelf life due to low moisture and is a most convenient assist when traveling with your pet whether on a plane or hiking in the wilderness. It weighs nearly nothing yet delivers full nutrition in a tidy, palatable form.”
We carry several different lines of freeze dried raw foods including the latest offering by Grandma Lucy’s call Macanna. See the link to full description: http://enews.centralpennbusiness.com/q/LmOBMUlYID2bf5Z_CHHDC1aTV-9qs0gTLkMuPyvqIStaed2QhGyaZihLn
This new Pet Age Magazine Reader’s Choice Award 2017 freeze dried raw food contains a list of nutrient dense super foods and ingredients that provide a level of nutrition that is hard to find in a single food. If you are at all interested in exploring a raw diet for your pet we would encourage you to stop by the store and talk to one of our staff members about the many frozen and freeze dried options that we have available.
Links to raw food articles: