Recommended dog food for Labrador to help with shedding
Wednesday, March 24th, 2010 at
8:49 pm
I have a 2 year old female lab who sheds a lot. She is currently on a Eukanuba diet as per the vets advice. I am considering switching to Purina Pro Plan as I have been informed that it is a better food. Any thoughts on this? I am looking for any suggestions that will help to slow down her shedding a little bit as it seems to be pretty excessive form other labs I have come across.
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Neither is a decent choice.
Canidae, Wellness, Innova or Artemis. These foods are holistic and healthy and will improve not only your animal’s coat, but could have positive effects on behavior.
Feeding well costs a bit more, but it’s well worth it for a happy healthy animal.
Life’s Abundance bought from a company on line.
i feed it to my three dogs and it is not only great nutrition but really has cut down on the shedding as any good nutritional product should.
investigate it on my source and you will see the difference.
Best to you and your dog.
I am using Holistic Egal brand Dog food It has no dyes or prosertives and they have blends specially made for different types of problems dogs have.
Hi Bryan,
Your dog is lacking in nutrients. Get her off purina and eukanuba- that stuff has fillers and lots of byproducts. Nutro Natural choice is a GREAT food for dogs and helps prevent shedding. It doesn’t contain corn or wheat, which is really a filler in their food. The dry food will be enough to use; you don’t have to give her the canned stuff if she isn’t picky about it. I have a Lab/Doberman mix who is picky and she eats the nutro lamb and rice.
Also, buy some Brewer’s Yeast tablets- they aren’t too expensive, and you can find them at Petco or Petsmart. one or two a day and you’ll notice a difference in about a month. I also feed my dog boiled eggs and brush constantly.
A good shampoo to use would be one that has oatmeal in it. It is gentle on their skin and keeps them from drying out, which results in hair loss.
Good luck!
Thanks for posting – this is a really good question and seems to come up on Yahoo Answers frequently.
My first advice would be not to listen to your vet when it comes to nutrition. Veterinarians receive very little instruction in regards to nutrition when they are at school, and what they receive is often sponsored by the big pet food companies – so of course they will recommend Eukanuba, Purina, Science Diet, etc.
My second advice is, learn more about dog food. There’s a great site called the Dog Food Project at http://www.dogfoodproject.com/ , which has information about all the ingredients in dog food and how to choose a food that is of good quality. I would start there.
Personally, neither Eukanuba nor Purina Pro Plan are what I would consider "good" dog foods by a long shot. They are commercial grade dog foods that are produced cheaply and are full of fillers (corn, wheat, etc.) and other unnecessary things (sugar, food coloring, etc.) that your dog doesn’t need.
You will want to look for a higher grade commercial kibble, or a premium grade kibble. Some good kibbles they sell at the pet food chains are Natural Balance, Nutro Ultra, and Blue Buffalo.
If you have a specialty pet store nearby, you should be able to get a hold of premium grade kibbles, or you can order them online. Recommended, good foods are Timberwolf Organics, Canidae, Solid Gold, California Naturals, Innova Evo and Fromm’s.
You may also want to consider a nutritional supplement that promotes a healthy coat and healthy skin. You can give Salmon Oil in liquid form, or Fish Oil pills (I like the combination fix, flax, and borage oil ones). You can purchase both at the grocery store in the human supplements aisle.
We have 4 golden retrievers. We have tried many brands of dry dog food. Life’s Abundance, Innova, Solid Gold, Fromm’s, and Purina Pro Plan and, frankly, we haven’t noticied any difference, good or bad, in the health of our dogs. They seem to like practically anything we feed them. I’m beginning to wonder if all this competitive dog food business is nothing more than another sham. Everybody seems to be getting in the animal food business. It’s sad because I know some dog foods have got to be better than others and common sense tells me to TRUST the older and most well known brands because they have been around a lot longer and MUST BE testing their product to be a lot healthier and better than their competition. Still, I don’t know what to feed our dogs to keep them happy and healthy. Do you have any suggestions? My vet tells me to stay with the well known & older brands since they know the dog food business more than anybody, but I don’t know how true that is because every vet in this country sells Science Diet and we all know why they sell that brand.
Hey Don, thanks for your comment.
From what I read you’ve been feeding your dogs some really good foods. As for a sham, well in my humble opinion no. Our pets didn’t die ( a couple years ago now ) from eating good food did they? It’s been a long time in coming that the pet food industry finally got caught with there outright deceptive ways and down right in-humane practices. This did bring about change and more recognition for the new, old, established or unknown company’s that do provide quality pet food. Since my pet was one who was “murdered” (my term) I no longer believe what they tell me and do my own due diligence on any food I feed my pets. Learning to read labels and what they say is something I suggest to everyone as a starting point. It’s the least we can do for our beloved pets. I use Life’s Abundance and Dr. Jane Bicks is awesome. I feed them Taste of the Wild too. You can also make your own raw food as well. I also now use a holistic vet in my area and don’t buy into all the so called “needed vaccines” either. I would like to think we all grow a lot smarter as we get older. The rose colored glasses are off and we must look beyond what is presented to find the real truth! I say follow your intuition, you sound like you have a clue and you do!!!