Pet Food

Feeding your dog or cat is as individual a choice as feeding the rest of your family.  From feeding a commercially prepared food to feeding a raw diet there are a wide variety of options out there for keeping your dog on a healthy diet.

With the number of animals that we serve in the program we are constantly balancing cost with quality.  Generally the dogs in our program are fed the chicken based IAMS®  or Diamond® brand food.  However if we receive donated food we mix that in too.  Some dogs may have special dietary requirements which may be veterinarian prescribed food or a regularly available food with a different protein source or one without grain. And some foster families choose to donate food for their foster dog(s).

When considering what to feed your dog:

  • Do your research.  There is tremendous variety in the quality of commercially prepared pet foods.
  • Read pet food labels.
  • Understand the ingredients listed.
  • Seek named protein sources such as chicken, beef, lamb.
  • Fresh meats have a lot of water in them.  Meals (chicken meal, lamb meal, etc.) are the protein source that has been dehydrated to about 10% moisture content.

There are many passionate folks in the world who have very strong feelings and opinions on pet food.  It may be as simple as polling your friends and family to see how they feel about the food they feed their pet or speaking to your pet’s veterinarian about it.  Below are a few good places to start if you’d like to learn more about pet food.