Puppy kibble

 

Puppy kibble or canned food - which is best to feed your puppy? Feeding your puppy good quality food will keep your puppy's coat shiny, his teeth clean, his bones strong and his immune system in tip-top condition.

It will also keep him feeling lively and cheerful, and will give him the best chance of living a long, disease-free life.

Here are some tips about what to look for in a good quality dog chow. You might even decide you would like to try your hand at making your own homemade dog food.

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Should I use puppy kibble or canned food?

Homemade dog food

Puppy feeding tips

High quality is essential - no compromise!

Should I use puppy kibble or canned food?

It doesn't really matter whether you choose puppy kibble (dry dog food) or canned food, as long as you're sure your puppy is getting the right combination of energy and nutrients according to his size and age.

You can even make your own homemade dog food, if you do a little research first.

Kibble

Many people find puppy kibble is more convenient as it is less messy than canned food and doesn't need to be kept in the refrigerator. If your puppy doesn't like the hard texture of the kibble at first, you can moisten it with a little warm water. Eventually, he'll get to like the crunch!

Crunching on dry food also helps to keep your puppy's teeth clean and exercises his jaw muscles. You'll also find that his stools (dog poo) will be smaller and firmer - much easier to clean up!

Canned food

Puppies often prefer the soft texture of canned food - at least until they've been given a chance to get used to dry food.

A high quality canned puppy food will provide all the nutrition your puppy needs but you will need to add bones and chew toys to keep his teeth clean.

Feeding your puppy exclusively on canned food can lead him to get so used to soft-textured food that he no longer enjoys chewing on good bones or chew toys. This can mean rotting teeth and diseased gums in the future - expensive to fix!

So it's a good idea to get him used to eating puppy kibble from an early age.

A combination of dry and canned food

It's quite OK to feed your puppy a combination of dry and canned food. In fact, it is a handy way of getting him used to kibble. You can mix the dry and canned food half-and-half, gradually reducing the canned food until your puppy is used to the kibble.

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Homemade dog food

Homemade dog food has become very popular recently, partly due to recent recalls of commercial pet food because of contaminants and toxins that have killed dogs and cats around the world.

It can be tricky to get the balance of nutrients right for a puppy and even a slight imbalance could cause problems in the future.

So unless you have done your research very carefully, it is better to keep feeding your puppy premium quality puppy food and leave the homemade food until he is grown up.

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High quality is essential - no compromise!

It's a sad fact of life: the best quality things are nearly always the most expensive! And this is certainly true of puppy kibble.

As a general rule, the cheaper foods you buy in the supermarket will have poor quality ingredients and may even contain fillers and colourings that are bad for your dog's health in the long term. There are a number of shocking truths about dog food that you need to know about before buying food from the supermarket.

Cheaper foods are less digestible, meaning your puppy needs to eat more of them to get his nutrients. This means you have to keep feeding your puppy more and any money you saved by buying cheaper food disappears!

Look for foods that claim to be nutritionally complete or 'complete foods'. These foods contain all the nutrients your puppy needs and you don't need to add other foods or supplements to his diet.

A top quality puppy food I have used myself is Orijen Puppy Food. Orijen is made with human-grade natural ingredients, such as meat, fruits, vegetables and grass. It's high protein and low carbohydrate and has a selection of ingredients that match the natural foods dogs would find in the wild.

Don't compromise your puppy's health in his early months - feed him the best quality puppy kibble you can and watch him thrive and grow!

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