Why does food seem to be such a problem??

As the title states, it does seem to be causing soooo many problems with our dogs.

Do you think that the manufacturers have molested the food too much or is it our dogs are just too sensitive these days.

Years ago there never seemed to be so many food related problems.

What are your thoughts???

I think... just like for our kids.. we've made everything too clean and clinical. It's like they are not able to build up any immune system. Might be other factors too but I def think thats part of the problem...

I completely agree ian, they actually found that the incedences of asthma actuall grew in line with the decline of gut worms.....turns out gut worms are good for the immune system and the release natural antihistamines (something like that anyway!)

My grandad used to breed dobermanns in france about 30yrs ago and my mum said all they were fed on was scraps of our food with some extras like rice and veg and raw bones and they were extremely healthy with no dietary problems... i think really food is way too processed for everything animal and humans! we arent supposed to digest that stuff its like fake food!

Alex
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How do you know it is down to food? There are lots more environmental factors that could cause it not to mention genes, are we more inclined to breed our dogs, as hobby breeders with just one or two, that have some sensitivity than would have been tolerated by less sentimental breeders years ago.
How do we even now that there is a problem? Perhaps more people seek help and solutions these days than they used to years ago when dogs did not fair so well. Dogs died younger years ago perhaps one of the reasons was because they struggled on with dietery problems never thriving very well. There, lots of food for thought!

I don't think there is a particular widespread problem with dogs' diets - in fact dogs now live much longer, healthier lives thanks to advances in pet nutrition (amongst other things).

I just feel that because the UK don't have to list every ingredient, vitamin and mineral that go into any processed dog food you just don't know everything they put in it. It's very frightening.

The dog food market is a huge moneyspinner! Not only for manufacturers and retailers but for vets as well. Over the last 6 months I have come to the conclusion that they feed our minds with such nonsense so we buy their product, at which our dogs then turn up their noses and from then on it is a money spinning roundabout. The trouble is we do not know what is in any food that we buy. This is true of food for human consumption as well. All we want is to feed the best possible diet to our dogs - and all the manufacturers want is - our money!

Actually the labelling of UK food is far better than most of the rest of the world. In America they have used euthanased pets in pet food something I doubt would happen here.
It's really down to the owner to be responsible and feed that food which is best for their dog. Certainly with none or the minimum of artificial ingredients.
Becky

I dont know wether it is down to dog food or breeding. I had my first dog nearly 40 years ago. God that makes me really old doesnt it. I was married with children at the time and could not afford to buy dog food for my two dogs. In those days children always had to be fed well first and then whatever was left over went to the dogs. I dont think I ever bought dog food so they just lived on left-overs. One lived a very healthy life until she was 17 and the other lived until 15 and right up to their last days were running around with the children. My GSD was only 8 when I had to have him pts recently and he was always fed on commercial dog food. So it does really make me think. Wish I knew the answer.

this is exactly what i mean, commercial dog food is not as good as we're led to believe.
if it was then why are there so many 'sensitive' diets, and illness related diets.
as far as breeding goes, then why are sensitive dogs being bred from??
only healthy dogs should be used to try to eliminate any problems.
dry food.......would you want to eat it?