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Location: UK
Joined: Sep 2011
Posts: 1,052
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They advertise a lot so it's logical that people would think they are top quality food.
A good guide is, if a dry food looks like a bag of smarties in colour, it's usually rubbish. Dogs don't see vivid colours like we do and it's coloured to appeal to owners eyes.
There are quite a few good foods on the market, like Arden Grange, Burns and others that I'm sure others with large/giant breeds can recommend. A food with a single source named meat as the first or second ingredient and no fractions of grains such as bran or starch are usually considered the best. The shorter the ingredients list is with the least number of grain and meat fractions, usually the better the food is. And "rich in" meat sources food as they are usually not the best quality. I personally don't like foods with wheat and maize, but you may find your puppy does well on those.
James Wellbeloved is one I've used for years on previous and current dogs with good results, but it's the adult and senior food I've used the most. The puppy food, especially the large breed one just went straight through my TM as a puppy - even the JW rep at a dog show told me it was too high in protein.
My friend used to wean her shar-pei onto JW puppy at 4 weeks and gradually mix in the adult from about 6 weeks old so they were on all adult at the age of 3 months. Protein wise, they were on the equivalent of the junior food from about 8 weeks old, so that may be worth looking at for your girl. Shar-Pei are a fast growing breed actually classed as a giant breed for their growth rate from a puppy to adult.
Other good brands are Arden Grange, Burns and from personal experience there are a couple of cheaper foods that are better than some of the highly advertised and expensive foods are Supadog Sensitive. The TM was raised on this food with a few additions like yogurt, tripe and some raw food like chicken wings, though I recommend you do more research as he's only a large and primitive breed rather than a true giant, so this may not be suitable for your girl. And the 3 Skinners Field & Trial varieties that are turkey and rice, duck and rice and salmon and rice. They are VAT free so are equivalent in quality to James Wellbeloved, but at least 20% cheaper. The last two are adult foods rather than puppy food, but that may be something to bear in mind when she's older.
I drove myself crackers looking for the right food for the TM as a puppy, especially due to him having an upset tummy on puppy food. I was terrified of him growing up deformed because I hadn't fed him properly. I worried about protein, fat, calorie and calcium levels (should be under 1.6% of the dry matter of the food, incidentally). I learned to relax when he was about 6 months old. Then he had a bout of panosteitis and I worried all over again. I'd have a google round and try to ask some fellow mastiff owners what they feed.
Good luck with your pup and I'm sorry if all this has given you a battered head.