Pet food ranges in price considerably. Cheap foods are cheap for a reason, usually because they’re made of GMO grains, by-products from grains, with a token meat content from poor quality sources, rendering plants, and 4-D animals (Dead, Dying, Disabled, Diseased). Doesn’t sound good does it, but this accounts for the majority of pet foods on the shelves.
Fortunately a select number of more “ethical” manufacturers sell better quality foods, but they’re few and far between.
Most dry foods are high in carbs, ranging from 40 to 50%, and given all carbs impact blood sugar this isn’t a good thing. It’s been proven high carbohydrate foods are damaging to dogs, but manufacturers don’t want you aware of this – well, duh, their foods are high in carbs (and carbs are cheap).
Recent years have shown the development of some excellent alternatives. They’re pricier, but in some cases you get what you pay for.
Enter Freeze Dried and Air Dried Raw Diets. A much more natural, species appropriate raw diet, with the convenience of dry food. Rawsome!
Freeze Dried
Back in World War 2 (and possibly World War 1), soldiers carried freeze dried foods because they wouldn’t spoil. The reason for this is moisture has been removed – moisture causes food to go off.
Skip to the present day and freeze-dried dog foods are emerging. This technique offers two excellent benefits:
- Nutrition stays intact. No cooking is involved.
- Shelf life is greatly extended, which means the food will keep as long as dry food does (or longer).
This means we can offer our dogs a highly nutritious properly formulated raw diet with the convenience of dry food. All you need to do is soak it in water for a few minutes before feeding. No real knowledge of raw feeding required.
So what’s the catch?
If you look at the cost per kilo it appears much more expensive than dry food. In truth it isn’t as expensive as it would seem as your dog would need to eat less to absorb the nutrition they need, and it’s far less damaging than the high carbohydrate dry foods we discussed earlier.
Have a look at K9 Natural and Frontier Pets (in Australia).
Air Dried
Air dried is similar to freeze dried, but the food is dried in… well, air. Warm air.
The nutritional value is still largely retained, although not quite as well as freeze dried. It’s still very good, and far better than processed dry foods.
The benefit with air dried is you can poor it into the bowl as you would a dry food. You don’t need to reconstitute it with water like you do freeze dried.
Have a look at ZiwiPEAK and Balanced Life (in Australia).