california natural and purina beneful

[REZA]

We have a 4 and a half month old westie. He has seemed to be very healthy with the exception of a sensitive stomach. So, we found california natural and he seemed pretty happy with that---but he still had diarrhea once a day and a very loose stool once a day. THe other day we ran out of food and our normal pet store was closed so we picked up the smallest bag of food we could find, which happened to be purina beneful healthy weight. He hasn't had any diarrhea or loose stools in five days. Everyone sings the praises of cal nat and aside from the diarrhea, he is very healthy---strong coat, active, happy, but I am thinking of changing to a possibly lower quality food because it may seem to suit our particular dog better. Any advice or thougths would be wonderful.

[Zoom]

That's not just lower quality, that's scraping the bottom of the barrel. They also add in a stool hardener if I'm not mistaken, so it just looks better. There are a million other types of food out there you can try before resorting to Purina.

[MafiaPrincess]

That's pretty disgusting for food...

Purina - Beneful Healthy Weight Formula

Ingredients:
Ground yellow corn, chicken by-product meal, corn gluten meal, soybean hulls*, whole wheat flour, rice flour, chicken, soy flour, beef tallow preserved with mixed-tocopherols (source of Vitamin E), sugar, animal digest, tricalcium phosphate, sorbitol, water, salt, phosphoric acid, potassium chloride, dicalcium phosphate, sorbic acid (a preservative), L-Lysine monohydrochloride, dried green beans, dried carrots, calcium carbonate, calcium propionate (a preservative), choline chloride, vitamin supplements (E, A, B-12, D-3), zinc sulfate, added color (Yellow 5, Red 40, Yellow 6, Blue 2), DL-Methionine, ferrous sulfate, glyceryl monostearate, manganese sulfate, niacin, calcium pantothenate, riboflavin supplement, biotin, thiamine mononitrate, copper sulfate, garlic oil, pyridoxine hydrochloride, folic acid, menadione sodium bisulfite complex (source of Vitamin K activity), calcium iodate, sodium selenite

*14***37; - a source of fiber

Guaranteed Analysis
Protein: 25%
Fat: 7%
Fiber: 9%
Moisture: 14%

Calories
306 Kcal/cup

[juliefurry]

I had that problem with my bernese mountain dog puppy. She had loose, watery stools everyday for months until we tried Timberwolf Organics Dakota Bison. Has your puppy been checked for parasites and stuff?

[showpug]

Give Canidae a try, I think you will be please with the results and the price.

www.canidae.com

Don't resort to Beneful!!!!!!!

[Luvntzus]

Honestly, just because your dog has firmer stools on Beneful doesn't mean that it's a healthy food. It also doesn't mean that there aren't other high quality foods that would be healthy and your dog would have firm stools on. There are so many other foods to choose from and I wouldn't settle for Beneful by any means! I've bolded the worst ingredients below:

Ground yellow corn, chicken by-product meal, corn gluten meal, soybean hulls*, whole wheat flour, rice flour, chicken, soy flour, beef tallow preserved with mixed-tocopherols (source of Vitamin E), sugar, animal digest, tricalcium phosphate, sorbitol, water, salt, phosphoric acid, potassium chloride, dicalcium phosphate, sorbic acid (a preservative), L-Lysine monohydrochloride, dried green beans, dried carrots, calcium carbonate, calcium propionate (a preservative), choline chloride, vitamin supplements (E, A, B-12, D-3), zinc sulfate, added color (Yellow 5, Red 40, Yellow 6, Blue 2), DL-Methionine, ferrous sulfate, glyceryl monostearate, manganese sulfate, niacin, calcium pantothenate, riboflavin supplement, biotin, thiamine mononitrate, copper sulfate, garlic oil, pyridoxine hydrochloride, folic acid, menadione sodium bisulfite complex (source of Vitamin K activity), calcium iodate, sodium selenite

There are so many things wrong with this food I don't know where to start. Menadione bisulfite is not in better foods because it's been shown to cause health problems:

http://www.dogfoodproject.com/index.php?page=menadione

The food is also based on corn instead of meat. It has low quality fillers (soybean hulls, wheat flour, rice flour), sugar, salt, "animal" fat... really AWFUL stuff for a dog to be eating every day. If you're interested, take a look at the ingredients to avoid list from the dog food project. It's very informative and will help you to read an ingredient list and really understand what's in the food.

http://www.dogfoodproject.com/index....badingredients

The food that I've found to be the best for dogs that have a sensitive system is Timberwolf Organics. It doesn't seem like it would because it has a lot of ingredients, but they really all have a purpose and usually work wonders. Another good one that I definitely recommend is Eagle Pack Holistic.

[dk666]

Originally Posted by showpug

Give Canidae a try, I think you will be please with the results and the price.

www.canidae.com

Don't resort to Beneful!!!!!!!

Canidae will even mail a few free samples to try and is a very good food and a great price. TWO also has sample you can buy on there web site to try before buying a large bag and then see which one works best for you. Living in a condo and having to pickup after Thor everyday I want his nice and small and firm too LOL

[Whisper]

I agree with the above.
Beneful is really junk. Not just a bit lower quality than California Natural.
There are so many other foods to try besides those two.
I think Canidae is a great food to try.

[ToscasMom]

Beneful is Terrible food.

[fillyone]

Co-workers Westie had same issues, turned out he had EPI
http://www.marvistavet.com/html/exoc...nsufficie.html

With the addition of pancreatic enzymes he's now happy and healthy with "perfect poop"