Food safety and food palatability for dogs

Combining balanced nutritional supplements, food safety and palatability is probably the most difficult task that an owner must face. The animal that finds the feed into the bowl must find it “irresistible” and nutritious as if it had just come from the laboratory of the best breeder. Food must contain both high quality plastic materials and high quality energy necessary to build and make work his body.
Dogs are heterotrophic animals, their diet must contain all organic and inorganic substances necessary for his metabolism, growth and energy stock. Dog’s body, before using nutrients, must demolish the large monomer molecules that they contain; absorb and distribute them to cells. Therefore the dog is helped during the digestive phase only if the ingested food contains nutrients with high assimilation, because they make more available the benefits of their proper intake.
Another key-factor for the success of a product is its palatability. Taken for granted that the most appropriate formulas for the aromas and flavors have been identified, its state of preservation becomes an indicator of both the goodness of the raw materials used and of their production process, but also of the quality of the package used. Therefore for dry products it is fundamental to use selected and fresh raw materials and a proper packaging.

Improper nutrition education: how much bad habits affect the animals’ health

Everyone of us feels good in his own skin when he is physically well. We don’t have to forget that for our four-legged friends is the same, even if their unlimited altruism allows them to wag their tail and snuggle even when they don’t feel well at all. Loving us and giving us their trust, they put themselves in our hands, it is therefore our job, following our sensitivity and our preparation, to take care of them in the best possible way, following the advice of those who, like Gheda Petfood, have been studying for years the best way to make them healthy and happy.

It is worth repeating that food rewarding practices away from meals are really a bad habit that do not consider in any way the real needs of our dog in relation to his physical activity or his age, causing him to gain weight and get used to a bad nutritional regime. What is really harmful is that the animal, once he gets used to tastes of men’s food, finds really difficult to accept the feeds formulated specifically for him. Therefore it depends entirely on the sensitivity and preparation of the owner not to fall into excesses or mistakes that may, sometimes, seriously damage the dog.

Gheda Petfood has always thought that animals can not only have their own tastes, but even physical problems and ailments as it happens to most of the people who take care for them. Here below you can find one example among the many researches carried out by Gheda Petfood: our experts have studied the problems of overweight and obesity on adult dogs. It is not hard to find indeed these pathologies in sedentary animals, especially in those who have lost much of their agility or in sterilized dogs. Overweight and obesity are the result in animals of excessive energetic intake compared to the energy actually used. There are common signals that can be found in these pathologies like: the difficulty to palpate the ribs, the presence of adipose tissue on the back and at the base of the tail and a very low resistance to physical stress and to heat.

Unfortunately if they are not submitted to a proper diet with a proper physical activity, obese dogs may experience several negative consequences like weakness, fatigue, severe joint problems, digestive an dermatological problems and diabetes mellitus.