I JUST had this conversation with a veterinarian at Cornell's animal hospital.

I think at least part of the problem is that the average person has been duped by zealous advertising. People pay ooodles of money for "fancy" dog food, which may only cost more because of the advertising budget.

Take a look at Wsava compliant brands, and the science behind that.

Good luck. So many things can be behind a dog's unwillingness to eat. My poor boy ended up being highly allergic to chicken.

Blue Buffalo, Halo, and Instinct are all good.

i've been feeding diamond naturals for years. it has always been consistent and i've never opened a bag that my dogs refused to eat from. i stay away from the chicken formula simply because so many dogs don't tolerate chicken well. for the most part, it isn't really a true allergy, it's simply an intolerance.

strangely enough, even dogs allergic/intolerant to chicken-based kibble can eat RAW chicken without a problem. i fed raw to my danes for 10 years and chicken was the bulk of their diet.

frank gets the beef meal/rice formula, pippin gets the lamb/rice because it's lower calorie and i swear, that girl can gain weight on air and water! i switched her to the low cal formula back in november when she topped off at 193#. she has lost almost 20# and looks great although it won't kill her to lose another 10. i'll be keeping her on this food, most likely, for life.

it's one of the few higher end kibbles that doesn't break the bank which is a huge bonus!

Choosing a quality dog food is a challenge. I had always read reviews on Dog Food Advisor. Here’s a link DogFoodAdvisor I do agree with @Ally De about WSAVA - here’s a link for them World Small Animal Veterinary Association

A point to consider when choosing a dog food is whether the food is made in the company’s own production plants or is made by a company that produces many food brands. That goes to how / if the equipment is cleaned between brand changes. The other point is when changing foods, always transition to new food over at least a week long period - increase new food / decrease old food gradually over the week.

The other point to consider & I’m sure you have done this - is a visit to Vet for a wellness check. Eating problems can be caused by issues with teeth - maybe your pup’s mouth hurts? Or, maybe there’s something else going on & a look at blood values will point out a problem. Dogs are great at hiding health problems from us until the problem is very bad. Blood work can reveal liver and kidney issues among a host of other things.

I, too, have gone through this problem. I have had two picky eaters in a row now. Small dogs. You didn't say what kind of dog you have. I have had an experience with a spoiled dog food. It was Hill's Prescription diet k/d that came from Chewy's. It was in June of last year. It had been a really hot spell around here and I think it was on a truck too long. I sent a picture to Chewy and they replaced it right away. It just didn't look right to me.

That pup has now passed and I have another small picky eater. She is a rescue, 7 year old toy poodle. She is missing some teeth so she won't eat dry food. She gets Hill's Biome for sensitive stomach - vet prescription. It's canned food and she eats it happily, right away. I agree with getting a recommendation from your vet. I actually got this recommended from a vet at the emergency department because I had to take Lacey in when she got severe diarrhea from my trying to find a food on my own. The Biome fixed her up immediately and she is doing well on it. It's been about 4 months since this happened. I got her in November and started looking for a "good" food to feed her then. It's a difficult task for sure. Good luck and post a picture of your pup, please. :)

Nutro for my Pitt that just passed at 13 1/2.

Royal Canin 8 plus for the current Chihuahua

Thanks for posting this, arkansas girl. Our vet said the Royal Canin puppy food we’ve been giving Lily (6 months) is good. It’s specific to breed but online reviews make me question it. I guess you can have that with various brands. We’ll need to make a change as she gets older, so I’ve been researching.

Purina Pro Plan sensitive skin and stomach - salmon and rice formula.

A note: is you have a puppy of a large breed, do not feed puppy food. You want to keep growth slow and not speed it. Slow growth is far better for the puppy. Just feed the adult formula.

Ours is a 15 pound Chihuahua/MinPin mix. He has to has canned food only. We use 5 1/2 oz canned only. He eats 1 and 1/4 cans per day.

My two dogs died a few summers ago at 15 and 17. I fed them Purina ONE chicken and rice and Purina Pro Plan. I could not ask for two healthier dogs as they never saw the vet except for their annual wellness visit. Before that, I fed my greyhound the same food. You would think I own stock in Purina, as I always fed my cats that too, and the current three eat salmon and rice and Fancy Feast premium wet food. The dogs ate wet food, too mixed with dry.

We feed Primal for our two small breed dogs. It’s pricey though.

The bags of food do definitely change from bag to bag, even my poor old human eyes and nose can tell the difference. So, my dog really REALLY loves this food, so when it's different, she kind of doesn't like it as much. I mean even I can see and smell it's different. This bothers me because it needs to be consistent for her because she has a sensitive system. So far, it hasn't made her sick it is just that some bags, she isn't real crazy about like she normally is. Also, I feel worried when I open a bag that looks and smells totally different from the last bag :(

Just for the record, she is very old, she is a 14 year old lab mix, she's my avatar photo when we first got her at 10 mo. ! She just had her annual vet visit complete with blood test this time since she's so old. Everything checked out fine for her. She is in great shape for her age. So that is why it really worries me that is food is maybe not as good as it once was because you have to praise the dog food at least to take some of the credit for her good health and her long life! I also attribute it to the fact that I keep her very active with lots of walking and dog park daily.

I googled Natures Recipe problems and they are having complaints. Someone different has probably bought the company.

Blue Buffalo would be closest to yours. Buy small bags to sample. Whatever you buy, change over slowly. By the way, everywhere will refund if you get a bad bag, even Chewy.

our vet recommended Purina Pro plan and that is what we feed our dog. I mix a T of pedigree caned with it. So far so good

Does anyone know much about the Farmer’s Dog brand, other than being pricey?

We use Fromm Family dog food. We started it because our last dog had food allergies and our local dog store carried this food. We moved, our new neighborhood pet store also carries it and our new dog, a picky eater, likes it. It is a family owned, fourth generation company, and the quality is consistent. It is not inexpensive by any means.

https://gofromm.com/

@chloebud I fed my last dog Farmers Dog & she did like it. They ship in dry ice & I had no issues with that process. Their customer service was great. I see that they are striving for WSAVA compliance but I don’t think they employ a PHD vet nutritionist which is one of the requirements & they may not have Board certified Vet nutritionist on staff either. I’m currently working with a Vet nutritionist & that’s how I became familiar with WSAVA. The nutritionist & my regular vet had the same concerns about Farmers Dog as they expressed about other foods of that type - human grade, or raw foods. The concern is listeria - and contamination of household food from improper handling of the dog food. I understand & accept their concerns as valid so I made sure to use proper kitchen procedures with the food & made sure to not exceed the shelf life once thawed. That might mean tossing some food. My reason for choosing Farmers Dog was that I didn’t want to go a home cooked route - too labor intensive & concern over not providing proper vitamins. My dog did like it but when she was diagnosed with a liver shunt we had to change her food dramatically. Her shunt wasn’t surgically correctable & sadly we had to say goodbye to her. She’s Ginger - the Papillon in my avatar.

Remember that it's not a good idea to change dog food overnight. I think the most common recommendation is to transition over a period of days - 90-10, then 80-20, 70-30, etc. I don't know if it's over a number of days, over a week, or what. If you're unfamiliar with doing this properly, check with your vet.

KW, thanks for the very helpful info! I’m with you regarding not going the home cooked route. I have no problem paying for good quality. Lily just turned 6 months so we have a few months before changing. Sounds like your sweet Ginger was a lucky, loved girl.💕

Totally off topic but I had one of those moments today with Lily. She was in our backyard with my husband when I noticed a coyote snoozing in our front yard. The backyard’s enclosed but that won’t stop coyotes since they can jump and scale fences and walls. I screamed at DH to grab Lily and the coyote took off. The ones that come around are very skittish of people. However, it was a reminder you can never be too careful with small animals in our neighborhood. We also have bears, mountain lions and bobcats, but the coyotes are much more frequent. They often come in groups, too.

This isn't about dog food but pet food in general. A year ago, I bought the cats Blue Buffalo since I thought that, since it was pricier, maybe it was even better than my Purina ONE. Cats didn't love it and when I mentioned to my vet, she said she doesn't recommend it and PurinaONE was her choice. Just one person's opinion. We quickly went back to Purina ONE and the cats were happy.

@chloebud That could’ve been a scary event had the coyote wandered around to your back yard. Because my Ginger was only 4.5lbs & my Whisper, also a Papillon, is 7.5lbs, we never, ever let either of them roam alone in our back yard. Besides the coyotes roaming at night, we’ve seen both raccoons & opossums walking along the tops of our back fence during early morning. Wandering cats too & they’’re all bigger than Whisper too. My concern is that she’d give chase - Papillons are lighting fast as you know if you’ve ever seen them run the agility circuits. If she cornered a critter, even a squirrel which she actively watches for, it would be a sad day I’m sure. Of course she’d have no chance with a coyote.

OMG, Chloebud, how scary!!!!! We only use a tie out for my dog and I always just stand out there with her. Very rarely do I leave her unattended, usually only if she's feeling bad and wants to eat grass and that is once in a blue moon. We do not have a coyote problem here but I just don't trust her to stay safe and plus I need to make sure she's done what she needs to do outside :) Mostly she gets walked around on her leash.

One dog food item that I finally figured out was causing her to itch and have a rash was RICE! This is a very odd allergen and was not easy to figure out. Almost all grain inclusive foods have rice these days so I really have no choice but to use a grain free food. The Nature's Recipe that she's been on for probably 7 years or so is the grain free chicken variety.

One thing that really bothered me when looking at reviews to see if others had complaints about this food was that someone opened a sealed bag only to find a mouse inside of it. GROSS!!!!!

Back in the day, our dogs ate stuff like Come N Get It and Kibbles and Bits and they loved it and lived long healthy lives. :P

Thanks everyone for the answers! This is a most helpful thread! Keep it coming!

re: grain-free food. you are probably already aware of this but grain-free food, if it's just the run of the mill cheap stuff, may not contain the proper amount of taurine that is needed for heart health.

i don't know if this is as true for small dogs as it is for giant/large breeds but a lack of taurine can lead to irreversible heart disease. while this isn't true with all dogs, enough studies have been done that link grain-free diets to DCM (dilated cardiomyopathy).

arkansas girl, back in the day reminded me of when I had my cat, Rico. I fed him Tender Vittles for the first 12 years of his life and only changed when they stopped making it. He lived to be 19. I don't remember what he ate for the last 7 years.

Trying to find a good and healthy food is so hard these days when there are so many choices out there.

“Of course she’d have no chance with a coyote.“

Right! Just this morning on our news was a story here of a mountain lion killing a 90-pound husky and 65-pound sheperd. All caught on the owners’ security camera.😞

A mountain lion is someone's yard is SO scary!

The main predator in our area are dog thieves. Especially for small saleable-on-Craigslist dogs. The porch thieves get the Amazon packages by the front door, the dog thieves get the cute dogs left in the back yard.

The old dog foods of the 60’s, & 70’s were different than today. They have the same name, but they are not the same food.

Speaking of back in the day, my last dog who has been gone for over 20 years, he loved the Come N Get It food which was very much like Kibbles and Bits but the vet thought he needed better so he suggested Eukanuba so I bought a bag, it was very expensive if I recall correctly, my dog would not even touch it! HAHA! Back to the Come N Get It until his death at 15 years old, an 85 lb boxer mix. My cat that I got back in the 80s would only eat Kozy Kitten which was some store brand, I don't remember anymore. That's what he loved and if I tried something "better" he wouldn't eat it. He wouldn't even touch a canned cat food at all! He lived to be about 17 y/o. I think that eventually he did start eating something like 9 Lives or something similar. I'm pretty sure they stopped making the Kozy Kitten so he had to eat something else. I agree, dog and cat food isn't the same now as it was "back in the day".

Kozy Kitty. I know because Rupert would not eat anything else. Nightmare situation as he had bladder issues and in those ancient day they thought they ought not eat fish. I had some dimwitted Vet tell me to feed him a high end dog food but they did not put the extra cat oriented extras in dog food. life is like that.