Anyone feeding Iams? Pros/Cons? Thanks.

I just switched a couple of mine to Iams, LB young adult maint and weight control. I'm seeing really nice glossy coats on the girl and boy who are on the Maint. The senior on the weight control is doing well, nothing extraordinary good or bad and she's maintaining a nice weight.

I had a boy whose had a Mast Cell Tumor removed and I wanted to put him on grain free which was pretty pricy. I thought I'd try the Iams for the others to try to smooth out the budget. So far, no complaints, we seem to be off to a good start with it. I had been feeding Eukanuba or Pro Plan. The Pro plan didn't agree with the boy who's now on the grain free. Everyone has always done well on the Eukanuba but it was getting up there in price. I would switch the Iams eaters back to it if the Iams became an issue for any of them.

What's nice about Iams for pet folks is that it is cost efficient and easily accessible. I don't feel like I'm asking people to mortgage their first born child when they ask for a recommendation. The pet puppies that I've watched grow out on it have done well so far as I know.

Owned by P&G . Too many re-calls. They are more concerned with profit VS making safe food.

You can't beat Dawn Dish washing liquid. Some companies need to be out of the food business. P&G should stick to what they do best.Making soap.

P&G bought out Natura Pet Food a few years back. When Natura was family owned they never had a recall in 20 years of business. Since P&G bought the company they have had to recall every food made.

Don't risk your dogs life to P&G

I have fed Iams products for over 30 years with NO BAD ISSUES. In fact, last year we lost a 17 1/2 year old male that had only needed ONE tooth cleaning in his life and had all his teeth at his death.

Same with my Cavaliers... I have seen horrible teeth on friends' dogs who feed raw or Pro Plan and my guys live into their teens and only need one or two dentals (and no extractions) in their lifetimes.

So to those who bash P&G or any other company, look at the numbers of bags sold vs. problems ever produced. There are plenty of other companies who got hit hard with melamine and other toxic issues over the years who don't do a tenth of the business. Unless you are going to cook your own dog food daily without using any kibble or non-organic supplements, you have the potential of a problem.

I have been extremely satisfied with Iams/Eukanuba and tell all my puppy buyers of both breeds to use it, too.

Best regards,

Leslee Pope
Huntcrest

I would suggest that your 17 and 1/2 year old lived a great long life in spite of feeding IAMS and it was his wonderful genetics that gave the long life. There is much evidence to suggest that length of life is more about genetics then food a dog eats. I hope those genetics were passed on to many pups.

As far as recalls go, post 2007 P&G IAms and Euk are right near the top. Then you include what P&G did to Natura who had never had a re-call. It is just poor QC. In my mind one recall is too many when it comes to food stuffs. Testing should be in place so it never happens.

You say it is bashing, I say it is telling the truth about pet food. p&G has milked the cow so dry in terms of profit it has been reported they want to sell the Pet Food companies it owns.

Feeding a dog healthier foods or home cooked or RAW can help a dog without the great genetics live longer and need less Vet visits. You really should never just feed a dog kibble. Adding as much human grade meats you can afford along with some RAW MEATY bones is far more beneficial then the man made chemical P&G adds to their products to keep teeth clean .

The link below goes to one of the best websites about dog food and nutrition I've ever seen. The man behind it worked 10 years as a nutrition expert for the British dog food industry. His research is immaculate.
All the major food brands are investigated and also graded on a nutritional scale from 1 to 5. It's very sad to see that many of the well known foods don't live up to their nutrition value. Iam's for example, does not. The majority of the six tested varieties only reach 1,7 or 1,9 on the scale.
I strongly recommend this site. It's a wealth of information.

http://www.whichdogfood.co.uk/the-dog-food-directory

This site was very disappointing and I question the authors credentials which BTW I could not find on his site. Just because he says he's been a canine nutritionist for 10 years doesn't mean anything! The definition of nutritionist is a person who studies or is an expert in nutrition.

If the UK doesn't have any other resource for educating people about ingredients then this is a start but it leaves much to be desired (as does some of the ingredients that are found in UK foods, sorry). The author likes strictly grain free foods and gives only these foods high grades which is a mistake. Using your personal opinion instead of science based information to rate a food is just wrong. You would be hard pressed to find a certified canine nutritionist with the same views as this guy, what he's feeding you is called propaganda.

Our dentist (dog food advisor) is better (not much though), lol.

Doesn't mean anything because he says so? I don't think so.
FYI I can tell you that David Jackson studied Zoology at the University of Wales and became fascinated by the link between an animal’s diet, its health and its behaviour. In his thesis he was able to look in some depth into this relationship and by the time he graduated it was clear that diet and animal welfare are absolutely inseparable.
As a graduate he went about increasing his understanding of animal nutrition and began training as a pet nutritionist. He spent several years working with various pet food companies up and down the country and quickly noticed not only how beneficial a suitable diet can be for our pets, but also how much damage an inappropriate food can cause. He saw literally hundreds of cases where sick or unruly dogs improved dramatically following a simple change to natural or home-made food.
Believe it or not, but Jackson is one of UK's few expert nutritionists. It's a fact that many, many dogs don't do well at all on dry and processed food. But the truth hurts, I guess.

For what it is worth, the Seeing Eye requires its puppy raisers to feed Iams according to their manual, online. I know they switched many years ago from Purina to Iams when Purina (One or Pro Plan? Not Dog Chow) changed its formula suddenly--this was a major formula change long before the shreds. I seem to remember that it was a grain ingredient change at the time. A friend is getting a black Lab pup to raise for them on Iams, and that reminded me of their use of Iams. I do think that one of the criteria is that the dry food be readily available nationally and at most stores. While I do not particularly like Iams dog food for my dogs, I cannot argue with the success of the Seeing Eye as one of the nation's largest breeders of healthy Labradors.

And for the hundreds of cases of sick dogs that he saw there were thousands that he didn't see that were eating commercial food and were doing just fine. His personal experience is anecdotal and doesn't prove grain free is best. Natural or home cooked food is always better than processed food, that's a no brainer.

Your bio on him doesn't convince me of anything. I hope the UK has a real canine nutritionist that isn't pushing only grain free.

too many recalls for me