# Which food for my westie??????



## Dale83 (Aug 27, 2009)

Our Daisy is 18months old and until now we have fed her on eukanuba which she has always enjoyed. Its seems however that many people on here do not think eukanuba is very good at all  therefore i would appreciated your opinions on what you believe to be best for my little westie.

We did try orijen about 8months ago as i had heard good things about it, however it didnt suit her as she suffered with terrible constipation.

Is eukanuba that bad??? If so we just want the best for daisy.

Thanks in advance

Dale


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## Ducky (Nov 23, 2008)

eukanuba is not the worst food out there, by a long way. 

however its also not the best. 

they still use wheat as a filler in their food which a lot of dogs cant tolerate well. as you will know, westies can be very prone to skin conditions, and wheat can be an aggravator of such things. 
its also quite expensive compared to other better quality foods.

some foods to consider would be Arden Grange, Burns, Fish4Dogs, James Wellbeloved, Skinners Hypoallergenic, CSJ, Wainwrights, to name but a few.

All of the above contain no wheat or similar cheap fillers and mainly use meat from good sources. They range in price between about £15-45 depending on brand and where you buy from. Eg, Arden Grange is cheaper to buy online.

I brought both my pups up on Arden Grange, and they thrived on it. Their coats are beautiful. I have also used Fish4Dogs and they LOVED this. 

Hope i was of some help!


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## Dale83 (Aug 27, 2009)

i forgot to mention that she recently had a poorly tummy which lasted a few days until we took her to the vets and was given a course of antibiotics. The vet gave her some royal canin sensitive wet food for a few days which she absolutely loved. We have never really considered we foods before but seeing how much she enjoyed the royal canin has left us a little confused as to what we should do. Dont get me wrong, she does eat the eukanuba but it can sometimes be a real struggle.


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## Ducky (Nov 23, 2008)

if you do want to use wet food, again make sure its good quality.

nature diet seems to the favourite! there is also Natures menu, AG Partners, Burns Penlan Farm, to name a few. 

you could always do a mix of both. my pair only get dry which seems to suit them fine.


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## Dale83 (Aug 27, 2009)

Thanks for the advice....

Im considering the arden grange, im checking out the prices atm. I think she would prefer wet food however if dry food is better for her I will just persist with it.
:thumbsup:


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## Ducky (Nov 23, 2008)

its not necessarily better for them. it is a bit cheaper and bit more convenient, as obv the dried food doesnt spoil if you leave it out the way the wet does. 

i def recommend the arden grange though! through personal experience


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## SlingDash (Jul 30, 2010)

> I think she would prefer wet food however if dry food is better for her I will just persist with it.


We have fed lots of kibble in the past, and we always moisten it first, before mixing with a high quality moist tinned food. I just think it must get more than a little boring for the dogs to eat dry 'cardboard' and nothing but - even though they seem to enjoy it.

Arden Grange dry kibble is fairly good stuff, but stick with the lamb variety (dark green bag) if you're going to give it a go. That particular one has a higher meat content than all the others (still only 30% though). The Arden Grange moist tins look very good - with up to 70% real meat in all the varieties.

We used to feed Burns, but it really isn't as good as some people say it is. It has an enormous rice content (average of 60% in all varieties!) and the amount of meat is really very low indeed (around 20% if you're lucky). As a result, it is extremely expensive for what you're getting - i.e. piles of what you put in being dumped, literally, straight back out again!

*NatureDiet* is also a very good quality moist food that all dogs I know absolutely love. It has around 60% REAL meat content, and is very good value at around 80p a tub. You can buy it in bulk to save even more. The in-laws are now feeding their six month old Westie on a mixture of *NatureDiet* and raw meats and offal.


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## Mum2Heidi (Feb 17, 2010)

Hi Dale,
I have a little westie x jr who is 18 months now. She was on dried - Wainwrights puppy and then onto Skinners Salmon and rice. After she had a tummy upset in the summer I realised that 100% dry didnt really suit her. Each time I tried to wean her back onto it, her tum started up again so I changed to naturediet wet and mixed it with some soaked skinners to use it up. It works well - she has 1/2 tray of Naturediet and the remainder soaked kibble. (I will probably keep her on it)
Skinners duck or salmon and rice is a good budget food. Low meat content 
but you can mix it with some wet to make it up. 
Another good dry with decent meat content is Vitalin Adult Maintenance and it's cereal free.

Hope you find something that suits.


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## SixStar (Dec 8, 2009)

Westies are prone to allergies, so I'd highly recommend either a hypoallergenic kibble, or the BARF diet.

I feed my Westie a mix of James Wellbeloved kibble, and BARF, and he does extremely well on this. When he was younger he used to have skin/digestive problems (was on Purina Beta from the breeder) but as soon as I put him on to my diet, he was absolutely fine- no itching, and no funny tum. It's the additives and junk in alot of dog foods that set off the allergies and intolerances.

I feed kibble one day, and BARF the next. (Ideally, I'd feed BARF full time but we go caravanning alot, and it's easier for the dogs to eat kibble whilst we're away!). I know many people feed entirely wet food, but this personally doesn't sit right with me.

Try putting the food down for 15 minutes, and then if it is uneaten, take it up and offer nothing (except water of course) until the next meal time. They soon learn if they don't want to go hungry, then they're to eat the food when it goes down! That's the way I've always done it, and bowls are always cleared as soon as they go down here, regardless of what they've got in them.


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## neota (Oct 6, 2010)

_When my little westie was small he had really bad stomach probs. Vets advised chicken breast and rice for a while then I discovered Burns which is good. It''s the only dog food we've tried that agrees with him. My local pet shop gave me some samples to try so we didn't have to buy a whole bag in case it didn't suit. Also, there's a fish and rice flavour that can help their skin, and I buy tinned mackeral in sunflower oil and mix about a 1/3 of tin in with his food. Hope this helps:thumbup:_


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## SlingDash (Jul 30, 2010)

If you're going to feed Burns, it'd be far, far cheaper to make your own food.

Rice costs next to nothing, and you can mix that with egg, chicken breast, fish, offal and the like, and end up with a far superior - and FAR cheaper - food for your little fella.

I don't know how Burns justify forty-odd pounds for what is essentially a big bag of rice.


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## new westie owner (Apr 30, 2010)

My little westie is on natures menu wet didnt like dry gets few biscuits for lunch bonio or other dog biscuits


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## Lyceum (Sep 25, 2009)

There's a lot of good foods out there. Arden granges lamb and rice is great, as is fish4dogs, natural dog food company, burns (burns, whilst a good food is over priced, Skinners Duck and rice is identical to burns duck and rice ingredients wise but the Skinners is £20 cheaper), arcana, taste of the wild.

Wet or dry is up to you, and which the dog would prefer. Naturediet, natures menue, natures harvest, weinwrights - they're all great wet food.

If you want dry, order samples and see which the dog prefers.


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## Horse and Hound (May 12, 2010)

Dale83 said:


> Thanks for the advice....
> 
> Im considering the arden grange, im checking out the prices atm. I think she would prefer wet food however if dry food is better for her I will just persist with it.
> :thumbsup:


To me its a myth dry food is better, it can be harder for tums to digest.

I'd also be warey about Natures Menu. It gave my Westie the runs, something cronic.

He's now on Wainwrights Wet, with a small handfull of Royal Canin for added crunch.

Something to also bear in mind is that a tin of sardines once a week can work wonders for their skin!


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## SlingDash (Jul 30, 2010)

> Something to also bear in mind is that a tin of sardines once a week can work wonders for their skin!


Absolutely - ours LOVE them!

They're only 34p/tin in our local TESCO (in oil - not tomato sauce), so ours get lots! :thumbup:


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## silverbeetle (Jul 17, 2009)

Our westie freddie is on Wainwrights wet - lamb flavour which he absolutely adores - woofs back his bowl in no time. 
He will not eat dried food at all so is on completely wet food. He is a good weight and has lovely coat. 
We also give him an evening primrose oil capsule every other day in his food for his skin.


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## CazStewart (Dec 3, 2010)

We were recommended to change our usual brand of dry dog food to "Symply" as it contains no cereal and is 100% natural. Our Westie has been suffering from skin problems throughout the last year (he's 11) and has been on steroids and other tablets, which help the symptoms, but cannot cure.

We were told that the high level of cereal in our supermarket brand of dog food was probably making his skin worse and to switch to a more natural brand.

Natural dog food from Symply - only healthy, natural ingredients.

It is only Day 3 so far, but with a bit of encouragement (such as cutting up a cocktail sausage into his "new" food to help him to eat the lot), he seems to have made the switch really well.

We were also impressed with this brand in that if your dog doesn't like it, bring it back and they will refund your money 100%.

Can't say fairer than that. Our Westie is on the Lamb and Rice type.


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## Colliekapers (Dec 16, 2010)

I don't have a westie so I don't know if my advice will be of any use to you as I don't know much about the westie breed.
However, I feed my dogs a combination of Arden Grange dry lamb & rice and Arden Grange wet lamb & rice which they totally love!
They never leave a biscuit uneaten and although one of my dogs can suffer with a sensitive tummy she does fine on Arden Grange.
I know there are a few breed specific food out there and I think Royal Canin might even do a Westie food, but I think it is a dry one.
Oh, with Arden Grange I am sure that you can boil the kettle, wet the food, let it cool and then feed it. To be honest I have never done this but one of my friends also feeds their dog Arden Grange and I know that they sometimes do that.
I leave the biscuits dry though as I think that eating dry food helps to clean their teeth, I don't know if that is right but that's what I always think. :


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## dvnbiker (Dec 2, 2009)

One I would point out is that AG does have maize in it which alot of dogs dont get on with - one of the reasons I have had to take one of my dogs off of it. 

There is no best food, there is only the food that suits your dogs with the best ingredients that you can afford. Mine get the best that I can afford that suits them. My youngster is on Natures Harvest wet food, eldest is on a combination of burns and Naturediet and my other boy is on burns. So something different for them all but it is what suits them best.


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