Cost of feeding your dog

sidevalve

sidevalve

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I spoke to a friend who lost her job recently and she is having trouble with dog food bills [she has two German Shepherds] and I was wondering why ?
Our current dog food bill is about £1.50 [that's around $2.25] per week and there is some left over for the next week at that. Is it the best quality - probably not but our girl [a Lurcher - similar to a greyhound] weighs in at seventy pounds, is fit, active, awe inspiringly fast [when she wants to be] has a good coat and looks as though she will [like our previous labrador collie and german sheperd] never really need to see a vet until the day she dies. They all reached good old ages [the sheperd being almost fourteen - a very good age for the breed].
I know she pays much much more for her dogs food but I still can't see why it should be more than £3.00 [ie two bags of the stuff we use].
Are simply being bluffed by the hype ? After all the dogs can't read the labels and when situations dictate is it not better to feed well on supermarket brand rather than less of the expensive stuff. These are not growing puppies and I wonder if the difference is worth it for an adult dog - our experience seems to say not.
 
sidevalve said:
I spoke to a friend who lost her job recently and she is having trouble with dog food bills [she has two German Shepherds] and I was wondering why ?
Our current dog food bill is about £1.50 [that's around $2.25] per week and there is some left over for the next week at that. Is it the best quality - probably not but our girl [a Lurcher - similar to a greyhound] weighs in at seventy pounds, is fit, active, awe inspiringly fast [when she wants to be] has a good coat and looks as though she will [like our previous labrador collie and german sheperd] never really need to see a vet until the day she dies. They all reached good old ages [the sheperd being almost fourteen - a very good age for the breed].
I know she pays much much more for her dogs food but I still can't see why it should be more than £3.00 [ie two bags of the stuff we use].
Are simply being bluffed by the hype ? After all the dogs can't read the labels and when situations dictate is it not better to feed well on supermarket brand rather than less of the expensive stuff. These are not growing puppies and I wonder if the difference is worth it for an adult dog - our experience seems to say not.
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I have a 4 year old ex racing greyhound who weighs in at about 77 lbs. I spend about £3 a week on his food (resting greyhound food - slightly higher protein than "normal" dog food). He gets a couple of treats a day and also breakfast and supper which are usually a bit of whatever I'm having minus the onions etc. There are cheaper brands of "proper" greyhound food but the brand I buy seems to suit him better. My last GSD used to do quite well on supermarket value dog food plus leftovers for the 13 years I had her.
 
Our dogs are like family and I have to admit that their food is costly. In the morning, we give them dog food for the protection of their kidneys. For lunch and dinner, we buy fish for them and at other times pork or chicken. It is usually boiled with no other ingredients especially salt is a no-no. When we have the time, we broil the fish which is their favorite. Sometimes we also fry the fish or the chicken but the pork is usually boiled. For our 3 dogs, their food budget costs more than the food budget of 1 person. But it's all right with me because I see our dogs to be happy during meal times.
 
We feed our dog on bagged old dog food ,costs £30 a sack and comes delivered ,lasts months
Then I either use my butchery trimmings so duck,venison,pork,beef ,or I get fresh pet mince of chicken / venison from the market not expensive
She does sing for her meals,when she decides it's time she howls and sings,so she must be happy
 
I am in the states and our chihuahua's primary food runs either $4.98 or $2.49 a week. He will not eat dog food. He was a rescue and had been living on scraps so he expects seasoned food.
He eats about 1 Walmart rotisserie chicken a week. (Preferably lemon pepper) He does not like the other 2 grocery stores. Now there are days when I cook for him, if we are having roast or pork chops.
 
Cinisajoy said:
I am in the states and our chihuahua's primary food runs either $4.98 or $2.49 a week. He will not eat dog food. He was a rescue and had been living on scraps so he expects seasoned food.
He eats about 1 Walmart rotisserie chicken a week. (Preferably lemon pepper) He does not like the other 2 grocery stores. Now there are days when I cook for him, if we are having roast or pork chops.
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Pampered chap! You need to be careful with the seasoned stuff though, I believe, I think that salt is not too good for them. We have a Manchester Terrier who was very picky. But he now eats cheap Aldi food (sachets) mixed with high end 'kibbles'. It still costs more than I'd like! He is still thin as a rake despite four meals a day! Here is my daughter with him.

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He is 14 years old. When we first got him, we had always heard a dog will eat when he gets hungry. Not this one, he has been known to go 2 days without food.
Oh on the rotisserie chicken, he doesn't get the skin, just the meat.
I once tried to feed him unseasoned ground beef. He looked at it, he sniffed it, then shoved it all off his plate.
 
Our dog was so spoilt by his previous owner that when we took him on we had to change his diet completely. He'd been eating onions, chocolate and grapes along with anything else you can think of that isn't good or is toxic to them. Oh almost forgot, he was given yoghurt pots too, he's have to attack the pot to get the yoghurt out ...... Then again his owner wasn't well and she later became bed bound.

When we took him on (4 days before she died, thank goodness we spared him that), we had already got the cheap supermarket brand biscuit meal in for him and some of their tinned meat. He has his biscuit meal in the morning and meat at around teatime. He didn't get any of our scraps at all at first, but now gets the occasional something, if no scraps then he gets a couple of dog treats. Bonio type things. The bill is roughly £4.50 a week.

The cat costs us about £2 a week, but she only eats dried food, hates all cat meat tins or packets, we've tried them all!!

OH has just reminded me that animal food isn't cheap in France.
 
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My aunt had (I no longer know her hence past tense) 5 children, 1 husband and a dog minimum to feed (frequent visitors). She found it cheaper to actually cook the same meal for the dog as for everyone else than buy seperate dog food. At night, he would even have the same snack as the kids, 2 digestive biscuits and a glass of milk! He wouldn't settle without it.
 
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These two beauties (both rescue dogs) live on pretty much the same food as us - we always cook too much, so the cost is minimal! When we've had bigger dogs we would supplement the leftovers with a dried complete mix, about £10 per 25 kilo sack. I don't think biscuit type dog food is natural fodder for dogs any more than it is for humans. My mother used to boil up offal for her dogs, mainly hearts and kidneys which she would buy in industrial quantities. Cheap, very nutritious and natural but by God it stank! Put me off offal for years :)
 
epicuric said:
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These two beauties (both rescue dogs) live on pretty much the same food as us - we always cook too much, so the cost is minimal! When we've had bigger dogs we would supplement the leftovers with a dried complete mix, about £10 per 25 kilo sack. I don't think biscuit type dog food is natural fodder for dogs any more than it is for humans. My mother used to boil up offal for her dogs, mainly hearts and kidneys which she would buy in industrial quantities. Cheap, very nutritious and natural but by God it stank! Put me off offal for years :)
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Lovely dogs!
 
These days I am starting to be concerned about my girls.. They are very costly to maintain and the dollars coming in have dwindled. I'm thinking of having a meeting with the humans to let them know they are going to have to cut back on their eating so my dogs won't be affected:giggle:.
 
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winterybella said:
These days I am starting to be concerned about my girls.. They are very costly to maintain and the dollars coming in have dwindle. I'm thinking of having a meeting with the humans to let them know they are going to have to cut back on their eating so my dogs won't be affected:giggle:.
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The dog had chicken leg and thigh tonight. We had picked them up for 25 cents a pound. I cooked up a batch tonight.
 
Cinisajoy said:
The dog had chicken leg and thigh tonight. We had picked them up for 25 cents a pound. I cooked up a batch tonight.
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25 cent a pound? Where do you live? At 25 cents a pound every body could eat and live.25 cents a pound? What kind of chicken cost that amount of money? Forgive my ignorance but is it "dog chicken?"
 
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