Does your dog eat Beneful made by Purina?

[Raymond Fries]

There is a class action lawsuit against Nestle for this food as many dogs have died. I hope nobody here has a sick dog because of this. Maybe choose another brand until this gets settled.

You can google this for further research but here are a couple of links:

http://topclassactions.com/lawsuit-settlements/lawsuit-news/49385-purina-beneful-dog-food-kills-dogs-class-action-says/

http://www.seattledogspot.com/dog-health-wellness/class-action-lawsuit-claims-purinas-beneful-dog-food-is-killing-dogs/

Take Care...

[Doug Ladendorf]

Thanks for the warning. Thankfully not us.

Recently I was researching new food for our lab and came across dogfoodadvisor.com. They alert to recalls and provide info and ranking for all dog foods. It's worth checking out and reading what they have to say about whatever food you are serving.

Doug

[Mike Cutler]

My dogs are on Blue.
I used to use the Purina line, but in my opinion they got a little sketchy about 10 years ago. It's too bad, because I really liked the Purina Hi-Pro line.

[Ken Platt]

I am shaken. I have been using Beneful for some years now and always felt I was giving my dogs a quality food, something better than the run of the mill Alpo or regular Purina. To the supermarket tomorrow to get something else. Recommendations?

Ken

[Raymond Fries]

My daughter has a golden retriever and has used Blue Buffalo for years. It was recommended by her vet. She uses only the duck because her dog is sensitive to others. I think Blue Mountain is a high quality food and you cannot go wrong with it. I am sure there are other premium brands but we have only cats and a parrot so we have not done a lot of research on dog food.

Maybe others can recommend another brand.

Good Luck finding one for your pet.

Take Care

[George Bokros]

Our dogs are on Wellness Core.

[Wade Lippman]

My dog has eaten Beneful for 14 years. She has had infected anal sacs several times in the past couple years, so the vet suggested we switch to a non-grain food. No recent infections, but she is still 14.:(

It is an popular brand; I bet all popular brands have 3000 complaints. Can't wait to see how it plays out.

[Bonnie Campbell]

I was feeding Beneful to my two small dogs years back when they had the China additive problems. Almost lost both dogs to it. I quit feeding them Beneful from then on. I thought I was buying quality food at the time.

[Jerome Stanek]

We have a joke going with my daughter every time we take care of her dogs we tell her they love Beneful. She is on many dog forums and they all say Beneful is one of the worst foods out there. We actually feed them the food she brings and eggs hot dogs and ground beef. They eat better than me when they're here. Maybe that is why they hate to go home

[Matt Marsh]

To the supermarket tomorrow to get something else. Recommendations?

Ken

I think you touched on something in your statement. I have never found quality pet foods at a supermarket. Here is a link to a site that rates different dog foods. I feed my Labrador Nutrisource Grain Free. He is healthy as an ox!

http://www.dogfoodadvisor.com/best-dog-foods/best-dry-dog-foods/

[Steve Rozmiarek]

We switched our gaggle of long dogs to Science Diet years ago from Beneful and they noticeably became healthier. I wish Science Diet wasn't so blasted expensive, but it's worth it to me.

[Phil Thien]

My dog is on Purina One Lamb and Rice, which gets two stars at that site.

But I looked at some of the user comments on foods with five-star ratings, and see complaints of dogs tossing their cookies and other digestive problems. This leaves me a little bit skeptical of the premium foods.

Not sure what the answer is, but my fella's health seems okay so I'm sticking with what I know.

[Charlie Velasquez]

Purina has several different formulas. I am not sure how it relates to Beneful, but if accurate, it appears many competitive dog owners trust the Purina brand.

According to their website, from the just completed championships:
"Miss P is the ninth Best In Show champion in a row to be fed Purina® Pro Plan®.... In fact, 94 of the top 100 all-breed show dogs in the country last year were fed Purina® Pro Plan®. This year, 7 of the 7 group winners were dogs who eat Purina® Pro Plan®"

I spent some time reading some articles on the internet last night, and this morning I took my dog in for a follow-up on his ACL surgery and had a chance to talk to my vet.

My take - Beneful, as the ingredients say, has a higher grain content, and some dogs are sensitive. If your dog is sensitive to grains then you need to be looking for a food with no grains. If your dog is not, then Beneful seems to be as safe as any other.

My vet prefers a food with more protein. Beneful is not the brand he recommends. But he said he would not "not recommend" it unless the dog had sensitivity issues. Then he wouldn't recommend any of the foods with high grain content.

But the articles do point out a couple of things. Anyone can file a lawsuit. And anyone can file a report in Consumer Affairs.

[Doug Ladendorf]

Phil, that's exactly what we were using. Our vet suggested some issues our lab was having were related to the food. You will also notice in the comments, suggestions by others that those who are having issues switching read up on how to switch dog food. If it's done "cold turkey" it can result in throwing up and diarrhea. Over the past two or three weeks we have been switching our lab to "Taste of the Wild" Hi Prairie formula dry. So far we like it and so does she. Issues (allergy type) have faded too.

[Tom M King]

Currently feeding Earthborn, and have been for a good while now. We switch every once in a while. Last was Taste of the Wild, and before that Blue Buffalo. They've done well on all of those.

[George Bokros]

Any switching of dog food needs to be done slowly. Introducing a small amount then gradually increasing it until you are completely changed over. An abrupt diet change can cause diarrhea and vomitting.

[Tom M King]

When using high quality food like we do, we have never experienced any trouble when switching food. We average 15 dogs, and never any issues switching from Earthborn, to Taste of the Wild, to Blue Buffalo, to Fromms, and I can't think of the others right off. We don't stay with the same thing for more than several months at the time.

[David Ragan]

One of my favorite soapboxes
there is absolutely NO reason to feed carnivores grains. Our cat doesnt limp anymore w/o grain
i thought Paleo was gimmicky when i first heard about it but when u read the reputable research from well respected medical journals (sadly-most out out europe) it us a rwal eye opener

[Garth Almgren]

Our vet recommended Nutro Natural Choice Wholesome Essentials for our "senior" dog. She seems to love it and never has had any problems with it. Can't find it in a grocery store though, have to get it from a pet supply store.

[Val Kosmider]

It pays to do a LOT of research on what your pet eats. Without going into a long drawn out diatribe, my pet recently had a problem related to the dry food that she had been eating for several years. When I looked into what was best for her, and what was in the food that pet companies sell, I was astonished.

Basically, all these dry grain foods are not what your pet would normally eat, but are the cheapest for a pet company to produce. In order to get the pet to eat the stuff, it is coated with a "palatant" --sort of a crack like substance which your pet cant resist.

Ever notice when you go into a pet store, or even a grocery store, that there are literally hundreds of "choice" offerings? That is because it is VERY profitable for a company to grind up cheap grains, or other animal parts....feet, skulls, eye balls, anything that can't be used in a hot dog, basically.....put a fancy label on it, say it "meets the minimum daily requirements", and get pet owners to pay a premium price for, basically, garbage.

In short, your pet should be eating protein foods derived from animal meats--muscle-- anything which is characterized as "chicken/beef/lamb/duck/whatever byproducts" is a no-no. Grains should be a minor ingredient, if included at all.

BTW, your vet gets paid to push certain brands. If you ask them, they have little idea what is in the food. But it sounds good..."Hills Veterinary Mix" or whatever..... "only available at your vet.

Just for giggles, search through the internet and find out what really goes on in the pet food industry. Hint: It isn't about keeping your pet healthy; it's about getting them to eat the cheapest/most profitable stuff possible.

[Tom Stenzel]

I remember about 30 years ago, a friend of mine had a compost pile in his yard. When he cleaned up the yard after his dogs he would put some of it in the compost pile. When it broke down it left behind... piles of sawdust. Needless to say he was livid about it.

Don't remember what brand of dog food he used but he sure let me know which one it was at the time.

BTW Val, I didn't know there was ANYTHING that couldn't be put in a hot dog. :eek:

-Tom

[Harry Hagan]

I am shaken. I have been using Beneful for some years now and always felt I was giving my dogs a quality food, something better than the run of the mill Alpo or regular Purina. To the supermarket tomorrow to get something else. Recommendations?

Ken

As George said, you’ll want to gradually wean the dog over to the new food.

The web has numerous sites that claim to conduct unbiased evaluations of dog food. Here’s one of several I relied on to choose my dogs’ food: http://www.dogfoodadvisor.com/

As a Costco member, I was happy to learn from several sites that Costco’s dog foods are not only ranked as one of the best values, but also some of the best available at any price.

[Randy Red Bemont]

I feed my dog "Taste of the Wild" wild boar and she loves it. I do give her "beneful" as a treat (small handful) once a day after supper. No more, it's in the garbage now. I'll find another treat food for her. Thanks for posting.

Red

[Matt Krusen]

I've fed all of my dogs Blue Buffalo for years and have never had an issue. My dad is a vet and has always suggested either Science Diet or Blue Buffalo. He doesn't sell dog food out of his practice so he has no incentive to push one brand over the other. He especially likes the Science Diet Senior for older dogs with joint issues/arthritis. I've seen a lot of old dogs get a second lease on life due to quality food and Rimadyl.

[Wade Lippman]

An article in the Christian Science Monitor says that propylene glycol is an FDA approved additive found in salad dressings, and mycotoxins are found in 40% of cereals eaten by people. Of course there is no evidence of mycotoxins in Beneful...
Class action suits are typically entirely for the lawyer's benefit. How many times have you gotten checks for $3.17 when the lawyers got $20M; perhaps because Redbull says it gives you wings when it doesn't?

[Scott Hackler]

I think this is possibly blown way out of proportion, just like the no grain in my dog food deal (just my opinion). We have had dogs and cats forever. The last dogs were 2 pure breed Beagles. One male and one female. Their whole life they have been fed Pedigree small breed, with the exception of Christmas and Thanksgiving when my wife would buy them both a can of wet food, the occational saltine cracker and ice cubes (yeah I know, but the dogs LOVE them). Point being is that the male lived to be 14 years old, never had a vacination other than a rabies and what ever the breeder gave them as puppies and lived a good healthly live. Always active and no issues. Old age just caught up with the old boy and between blindness, deafness and jont issues in tlast 8 months of his life, he was great and acted like a puppy. His sister is still with us and it's the same story. Full of energy and no health issues. She is now 11.

If you want to spend the dough on the high end foods, great for yu and great for your animal. But please don't believe that they can't be healthy on standard dry food. They sure aren't going to live much longer on the whole meat diet, carnivore or not.

Again, just my opinion and experience.

[bill kaminski]

Wife and have Havanese show dogs, whom get the best of everything...we feed Fromm's. We feel that it is as good as any. YMMV bill