What Is The Best Costco Dog Food

Super Premium Mature Dog Chicken Rice & Egg Formula

This Kirkland Mature Dog Food is designed especially for senior dogs who are in the last quarter of their lives.

It contains Kirklands usual ingredients: fresh chicken and chicken meal, as well as egg product. This blend gives your golden oldie a good dose of protein to keep her muscles strong and provide her with energy. Given that the protein content is high, at 27%, I would recommend this food for mature dogs who are still active .

This recipe contains the usual wholegrain brown rice and barley as well as oatmeal and ground white rice. While white rice is okay for dogs, it is not nearly as nutritionally beneficial as brown rice – I would prefer to see more brown rice instead.

The nutrients from the fruit and veg will support your older dogs immune system and help fight off diseases such as cancer.

If your senior dog is prone to joint conditions or already suffering minor symptoms, this food will help support her joints. Kirkland includes middling levels of glucosamine and low levels of chondroitin .

Alternative Dog Food: Victor Senior Healthy Weight

This Senior Healthy Weight recipe from Victor has almost exactly the same macronutrient balance as Kirklands. But it includes nutrients for joint support in much higher amounts , which I think makes it suitable for dogs already suffering from joint problems.

Costco Wet Dog Food Is It Cheaper Or More Expensive

Nothing new to those of you who have been buying from Costco for years, is the fact that Costco wet dog food is cheaper than you are used to. Nothing different from the last five years

I found this information by going on several price comparison websites, looking for a site that would compare the prices of both types of food. I was surprised to find that it wasnt really available anywhere in the United States, but there are websites that are devoted solely to Costco food, that I was able to use for my price comparison searches.

So I did an Internet search for Costco dog food, and costco wet dog food. You get results, but they are not the same website for each result.

Dry food prices are very similar, with about a half percent difference per package. The difference in pricing is mainly due to packaging and shipping costs. The reason for this is that Costco sells a huge volume of their food to retailers every day.

When you compare wet dog food costs, you can see how much cheaper they are. Costco makes a good profit on wet dog foods. Costco sells their food through independent distributors. Because the independent distributors have lower overhead, they pass the savings onto you.

That means that Costco would be your only option. There arent many retailers that carry wet dog foods, like there are wet dog treats, so if you are unable to visit a retailer that has wet dog foods, then you may be stuck ordering from one of the online vendors. that sell only dry foods.

How Come Theres Canola Oil In Some Kirkland Dog Foods

Canola oil is usually included in dog foods because it is a source of both calories and fat. It also provides your pooch with Omega 3 acids. Canines arent able to make Omega 3 acids themselves, so they need to get it from their diets. One commonly known Omega 3 acid is DHA, although it should be known that canola oil doesnt include DHA. Rather, it includes ALA, which dogs can then turn into DHA .

So, in short, canola oil is usually added to kibbles like Kirkland dog food for fat and calories. If youre looking specifically for something that includes DHA for your dog, one more effective source is salmon oil.

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Kirkland Signature Adult Formula Lamb Rice And Vegetable

This is one of Kirklands most popular brands because it provides complete and balanced nutrition for all adult dogs. The three primary ingredients are lamb, lamb meal, and whole-grain brown rice, which are ideal protein sources, as well as being highly digestible.

You will also find glucosamine and chondroitin to help support your dogs joints and antioxidants to support overall health. For a strong immune system, the addition of omega-6 and -3 fatty acids is an ideal ingredient. It uses Active9 probiotics to provide live, active cultures that support healthy digestion. Thus, this formula is great for overall health.

On the downside, it is not ideal for dogs with grain allergies because it contains brown and white rice. It also contains brewers yeast, so do not buy if your dog is immunocompromised, is prone to yeast infections, or has an allergy to yeast. However, many like that it does contain fruits, such as apples and cranberries, and vegetables, such as kelp and peas.

Kirklands Top 5 Dog Food Products And Their Best Alternatives

Below are the pros and cons of all the recipes included in this review:

This recipe is designed for medium to large breed adults. Its protein reading is 26%, coming mainly from chicken and chicken meal. The latter contains four times more protein than the whole meat, which makes it highly nutritious for your dog.

The fiber is fairly low here for a puppy food. However, the fruit and vegetables plus the probiotics should be enough to aid your puppys digestion.

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A Natures Domain Puppy Is A Happy Puppy

The most common puppy food choice for Natures Domain puppies is the chicken and pea formula, and by all accounts, puppies love the taste. What puppies dont know is that their delicious dog food contains plenty of DHA to support the development of their eyes and brain, along with essential omega fatty acids for a shiny coat and healthy skin.

Best Kirkland Nature Domain Dog Food Review

• Appliances

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• Supplemented With Antioxidants And Omega Fatty Acid Nutrition
• This Formula Offers Great Nutrition For Overall Health And Vitality For All Dogs
• Probiotics And Prebiotics Help Support Healthy Digestive And Immune System
• Grain-Free Formula

• This adult dry dog food promotes digestive health while nourishing skin
• A source of prebiotic fiber to support a balanced gut microbiome in your grown dog
• This dog food is formulated to be highly digestible for optimal nutrient absorption & easier stool pick-up
• Packed with vitamin E & Omega-6 fatty acids to help your grown dog get a lustrous coat and healthy skin
• Made in the USA with global ingredients you can trust

• One 30 lb. Bag – Purina Pro Plan Sensitive Skin and Stomach Dog Food With Probiotics for Dogs, Salmon & Rice Formula
• Oat meal is easily digestible and gentle on the digestive system
• High protein formula, with real salmon as the first ingredient
• Fortified with guaranteed live probiotics for digestive and immune health
• Used to be known as FOCUS Sensitive Skin & Stomach Salmon & Rice Formula

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Natures Domain Puppy Food

For the smallest and newest members of the family, Natures Domain offers a specialized puppy food recipe designed to support puppies as they transition into adults when they will move on to adult dog food. Kirkland Signature Natures Domain chicken, rice and vegetable puppy food is made with smaller dry dog food size just perfect for puppies and includes added DHA to promote puppies eye and brain development.

With infused probiotics to support a healthy digestive tract, Natures Domain puppy food is chicken based and the perfect starter meal for a growing puppy.

What Do We Know About The Kirkland Brand

The Kirkland Signature brand, under the Diamond Pet Foods company, has been operating for almost 50 years. As such a well-established and highly regarded pet food manufacturing company, the Kirkland brand has had great success in expanding its existing line of dog food products to include Natures Domain, a grain-free offering high in animal protein.

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Merrick Classic Healthy Grains Dry

Rating:

Real Beef and Brown Rice is one of five recipes included in our review of the Merrick Classic dry product line.

• First 5 ingredients: Deboned beef, pork meal, brown rice, barley, oatmeal
• Type: Grain-inclusive
• Price: $$

Merrick Classic Healthy Grains derives the bulk of its animal protein from fresh deboned beef and pork meal. Dry matter label analysis reveals the recipe contains 29% protein, 17% fat and 46% estimated carbs resulting in a fat-to-protein ratio of about 58%.

This fully balanced formula contains zinc amino acid complex and 4 other chelated minerals, superior nutritional supplements typically found in higher quality dog foods. Reasonably priced. Highly recommended.

Sample buyer reviewAfter adopting animals that had been dropped off at my property I thought it was easy to buy cheap dogfood to keep them all nourished. Bad deal! I was contributing to poor health and obesity. I switched over to Merrick and within weeks noticed a change in weight and energy in all my pets.

Who Makes Kirkland Dog Food

While Costco itself is the distributor of its Kirkland branded items, its worth pointing out that they are not actually the manufacturer of these products. They contract with other brands who specialize in their respective industries, and then sell these goods white-labeled under the Costco Kirkland brand.

This is actually a great thing for consumers because it means that Costco isnt trying to become an expert in hundreds of different industries. They simply work with an existing leader to capture their knowledge and know-how, and pass that on to their consumers.

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Costco Dog Food Review & Pricing

Costco has 11 different varieties of dog food. For comparison purposes, lets look at the Kirkland Signature Adult Formula Chicken, Rice and Vegetable Dog.

When doing pet food comparisons, its extremely difficult to compare apples to apples. No two pet foods have the exact same formula. What I personally look for is a formula that has a protein source as the main ingredient, and zero-to-few cheap fillers as ingredients. The Kirkland dog food ingredient list meets that criteria, as well as adding in some good vitamin supplements and nutrients :

At a price of $28.99 for a 40 lb. bag, in store , the price per pound comes in at just $0.72.

Lets look at how this compares to the 5 best selling, chicken-first, no corn/wheat fillers, non-specialty , similar dry dog foods on the popular pet product site, Chewy.com:

As you can see, only the Purina ONE comes close in price per volume, and it is still 61% more expensive than the Costco Kirkland dog food. The average price per volume of the top 5 brands is 236% more expensive than the Kirkland dog food.

Purina Pro Plan All Ages Sport Performance 30/20 Salmon And Rice Formula

Purina Pro Plan All Ages Sport Performance 30/20 Salmon and Rice Formula is a specialized recipe explicitly made for athletic dogs. The formulas 30/20 recipe represents 30% protein and 20% fat and aids in the metabolic processes as well as supports muscle.

It is AAFCO approved for dogs in all life stages, including puppies and pregnant or nursing mothers. The Pro Plan Sport sub brand prides itself on fueling 95 of the top 100 dog shows.

Here is a comprehensive breakdown of the formulas nutritional information:

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Aafco Dog Food Nutrient Profiles

The following items represent some of The Dog Food Advisors most frequently asked questions about AAFCO dog food nutrient profiles.

What is AAFCO?

AAFCO is an acronym for the Association of American Feed Control Officials. AAFCO is a non-profit organization that sets standards for both animal feeds and pet foods in the United States.

What are AAFCO dog food nutrient profiles?

In order for a dog food to be marketed as complete and balanced, it must meet the nutritional standards established by AAFCO.

These nutritional adequacy standards are defined by two nutrient profiles based upon a dogs stage of life

• Adult maintenance
• Growth and reproduction

Where can I find the AAFCO nutrient profile for each recipe in a review?

The AAFCO nutrient profile symbol can be found in the list of recipes within every dog food review.

** Puppies and pregnant or lactating females

What does growth and reproduction mean?

Dog foods rated for growth and reproduction are designed for puppies and pregnant or lactating females.

How can a manufacturer claim a particular product meets one of the two AAFCO nutrient profiles?

In order for any dog food company to claim a product is complete and balanced for a specific life stage, that claim must first have been validated in one of two ways

• Nutrient content analysis
• AAFCO-compliant feeding trials

How can a consumer know which method was used to verify AAFCO nutritional adequacy?

However

The Top 21 Dog Foods In Canada For 2021

Over the past several decades, Canadian pet food manufacturers have been developing high quality, human grade, and innovative pet foods to supply both Canada and the world. We have carefully evaluated more than fifty Canadian pet food brands, closely scrutinizing every aspect of the manufacturer and their recipe. Here are just a few of the things we consider:

• Quality and source of ingredients, including how fresh the ingredients are, where theyre sourced from, whether they include antibiotics or hormones, if theyre GMO free, organic, and more.
• Manufacturing practices and transparency. We believe the manufacturers of the foods we feed our beloved pets should be accountable for every step of the manufacturing process.
• Innovation and sustainability. As we move towards a more eco-friendly world, pet food manufacturers should be focused on developing earth-friendly standards and practices as well.

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Kirkland Dog Food Recalls

No company is perfect, and where Kirkland has failed in the past, theyve since made up. Kirkland dog food recalls have been sparse, which is why the company is more transparent than ever before about what ingredients, processes and packing standards go into their signature dog food.

2012 – One of two only recalls in history. Kirkland dog food, led by Diamond Pet Foods, Inc., issued a recall because they couldnt be 100% certain that their dog food didnt contain salmonella contamination. While the recall didnt yield any cases of salmonella in pups or adult dogs, they went on the side of caution to prevent a possible issue from arising. The contamination leak proved false, and the products were completely fine.

2007 – Similar to the 2012 issue, this decade-old occurrence was sparked out of similar issues. Diamond Pet Foods, Inc., couldnt say for certain that their most recent batch of Kirkland dog food didnt contain melamine. A hole in their system brought focus to the issue, and while no cases of melamine were ever found in any dogs who had ingested Kirkland dog food from that batch, they wanted to be absolutely certain.

Kirkland Signature Nature’s Domain Salmon Meal & Sweet Potato Formula For Dogs Review

Ingredients: canola oilpea proteinRed:

This product is manufactured by Costco Wholesale Corporation.

According to our data, this Kirkland Signature recipe provides complete & balanced nutrition for all life stages. In other words, this formula is AAFCO approved.

Kirkland Signature Nature’s Domain Salmon Meal & Sweet Potato Formula For Dogs is formulated to meet the nutritional levels established by the AAFCO Dog Food Nutrient Profiles for all life stages.

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Sportsmans Pride Professional Formula 30/20

Sportsmans Pride is a dog food line geared towards canine athletes and is billed as supportive of the endurance and energy requirements of working dogs and active pups.

While that sounds good, we need to take a look at the recent recall of one of its products and the ingredients it contains.

On June 3, 2021, the FDA issued an alert regarding one lot of Professional Formula 30/20. Sunshine Mills, Inc., which manufactures Sportsmans Pride and the brands Sprout, Intimidator, and FRM Gold Select , issued a voluntary recall of this recipe for potential salmonella contamination.;

But looking past the recall alert, wed have to say that this recipe doesnt meet our standards either. The main ingredient in this food is chicken byproduct meal, a rather dubious ingredient with regards to quality.;

Chicken byproduct can mean any leftover part of the chicken, and not just its organs. With quality recipes, manufacturers generally state chicken liver, chicken heart, and so on.

When a manufacturer lists byproduct only, that means its probably a combination of a lot of unsavory things that wont sound as good when listed down and specified.

Lastly, this food uses more carbs than protein to supply the energy needs of dogs because there are three grain and corn ingredients within the first five slots.

The potential for contamination was noted after a sample of 5 lb. Sprout Sporting Dog Food product was collected and tested positive for salmonella during routine surveillance.