An essential factor when selecting the best meal plan for your mini Poodle is understanding how to read the ingredients label. At Hungry Bark, we know choosing the right meal plan for your dog can be a tad overwhelming at first, so let’s dive into how to understand what you read when you see a product label.
The first thing to understand is that dog food as an industry is highly regulated by the FDA. Even then, there are some loopholes that subpar manufacturers attempt to use when describing their recipes.
But before we explore the terms that are commonly used with food labels, you need to understand the building blocks to a great meal plan.
In a food label, ingredients are listed in order of weight, giving the first items listed higher priority and percentage than anything that follows it. High-quality meal plans will list a single source of animal protein first before including carbs and fats and avoid using any misleading terms that hide the inclusion of additives and fillers.
As the primary ingredient in a recipe, proteins are the main source of energy for your pet. They serve to strengthen and maintain the skeletal-muscle system while also providing a satiated feeling longer.
Carbohydrates act as backup energy after proteins and also act like sugars in the blood. This delayed source of energy sources acts as fuel for the brain and other cognitive functions.
Similarly to carbohydrates, fats are a long-term energy source. One other function is that they break down as sugars to aid the body with absorbing crucial vitamins and minerals.
Avoid labels with an ingredient list that obscures where the protein comes from, such as using the term “meat meal.”
Food labels should be clear about the origins of their ingredients and eliminate the possibility of unwanted additives and preservatives. They should also avoid using obscure language as a descriptor of the elements.
For example, a product label that lists “meat meal” or lists “Turkey Dinner For Dogs” is both unclear and a little misleading.
Some manufacturers use these misleading terms to comply with FDA requirements while hiding their use of fillers and additives.
FDA standards require manufacturers to list ingredients in such a way that describes the recipe’s content, but if you don’t know what you’re reading, these recipes may seem as if you’re choosing a healthy meal plan when in all reality, it’s not as healthy as it looks.
When reading over a food label, there are four different categories of terms used to detail the quality and purity of ingredients. Those categories are best described as the 95% rule, the 25% rule, the with rule, and the flavor rule.
The 95% Rule
If a food label asserts that it includes a specific protein, in this case, let’s use chicken, then the recipe must consist of at least 95% of chicken in the final product. So when you see a food label that says “turkey for dogs,” then you can have the confidence that the recipe is 95% turkey in the recipe.
