Like with Human food, cheap pet food is chemically designed to taste good for pets. That doesn't make it good or healthy. Advertising and psychology have been working together for over 100 years to determine what look, word, and image will make you buy a product. If you want to keep your pet truly healthy, you have to ignore everything else - and learn to read the label.
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In order to provide the best health for your pet, look for REAL ingredients from REAL sources, without cheap fillers and chemicals.
THE FOUR CATEGORIES OF PET FOOD
Desert Raw Holistic Pet is committed to only providing the very best brands from each category. Each product in our store is carefully selected based on ingredients, sourcing, and efforts to support other small businesses with sustainable, eco-friendly business practices.
RAWRaw pet food is the absolute best for your pet in every way. It is full of moisture, digestive enzymes, and micronutrients. Because it is minimally processed and never exposed to heat, a quality raw diet can avoid things like synthetic vitamins that are absolutely necessary for any food that goes through a heat process. The best raw diets come from small, sustainable companies with humane farming practices. These are the ones Desert Raw carries in our store.
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DEHYDRATEDDehydrated is a HUGE step above kibble and canned food, and ends up being a great option for many pets because it can be comparably affordable while still providing the moisture your pet requires, and more natural nutrition and digestive enzymes than highly processed food can provide. Human-grade foods with lightly cooked meats and veggies, these foods require much fewer synthetic vitamins and provide complete nutrition with convenience and affordability. Just add water, let soak, and serve!
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CANNEDCanned is the next best for your pet, because of the rich moisture content. A lack of moisture in pet food can cause digestive issues in dogs and renal failure in cats. A moisture-rich diet with just a few high quality ingredients can provide your pet with a good amount of nutrients and support long-term health. At Desert Raw Holistic Pet, we carefully rejected any canned food with fillers, unnecessary chemicals, and low-quality proteins to ensure that no matter what you choose from off our shelves, your pet is getting the best - we did the guess-work for you.
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KIBBLE/DRYIf you can't afford to feed raw 100% of the time, you can balance your budget by feeding kibble with proper supplementation (we recommend add water and a digestive enzyme supplement, and fresh food whenever possible). A high-quality kibble is free from fillers like corn, wheat, peas, and alfalfa, and has real, whole foods from sustainable farms. By mixing in a top-quality kibble, you can have the ease of a good dietary base, and can supplement the enzymes and nutrition your pet needs to be well rounded from there. At Desert Raw Holistic Pet, we can help you navigate all the tricks and secrets to find the kibble that is going to be best for your pet - your wallet.
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WHAT TO LOOK FOR
As in all things, there is a Good, Better, and Best category of foods. Of course, there is also another category - "Don't Touch With a Ten Foot Pole." Unfortunately, most commercial pet foods on the market fall into this category, and it can be difficult to wade through the marketing to figure out what you really should be feeding. Here are some basic guidelines for healthy eating for your pet:
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Species appropriate - Dogs are genetically identical to Wolves (sharing 99.8% of their DNA), and Cats are closely linked with Cougars, Lions, and other wild, beautiful-but-dangerous creatures (sharing 99.2% of their DNA). From an evolutionary standpoint, these sub-species became domesticated because it was mutually advantageous for them to do so - but being domesticated has not changed what they were designed to eat. For a pet to truly have good health, they need to eat like they always did before the Industrial age, when they hunted for food or ate scraps from the tables of their humans. Dry kibble was only introduced on a large scale for pets after WWII - partially because of a tin shortage that made producing canned pet food expensive.
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Dogs and Cats were never eating high-grain, high-carb diets until it became profitable for pet food companies for them to do so - after all, corn is much cheaper than meat. But you don't see a lion eating corn, and you don't see a wolf nomming down on a stalk of wheat. Cats and Dogs need to eat what they were biologically designed to eat - mostly meat, with some vegetables and minerals, like they would get if they were eating in the wild. So first and foremost, a healthy diet for pets should mimic their ancestral diet - the diet they are genetically designed to eat.
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Moisture Rich - Of all the problems kibble can cause, the lack of moisture in the food is probably the biggest issue. Because dry pet food is only around 10% water, dogs and cats have to produce the moisture needed to digest the food themselves, leading to a chronic state of dehydration. Feral cats in the wild hunting mice and other small game get more than 80% of their moisture from their prey, and cats developed without a good sense of thirst - so they can be pretty thirsty and not even recognize it. This leads to one of the most common causes of death for house cats - renal failure. While dogs have a better sense of thirst, years of pulling moisture from their intestines to digest food can place a lot of stress on their digestive system, and eventually many of the chronic issues common in dogs start to appear. The best way to keep your pet healthy is to provide them a diet rich in moisture, to put less stress on their bodies and saving that energy for loving you.
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Quality Ingredients - Because the standards for pet food are more relaxed than human food, over time American pet food has slowly degraded in quality as pet food manufacturers have cut corners and saved on costs, making cheap, affordable food - great on the wallet in the short term, but when you factor in the veterinary bills for chronic diseases like obesity, IBD, Renal Fatigue, Diabetes, Cancer, Allergies, and more, you actually end up paying MORE out of your pocket in the long run with expensive veterinary bills. A quality pet food will have real, whole ingredients - no meals, rice, peas, wheat, by-products, corn, alfalfa, or filler ingredients. Looking at the label, the ingredients should be recognizable, healthy, and free from cheap fillers.
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LEARN FROM US
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It can take a lot of time and energy to learn exactly what is and isn't good for your pet, the tricks manufacturers use to get you to buy their products, etc. It can be daunting to try to wade through the information out there. Our goal in starting Desert Raw Holistic Pet was to help use our industry knowledge to guide pet parents on their journey of creating healthier, happier pets. Because this is our main focus, we will take as much time as you need to make the best decision you can. If you don't have the time, don't worry. Desert Raw Holistic Pet is committed to only carrying the best quality pet foods on the market, so you can trust that anything in our store is going to be good for your pet. We can help you avoid falling into their traps. That is more than our business - it is our passion.
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