When we got Milly as a rescue she'd been on JWB puppy and seemed to be OK with it but, when she came to move over to the adult JWB, she just couldn't take to it a all. Really strong and frequent aromas and she started itching and scratching all over.
We moved her over to Orijen adult and the problems disappeared within a week or so. She's been on it ever since, her weight is spot on for her size at just over 12 kilos and her coat really shines. She's on 120g of Orijen per day split between two meals.
When we got Chaz his breeder had been using Purina so we slowly moved him onto Orijen Puppy and then, two months ago, onto the adult version the same as Milly. He's bigger than Milly, 14.5 kilos, and is on 140g per day also split between two meals.
We buy Orijen in 13kilo bags which, at 260g per day, lasts 50 days. 2 x 13kilo bags cost £125 from Zooplus, lasts 100 days so we spend £1-25 per day, 58p for Milly and 67p for Chaz, on what's arguably one of the best quality dog foods available.
The feeding quantities for Orijen may seem quite small but the food contains no fillers, bulking agents or cereals at all. 80% of it is human quality meat and 20% is fruit and vegetables. The poos are smaller than with foods containing bulking agents and tend to be firmer and less smelly.
The general guide to feeding with Orijen is 10g of the kibble per kilo of body weight per day but the Orijen Puppy version is slightly more and needs to be increased as the puppy grows. Chaz was fed Orijen Puppy for nine months before moving to the adult version and is now just over 14 kilos, has a pronounced waist and has even persuaded our vet to move to Orijen for his springer spaniel
.
I don't have a PhD in dog nutrition (Love it
) but we went for Orijen after following advice on here some time ago. It's worked very well for us and our two cockers. There are lots of other dog foods out there though, some better than others, and the illustration of costs I've given just helps to see that even the higher priced foods don't need to break the bank.
Acana, another dog food from the makers of Orijen (Champion Petfoods, Canada), has slightly less protein and we sometimes give it to our two to provide some variety. It's formulation is very much as Orijen and we've found that they're quite happy to move from one to the other, or a mix of the two. Slightly less costly but also of the highest quality.
We use a portion of their daily food allowance as treats rather than give extra treats. They get half their food in the morning and the remainder, from which the treats have been taken, in the evening. The only additional food that they get are a few slices of raw carrot per day, half a Bonio at bedtime and a weekly treat of a small tin of sardines split between them.
Bob.
