The Dog Bowl Pet Supply and BARF Raw Food Blog

Being in the forefront of a concept that request consumers to consciously "think" about what they are buying we are constantly bombarded by the fact that there are marketing falsities on an astounding amount of available products.

Here is an example: Take "Natural Greenies" or "Smart Greenies" for instance, the packaging alone labels the purchaser as smart and aware of healthy options. But what IS this item? When we break down the chemistry of the "natural" item the findings are in fact quite contrary to the labeling. It is as if the manufacturer is telling you, the consumer, one thing and selling you another.

"Low fat", "low carbs", "all natural", and of course, the newly popular "organic" wording is practically on everything marketed from toilet paper and shoes, to food items.

As a consumer and a smart one at that, all we simply have to do is take a second and think about the item in question. Ignore all the beautiful packaging and labels and think about what it took to put that item on the shelf. At the very least, question what it takes to sustain that item in it's container or bag.

The conclusion of your thoughts will no doubt be in conflict with the "wonder ingredients" that is formulated as natural and true. Yes - they were real at one point & then they were changed to what you see now, and of course processed. Hmmmmm

So getting back to "real and basic" it seems that if it were in fact "natural and real" it would rot and break down - real items do. For example, if you leave an apple out on the table over the course of a month it starts to deteriorate. Well of course it does! It is a fresh, real item. And as a smart consumer we don't need a label to tell us that!

Labels: BARF Raw Pet Food, Dog Diet, Dog Nutrition, Energy and Environment

We had a funny thought while at the grocery store & thought we would share it with you.... As we walked down the chip & cereal isle we wondered.... Would you think that any number of these crunchy items as a tooth cleaner? Of course not! That would be outrageous!

We don't eat crackers or cereal and think "my mouth is so clean"; in fact, consuming dry crunchy crackers results in anything but clean - a sticky pasty mess in our mouth is more like it. Oh and REALLY thirsty to say the least! (Try it out for yourself and see!)

So why OH why do we as consumers "buy" into the crunchy dog or cat food as cleaning agent for teeth? Aw... the power of marketing - the ole' give them a crunch to clean marketing slogan.

As humans we CAN move our bottom jaw left and right in order to chew, but our cat & dog's anatomy is up & down (ONLY). Yes ladies and gentlemen our dogs and cats both consume their food in a pull and tear motion, there is NO chewing.

Just a little marketing "food for thought"!

Labels: BARF Raw Pet Food, Dog Diet, Dog Nutrition, Energy and Environment, Pet Dental Care

The Dog Bowl has found the perfect ball!

We love it so much we put our name on it!

This dog ball floats, it squeaks!

It is the perfect size: 2 5/8" (65mm) (Size of a tennis ball but it doesn't come apart at the seams.)

This dog ball is made specifically for "ball loving dogs" - if your pup qualifies for this title this ball toy is a must have!

The Dog Bowl rubber ball now comes in three colors: Lemonade Yellow (shown), Blueberry Blue, or Cherry Apple Red. *The Lemonade Yellow is the most popular!

Looking for a present for someone who just got a new pup? This rubber ball makes the perfect gift for any new pup owner too!

Because we love this ball so much & you will too - The Dog Bowl is now offering FREE shipping for this item to all U.S. destinations!

Labels: Behavior and Training, Dog Style, Dog Toys, Traveling with your dog

“NO WONDER THEY CALL ME A BITCH” by ANN HODGMAN

Ann Hodgman is a food critic for Eating Well magazine. Besides playing goalie on a women's hockey team, she is the author of more than forty children's books, including My Babysitter Is a Vampire, and several cook­books. For reasons soon to be apparent, however, the following "taste­less" essay did not appear in Hodgman's food column, "Sweet and Sour," but in the satiric magazine Spy, for which Hodgman was a contributing editor. A spoof on taste testing, it takes a blue ribbon for disgusting description that appeals to the grosser senses.
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I've always wondered about dog food. Is a Gaines-burger really like a hamburger? Can you fry it? Does dog food "cheese" taste like real cheese? Does Gravy Train actually make gravy in the dog's bowl, or is that brown liquid just dissolved crumbs? And exactly what are by­products?
Having spent the better part of a week eating dog food, I'm sorry to say that I now know the answers to these questions. While my dachs­hund, Shortie, watched in agonies of yearning, I gagged my way through can after can of stinky, white-flecked mush and bag after bag of stinky, fat-drenched nuggets. And now I understand exactly why Shortie's breath is so bad.

Of course, Gaines-burgers are neither mush nor nuggets. They are, rather, a miracle of beauty and packaging-or at least that's what I thought when I was little. I used to beg my mother to get them for our dogs, but she always said they were too expensive. When I finally bought a box of cheese—flavored Gaines-burgers-after twenty years of longing—I felt deliciously wicked.

"Dogs love real beef," the back of the box proclaimed proudly. "That's why Gaines—burgers is the only beef burger for dogs with real beef and no meat by-products!" The copy was accurate: meat by­products did not appear in the list of ingredients. Poultry by-products did, though—right there next to preserved animal fat.

One Purina spokesman told me that poultry by-products consist of necks, intestines, undeveloped eggs and other "carcass remnants," but not feathers, heads, or feet. When I told him 1'd been eating dog food, he said, "Oh, you're kidding! Oh, no!" (I came to share his alarm when, weeks later, a second Purina spokesman said that Gaines-burgers do con­tain poultry heads and feet-but not undeveloped eggs.)

Up close my Gaines-burger didn't much resemble chopped beef. Rather, it looked-and felt-like a single long, extruded piece of redness that had been chopped into segments and formed into a patty. You could make one at home if you had a Play-Doh Fun Factory.

I turned on the skillet. While I waited for it to heat up I pulled out a shred of cheese-colored material and palpated it. Again, like Play-Doh, it was quite malleable. I made a little cheese bird out of it; then I counted to three and ate the bird.

There was a horrifying rush of cheddar taste, followed immediately by the dull tang of soybean flour-the main ingredient in Gaines­burgers. Next I tried a piece of red extrusion. The main difference between the meat-flavored and cheese-flavored extrusions is one of tex­ture. The "cheese" chews like fresh Play-Doh, whereas the "meat" chews like Play-Doh that's been sitting out on a rug for a couple of hours.

Frying only turned the Gaines-burger black. There was no melting, no sizzling, no warm meat smells. A cherished childhood illusion was gone. I flipped the patty into the sink, where it immediately began leaking rivulets of red dye.

As alarming as the Gaines-burgers were, their soy meal began to seem like an old friend when the time came to try some canned dog foods. I decided to try the Cycle foods first. When I opened them, I thought about how rarely I use can openers these days, and I was suddenly visited by a long-forgotten sensation of can-opener distaste. This is the kind of unsavory place can openers spend their time when you're not watching! Every time you open a can of, say, Italian plum tomatoes, you infect them with invisible particles of by-product.

I had been expecting to see the usual homogeneous scrapple inside, but each can of Cycle was packed with smooth, round, oily nuggets. As if someone at Gaines had been tipped off that a human would be tasting the stuff, the four Cycles really were different from one another. Cycle­1, for puppies, is wet and soyish. Cycle-2, for adults, glistens nastily with fat, but it's passably edible-a lot like some canned Swedish meatballs I once got in a Care package at college. Cycle-3, the "lite" one, for fatties, had no specific flavor; it just tasted like dog food. But at least it didn't make me fat.

Cycle-4, for senior dogs, had the smallest nuggets. Maybe old dogs can't open their mouths as wide. This kind was far sweeter than the other three Cycles-almost like baked beans. It was also the only one to contain "dried beef digest," a mysterious substance that the Purina spokesman defined as "enzymes" and my dictionary defined as "the products of digestion."

Next on the menu was a can of Kal Kan Pedigree with Chunky Chicken. Chunky chicken? There were chunks in the can, certainly-big, purplish-brown chunks. I forked one chunk out (by now I was becoming more callous) and found that while it had no discernible chicken flavor, it wasn't bad except for its texture-like meat loaf with ground-up chicken bones.

In the world of canned dog food, a smooth consistency is a sign of low quality-lots of cereal. A lumpy, frightening, bloody, stringy horror is a sign of high quality-lots of meat. Nowhere in the world of wet dog foods was this demonstrated better than in the fanciest I tried-Kal Kan's Pedigree Select Dinners. These came not in a can but in a tiny foil packet with a picture of an imperious Yorkie. When I pulled open the container, juice spurted all over my hand, and the first chunk I speared was trailing a long gray vein. I shrieked and went instead for a plain chunk, which I was able to swallow only after taking a break to read some suddenly fascinating office equipment catalogues. Once again, though, it tasted no more alarming than, say, canned hash.
Still, how pleasant it was to turn to dry dog food! Gravy Train was the first I tried, and I'm happy to report that it really does make a "thick, rich, real beef gravy" when you mix it with water. Thick and rich, any­way. Except for a lingering rancid-fat flavor, the gravy wasn't beefy, but since it tasted primarily like tap water, it wasn't nauseating either.

My poor dachshund just gets plain old Purina Dog Chow, but Pur­ina also makes a dry food called Butcher's Blend that comes in Beef, Bacon & Chicken flavor. Here we see dog food's arcane semiotics at its best: a red triangle with a T stamped into it is -supposed to suggest beef; a tan curl, chicken; and a brown S, a piece of bacon. Only dogs under­stand these messages. But Butcher's Blend does have an endearing slogan: "Great Meaty Tastes-without bothering the Butcher!" You know, I wanted to buy some meat, but I just couldn't bring myself to bother the butcher. . .

Purina O.N.E. ("Optimum Nutritional Effectiveness") is targeted at people who are unlikely ever to worry about bothering a tradesperson. "We chose chicken as a primary ingredient in Purina O.N.E. for several reasonings," the long, long essay on the back of the bag announces. Chief among these reasonings, I'd guess, is the fact that chicken appeals to people who are-you know-like us. Although our dogs do nothing but spend eighteen-hour days alone in the apartment, we still want them to be premium dogs. We want them to cut down on red meat, too. We also want dog food that comes in a bag with an attractive design, a subtle typeface, and no kitschy pictures of slobbering golden retrievers.

Besides that, we want a list of the Nutritional Benefits of our dog food-and we get it on O.N.E. One thing I especially like about this list is its constant references to a dog's "hair coat," as in "Beef tallow is good for the dog's skin and hair coat." (On the other hand, beef tallow merely provides palatability, while the dried beef digest in Cycle provides pal­atability enhancement.)
I hate to say it, but O.N.E. was pretty palatable. Maybe that's because it has about 100 percent more fat than, say, Butcher's Blend. Or maybe I'd been duped by the packaging; that's been known to happen before.

As with people food, dog snacks taste much better than dog meals. They're better looking too. Take Milk-Bone Flavor Snacks. The loving­hands-at-home prose describing each flavor is colorful; the w_iters prac­tically choke on their own exuberance. Of bacon they say, "It's so good, your dog will think it's hot off the frying pan." Of liver: "The only taste your dog wants more than liver-is even more liver!" Of poultry: "All those farm fresh flavors deliciously mixed in one biscuit. Your dog will bark with delight!" And of vegetable: "Gardens of taste! Specially blended to give your dog that vegetable flavor he wants-but can rarely get!”

Well, I may be a sucker, but advertising this emphatic just doesn't convince me. I lined up all seven flavors of Milk-Bone Flavor Snacks on the floor. Unless my dog's palate is a lot more sensitive than mine-and considering that she steals dirty diapers out of the trash and eats them, I'm loath to think it is-she doesn't detect any more difference in the seven flavors than I did when I tried them.

I much preferred Bonz, the hard-baked, bone-shaped snack stuffed with simulated marrow. I liked the bone part, that is; it tasted almost exactly like the cornmeal it was made of. The mock marrow inside was a bit more problematic: in addition to looking like the sludge that collects in the treads of my running shoes, it was bursting with tiny hairs.

I'm sure you have a few dog food questions of your own. To save us time, I've answered them in advance.

Q. Are those little cans of Mighty Dog actually branded with the siz­zling word BEEF, the way they show in the commercials?

A. You should know by now that that kind of thing never happens.

Q. Does chicken-flavored dog food taste like chicken-flavored cat food?

A. To my surprise, chicken cat food was actually a little better­
more chickeny. It tasted like inferior canned pate.

Q. Was there any dog food that you just couldn't bring yourself to try?

A. Alas, it was a can of Mighty Dog called Prime Entree with Bone Marrow. The meat was dark, dark brown, and it was surrounded by gelatin that was almost black. I knew I would die if I tasted it, so I put it outside for the raccoons.
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Source Reference: Author: Hodgman, Ann. "No Wonder They Call Me a Bitch." The Norton Sampler, 6th Edition. Ed. Thomas Cooley. New York, NY: W. W. Norton and Company, 2003. 47-51.

Labels: BARF Raw Pet Food, Dog Diet, Dog Nutrition, Dog Treat, Pet Dental Care

From The Dog Bowl to BARF: "Dear BARF, at The Dog Bowl we feed our pets & highly recommend the BARF Diet to our customers. This statement from one of our clients & we found this to be incorrect comparison of products, as you know we do offer the Nature's Variety as well. From our client: 'The frozen raw natures variety is one of the only truest non artificial food ever, I used to feed BARF raw but found that it has two artificial ingredients that are actually bleachers as well as not being complete once I studied it more so now nature's variety is my favorite...' There is an unfounded rumor regarding the BARF diet that it has "synthetic vitamins" and bleach in the BARF diet foods.... We have NEVER heard such a thing and have been feeding BARF for years! The Dog Bowl's question to you, BARF: How can we educate consumers regarding these unfounded rumors? And does BARF contain any of these items?"

Official statement from BARF to The Dog Bowl: This is indeed a rumor! "What ingredients is the customer referring to? The only thing that I can think that the claims might refer to is the Vitamin E, Manganous Oxide and Zinc Oxide. These are added to the diet in very small amounts. It is not our desire to have these ingredients added to the diet but it is what AAFCO is dictating to us and making us put this in our diets in order to comply with their requirements for a complete and balanced food. If Natures Variety IS NOT REQUIRED TO ADD THIS TO THEIR DIET THEN THEY ARE NOT COMPLYING TO THE REQUIREMENTS AS LAID OUT BY AAFCO. We are being proactive and complying to their request in staying legal and able to defend our claim of being complete and balanced." Regards, BARF World, inc.

Labels: BARF Raw Pet Food, Dog Diet, Dog Nutrition

The Dog Bowl has two wonderful solutions if you have to walk two dogs at one time! We offer a nylon rolled double dog leash and also a leash coupler (coupler works with your current leash).

The Double Dog Leash (shown to the left) is our most popular leash for walking two dogs.

The patented SlideLok Coupler creates the distance you desire between both dogs. It also allows one dog to have a shorter or longer leash that the other - this is great for the one that like to walk faster or slower!

The Dog Bowl is now offering free shipping for the Double Dog Leash (shown top left). This makes a great gift for anyone who struggles with walking two dogs! It also is a great way to train a dog along side a dog that walks well - adjust the SlideLok down to keep both dogs close to each other. They will begin to work and walk as a team and the SlideLok will take all the pressure and tension of their battle!

This double dog leash is available in seven different colors and a handy key ring (shown) which allows a quick exit from your house with the pups! Oh... and we almost forgot to mention the Double Dog Leash also comes with a cushy grip handle (shown) - which makes walking two dogs even more comfortable for you!

The second option we offer at The Dog Bowl is the Leash Coupler (second photo, bottom left). This option comes in seven colors and works with your leash. It simply allows you to modify your one leash.

The coupler is an easy addition to any leash because the leash coupler allows you add a dog anytime you want - this is a great option if you are a foster home for a second dog.

Professional dog walkers also love this option - it is a handy addition for adding a second dog to your walk! Ordering two couplers will also allow you to walk four dogs at once and you will only have to have one (or two) leashes. (Please note: Choosing the number of leashes to use with the coupler is up to you of course & depends on your dog walking skill level, but most people have no problems once they work with their dogs for a little while.)

Both dog leashes mentioned are made of rolled nylon material (not cotton) so they will last & do not stretch out or fade. These leashes are proudly made in the U.S.A.!

Labels: Behavior and Training, Dog Leash, Dog Style, Traveling with your dog

The Dog Bowl offers the Leba III dog dental spray - now on sale & offering free shipping (for U.S. destinations)!

Leba III Spray is considered the "miracle formula dental spray" in the pet industry. Use the Leba Dental Spray for home pet periodontal cleaning. The Leba Spray actually turns your dog's teeth white in a matter of weeks in a all-natural way!

LEBA III is a “miraculous" herbal product that will not damage enamel and has no side-effects. Mist spray application formula makes daily use easy and safe. No more anesthesia for your pet or outrageous teeth cleaning bills. LEBA III is a dog teeth cleaning system that will save your dog from the most common health problem in dogs, periodontal disease.

Leba III should not be used with any other dental product such as toothpaste during the treatment cycle. This will dilute and possibly negate the effectiveness of the formula. But don't worry The Dog Bowl will send an instructional sheet that clearly outlines the directions for using the Leba III spray.

Testimonials tell the story best: “Leba III works by stimulating the enzymes in the saliva and gradually cleaning away the plaque buildup that can lead to periodontal disease. The product not only does away with home brushing but also helps protect your pet from the trauma of undergoing anesthesia for a professional cleaning.” - Tim Hockley, President of Animal Wellness Magazine

Labels: Pet Dental Care