You can feed your Golden Retriever high-quality commercial food, but the best way to provide a nutritious healthy diet is to combine both commercial food for dogs with fresh food for people.
Whether dry or canned, most commercial dog food lacks the nutrients, vitamins, and minerals that come with fresh food.
Vets agree that fresh food is good for your dog, providing practice use moderation.
Golden Retrievers love fresh food.
They can smell it a mile away, and if it smells good, they'll eat it! Commercial dog foods are good sources of protein and vitamins, but fresh food contains more essential nutrients and a more varied diet.
For example, fresh chicken and beef provide more protein and minerals than any commercial dog food on the market today.
Fish also contains plentiful protein and helps your Golden Retriever maintain a healthy brain.
As long as your give a dog the proper nutrients and minerals, they can stay healthy.
But Golden Retrievers love variety, and the are delighted when the receive the same food as they see people eating.
To keep your Golden interested in his food, offer them a different food each day.
Recommended people foods for dogs include chicken and chicken livers, kale, red beets, chickpeas, and peas.
Avoid corn, wheat, and soy, as more dogs tend to be allergic to them.
People also feed their dogs some fruits, vegetables, and grains without ill effect.
These include apples and bananas, carrots and cauliflower, peaches, rice cakes, and tuna.
Play it safe.
Don't make big changes in your Golden Retriever's diet at once.
Add a little of a fresh food one day, and wait a day or two before doing it again.
Dogs have reacted badly to sweeping diet changes, so you'll want to be cautious.
There are also human foods that are poisonous to dogs, including chocolate, onions, garlic, and macadamia nuts.
Don't give your dog fruit pits or potato peelings, foods with caffeine, broccoli, or raisins or grapes.
Before you make changes in your Golden Retriever's diet, check out the internet for those foods that are safe and those that are not safe.
Be sure that your Golden Retriever gets plenty of animal protein in his diet.
Dogs are not carnivorous animals.
Unlike cats, who must have meat to survive, dogs can survive on a diverse diet of plant and animal products.
They are omnivores and eat all types of foods.
In the wild, they eat grasses, leaves, and other plants.
Having said this, dogs do in fact thrive on animal-based diets.
Although an all-meat diet is dangerous, dogs do need meat.
To be safe, you should give your Golden a combination of dog and people food to assure he gets all the nutrients he needs.
Make sure his diet is about half animal protein, and spice things up by giving him different human foods each day.
Be careful not to over-feed your Golden Retriever as you experiment with new diet combinations.
You might want to weigh him once a week to be sure you catch any weight-gain trends as they happen.
Also, observe your Golden Retriever's reactions to human food in case he should have an allergy you didn't expect.
If ever in doubt, do not hesitate in giving your vet a call.
Your vet knows your dog and its medical history.
They'll be able to recommend the best diet, including both commercial food for dogs and human foods, to maintain proper health and an appropriate weight.