This is a sponsored post. All opinions are my own. 

Natural Pet Food for Your Best Friend

One member of the family truly is always ‘there’ for you. You know, the one who runs to meet you at the door when you get home? The one who wants to play, exercise, and sleep next to you no matter how their day has gone? Heck, they’ll do just about anything to make you happy.

You know who we’re talking about, right? Your dog! That furry family member who offers you unconditional love every day of the week, and who you love back just as much, if not more. But how do you return your dog’s love? Besides taking him or her for walks, playing fetch, cuddling on the couch and offering the occasional treat? Do you feed your dog a healthy, natural diet?

Did you know that a diet formulated with wholesome, natural ingredients could help your dog live a longer, healthier life, but that most dog foods aren’t made up of natural ingredients?

Check Your Bag

Veterinarian’s Weigh In

Why are natural dog food diets so important anyway? “Natural products go far beyond just basic nutrition,” says Dr. Al Townshend, staff Veterinarian at Wellness® Pet Food. “Natural diets are designed to provide the very best nutrition and can have significant benefits.”

In fact, according to Dr. Townshend, “natural diets offer ingredients with some important health benefits such as probiotics, those good bacteria that are essential for a healthy immune system and digestive tract; glucosamine and chondroitin for joint health; omega-3 fatty acids or fish oils for heart and kidney health; and added digestive supplements to enhance digestibility to get the very best benefits from quality proteins and fats.”

Wellness Natural Pet Food

As a leader in natural pet food, Wellness uses natural, high-quality proteins and fats in their dog food recipes. They also include fruits and vegetables for natural vitamins, minerals and other benefits, especially antioxidants that occur in blueberries, cranberries and some vegetables, which help make their dog food products some of the healthiest options in the marketplace.

Wellness recipes do not include added artificial colors, flavors or ingredients, and they’ve even created a helpful “Check Your Bag” website that you can use to compare their natural dog food to those from some competitors who claim to be natural.

Some of the biggest benefits to Wellness® Complete Health® Recipes include:

• Live Active Probiotics – Added after the cooking process to promote a healthy intestinal tract and overall digestive health at guaranteed levels
• Omega 3 & 6 Mix – Offering guaranteed levels of essential fatty acids for cellular function and healthy skin
• Essential Vitamins & Minerals – Designed for cellular health, immunity and disease resistance
• Fruit & Veggie Antioxidants – A proactive step in improving your pet’s nutrition
• Rigorous Safety Testing – A Quality Assurance program that maintains strict standards for food safety
• Excellent Nutritional Standards – Every batch of dry food is tested throughout the entire manufacturing process, from its basic ingredients to the finished products

While Wellness might not be as widely-known as some of the more mainstream brands of dog food, their devotion to quality and natural, high-quality ingredients makes their food safe, wholesome and beneficial to pets’ health and wellbeing.

To pick up a bag of some of this high-quality, natural dog food, you can order it online or stop by one of the retail locations listed in the Wellness Store Locator.

But be sure that you also connect with their Naturally Well Pet Community, a free online program that provides exclusive savings offers, fun contests and helpful tips about keeping your pets happy and healthy.

And consider following their Facebook page and Twitter feed, where you can join in on the fun with a huge group of fellow animal lovers who share heartfelt, funny stories, entertaining photos and videos of their pets.

If you’re at home as you read this, it’s a good bet that your dog is sitting right next to you, watching your every move. Take a quick moment to tell them about the importance of eating a natural diet, then watch the look on their face… we promise they’ll still love you!

Pet Factoids

Pet ownership in the U.S. has more than tripled from the 1970s, when approximately 67 million households had pets, to 2012, when there were 164 million owned pets.

According to a Packaged Facts survey, 83% of pet owners consider their pet to be a member of the family.

U.S. Pet-Ownership Estimates from the American Pet Products Association for 2012.

• 83.3 million – Number of owned dogs
• 47% – of households own at least one dog
• 70% – of owners have one dog
• 20% – of owners have two dogs
• 10% – of owners have three or more dogs
• 1.47 – the average number of owned dogs per household
• 20% – of owned dogs were adopted from animal shelters
• 83% – of owned dogs who are spayed or neutered

$231 – the average annual amount spent on routine vet visits!         

Natural Pet Food For Cats, Too!

Here’s our cat, Paris. She’s been eating natural pet food since the day she came home. She has the softest coat I’ve ever seen or felt in a cat. She’s also extremely healthy!