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Hi, just wanting to compare kibble size for some different dry food brands.

If people could briefly comment on the name and flavour/type of the food, approx size of the dry food pieces e.g. less than 0.5cm, 1cm across etc and shape that would be very helpful! Feel free to add any extra comments e.g. strong smell, very crumbly, very palatable etc.

Brands I'm particularly interested in are TOTW, Artemis, Earthborn, Black Hawk, Canidae, Wellness and Holistic Select. Also any dry foods people have with either particularly large or small pieces. Some of these I've tried but obviously not every flavour/type! Thanks for your help :)

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Hi, just wanting to compare kibble size for some different dry food brands.

If people could briefly comment on the name and flavour/type of the food, approx size of the dry food pieces e.g. less than 0.5cm, 1cm across etc and shape that would be very helpful! Feel free to add any extra comments e.g. strong smell, very crumbly, very palatable etc.

Brands I'm particularly interested in are TOTW, Artemis, Earthborn, Black Hawk, Canidae, Wellness and Holistic Select. Also any dry foods people have with either particularly large or small pieces. Some of these I've tried but obviously not every flavour/type! Thanks for your help :)

What are you trying to achieve? :)

I can't say I've noticed anything unusual in size in any of the brands you have mentioned.

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I have tried a few of the Earthborn ones. Most are very small kibble, ie less than 0.5cm probably. I'm currently using the new large breed one and it's a nice decent sized kible. At a guess I'd say 1.5cms, but I'll check for you later on.

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Hi, just wanting to compare kibble size for some different dry food brands.

If people could briefly comment on the name and flavour/type of the food, approx size of the dry food pieces e.g. less than 0.5cm, 1cm across etc and shape that would be very helpful! Feel free to add any extra comments e.g. strong smell, very crumbly, very palatable etc.

Brands I'm particularly interested in are TOTW, Artemis, Earthborn, Black Hawk, Canidae, Wellness and Holistic Select. Also any dry foods people have with either particularly large or small pieces. Some of these I've tried but obviously not every flavour/type! Thanks for your help :)

What are you trying to achieve? :)

I can't say I've noticed anything unusual in size in any of the brands you have mentioned.

I often have clients ask for recommendations for premium/super premium brands with larger kibble size (these clients usually can't feed raw for medical reasons). I've fed one of my dogs several of the different Canidae formulations and noticed that the pieces are quite small for a larger dog (otherwise good experiences with Canidae though). In my own dog I do see a noticeable reduction in gingivitis and plaque with larger textured kibble, compared to very small kibble.

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Yes also interested, are you doing a survey/ research etc?

Wellness- most types are small, triangular ish faces. About 1cmx1cm. Fairly dry, lots of 'dust'.

Holistic select- most types are your traditional 'flat disc' about 1cmx 1/2cm. Fairly typical kibble.

The earthborn holistic (think it was primitive? ) I tried had very small flat rectangles. About 3/4cmx 1/2 cmx 1/4cm (height). Very dark colour, rich.

I find puppy/ small breed kibble types tend to have smaller sizes, large breed formulas bigger, though it depends on brand.

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Yes also interested, are you doing a survey/ research etc?

Wellness- most types are small, triangular ish faces. About 1cmx1cm. Fairly dry, lots of 'dust'.

Holistic select- most types are your traditional 'flat disc' about 1cmx 1/2cm. Fairly typical kibble.

The earthborn holistic (think it was primitive? ) I tried had very small flat rectangles. About 3/4cmx 1/2 cmx 1/4cm (height). Very dark colour, rich.

I find puppy/ small breed kibble types tend to have smaller sizes, large breed formulas bigger, though it depends on brand.

Thank you, very helpful :)

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Sunday Pets is massive kibble. Biscuit size.

I have noticed that my dog's teeth are best when I am feeding Holistic Select. Must be something in the kibble that helps as there is nothing about the size that would help clean teeth.

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Wellness core, fish one is average sized, pyramid shaped.

Earthborn Holistic Coastal Catch has almost the exact same ingredients but the kibble is really tiny, flat squares

They both have a fairy strong fishy smell, and are both slightly oily to the touch.

My dog tolerates both, only difference is he eats the larger Wellness a bit slower, but he isn't a fast eater anyway.

My dog gets supplimented with meaty bones like turkey necks which are great for teeth cleaning, so I can't really comment on teeth cleaning properties of the kibble.

Edited by LisaCC
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Sunday Pets is massive. They are like brick shape pieces over 1cm long when broken up individually. Not much smell really. Both my dogs like this kibble & it is good for slowing down a dog that inhales their food like Stella does even though she is feed in a slow feed bowl or a Kong. Both did well on this food. Kept great condition.

Cannidae Pure Sea. Small pieces. Pea like size. Smells inviting. Quite fishy & oily to touch. Both mine love this food & kept great condition on it. Stella eats this faster as the pieces are small though. Another great backup dry that suits us.

Earthborn Holistc coastal catch is another pea size shape kibble. Also has inviting smell. Both mine like it & do well on this one also.

I use any of the above dry food as great backup dries. Have tried lots of other premium grain frees. Black Hawk being least preferred. Both mine went dreadful condition wise.

My dogs fav & mine atm is KiwiPeak Venison & fish. Unusual looking dry food shaped like cardboard about a pea size. Square & flat. Smells amazing. Very strong aroma. My 2 love this kibble. Stella eats this fairly slowly even though it is only small pieces as it is flat & must be a bit difficult to pick up. Best of all they both thrive on this product. And they maintain a great muscle tone & coat. Noticeably smaller/firmer stools as well. Down side it is $$$ but you feed a lot less as it is freeze dried. I think it's about 1 cup to 4 from memory & do 80% raw so a 5 kilo bag lasts me about 3.5 months for my 2.

This is my pick of commercial dry foods thus far that I have tried :)

Edited by BC Crazy
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Thanks for the help so far :)

Can anyone out there comment on Artemis, Black Hawk or TOTW?

I've noticed the small size of the Canidae cat kibble too, our very fussy cats actually quite like the Pure Sea one but it's very small and they swallow them whole. I think it's even more important for cats to have larger kibble as they can be less inclined to chew on bones and crunching on larger kibble definitely helps to reduce periodontal disease in cats. Would love Canidae to make their cat kibble 2-3x the size!

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Artemis is probably on the small side of medium. Can measure later if you like.

I mix in a bit of Pro-Plan Sensitive with Zig's and the size really varies - used to be small then changed to really large and now probably the larger side of medium.

Em eats all the prize food so she's tried nearly everything - I think she's currently eating Hills grain free - which is on the small side of medium.

My dogs are fed out of Kong Wobblers or stuffed Kongs etc which slows them down no matter the kibble size.

ETA: For cats I'm not sure the size of the kibble makes much difference to their teeth. I know mine do the one crunch and swallow with large dental biscuits and I suspect that's pretty common. Would rather feed chicken necks.

Edited by The Spotted Devil
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Another one to try, that not a lot of people know about is Performadog. It's a Melbourne based dry kibble, that the first 2 things are meat and meat by products and its a really small kibble, so I'm quite content giving it to my dobies and to my little Tenterfield terrier.

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ETA: For cats I'm not sure the size of the kibble makes much difference to their teeth. I know mine do the one crunch and swallow with large dental biscuits and I suspect that's pretty common. Would rather feed chicken necks.

Yes I completely agree that raw stuff like necks and wings would be the best, but so many cats are so stubborn about raw and the owners seem to struggle a lot unfortunately. I've recently seen a large study done first hand (not published yet) - similar approach to this one:

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/15773760

The results seen were similar to the above - large kibble pieces (not just ones with 'mechanical cleaning qualities' like t/d but also Royal Canin Maine Coon etc) did seem to reduce the accumulation of plaque and incidence of gingivitis. I'm aware of studies that show the opposite though and I'm certainly not advocating dry food as the ideal food for cats - rather for owners that want to feed dry then perhaps a larger kibble may provide some benefit (to some cats).

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BlackHawk - Chicken & Rice - disc shaped approx. 1.5 cm; Lamb & Rice - disc shaped - slightly thicker - approx. 0.75 cm. Can't remember the Fish size. Lamb & Rice cat kibble - star shaped flat - approx. 0.5 cm. Not greasy or smelly - apparently highly palatable according to the Border Collies and the Norwegian Forest cats - who enjoy crunching their way through the dog food as a treat. (The Border Collies aren't a reliable guide to palatability - they are very easy to please :D .)

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I'm using Wellness Simple at the moment. It is a triangle shape and medium size. It is a little odd in that it has no doggy food smell. Not sure if fussy eaters would like it. Poppy eats anything and was a bit like 'are you sure?' at first.

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I'm using Wellness Simple at the moment. It is a triangle shape and medium size. It is a little odd in that it has no doggy food smell. Not sure if fussy eaters would like it. Poppy eats anything and was a bit like 'are you sure?' at first.

Interesting, is it the turkey one? I couldn't get any of my cats to eat Wellness for love or money :laugh:

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I'm using Wellness Simple at the moment. It is a triangle shape and medium size. It is a little odd in that it has no doggy food smell. Not sure if fussy eaters would like it. Poppy eats anything and was a bit like 'are you sure?' at first.

Interesting, is it the turkey one? I couldn't get any of my cats to eat Wellness for love or money :laugh:

Duck and Oatmeal. Yeah the normal Wellness wasn't super well received. I can usually tell if Poppy really loves the food as good food gets drools :laugh: Natures Gift kibble is a fav!

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BlackHawk - Chicken & Rice - disc shaped approx. 1.5 cm; Lamb & Rice - disc shaped - slightly thicker - approx. 0.75 cm. Can't remember the Fish size. Lamb & Rice cat kibble - star shaped flat - approx. 0.5 cm. Not greasy or smelly - apparently highly palatable according to the Border Collies and the Norwegian Forest cats - who enjoy crunching their way through the dog food as a treat. (The Border Collies aren't a reliable guide to palatability - they are very easy to please :D .)

Black Hawk - The fish one is similar or slightler larger than the chicken and rice. I could take a photo if you want I have all of them.

I feed mine Advance Active, large triangular shape probably around two cm sides and around 1cm thick?? I can measure properly later.

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