By Rebecca L. Remillard, DVM, Ph.D.
A homemade diet should be complete and balanced. “Complete” means the diet contains all of the known essentials – for dogs, that’s about 40 individual nutrients. “Balanced” means those 40 essential nutrients are present in the correct ratio to the calories in the diet. Failure to achieve nutritional balance (nutrient concentrations in balance with calories) is the pitfall of homemade diets formulated by armchair nutritionists.
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