Natural Nutrition, Backed By Science
Genius Pet Food is formulated using the latest research and advice from Veterinarians and Animal Nutritionists Worldwide, to produce a diet that optimises the health and longevity of your pet by ensuring the full range of essential amino acids are available to maximise nutrient absorption from the gut and to maintain heart health.
What's Different About Genius Pet Food?
We've formulated our dog food based on good science rather than marketing myths and so:
✔ It contains a complimentary mix of grains and vegetables to ensure that your dog's dietary requirement for essential amino acids is met
✔ The majority of our protein content comes from real meat ingredients, not cheaper plant protein substitutes that can cause health problems
✔ We include a wide variety of grains, vegetables and fruits to promote a healthy gut microbiome
The trouble with grain free pet food
Veterinarians worldwide are becoming increasingly concerned about the feeding of grain free pet foods causing nutritional dilated cardiomyopathy, which can lead to heart failure and death in dogs.
Nutritional DCM is currently thought to be due to poorly formulated diets with high inclusion rates of legumes such as peas, chickpeas and lentils. These ingredients contribute to an imbalance in the amino acid taurine, which then affects heart function.
This imbalance may be due to low levels of methionine and cysteine (from which dogs make taurine) in the diet or poor absorption of these amino acids in the gut due to high fibre levels and poor bioavailability.
Why has grain free pet food become so popular?
Because of some really clever marketing tactics by smaller pet food companies looking to differentiate themselves from larger, established pet food manufacturers.
Many pet owners now falsely believe that grains are a major cause of allergies in pets, when in fact most food allergies are caused by meat proteins, most commonly chicken and beef.
The trend towards low carbohydrate pet foods has led many pet owners to incorrectly assume that a grain free food must be lower in carbohydrates. This is not always the case.
Grains have also been deemed 'fillers' of no nutritional value when in fact they are a highly digestible source of vital amino acids such as methionine and cysteine in a diet.
Peas - the new filler
Traditionally legumes have been used in small amounts in pet foods as a complimentary protein source, as they provide a valuable source of the amino acid lysine. This is how we have formulated our food.
With the increased popularity of grain free pet foods legumes have become a cheap way to inflate the protein content of a food. Inclusion rates in some pet foods have reached 40%. At which point they are now a primary protein source.
If you see peas and other legumes high in an ingredient list then they are contributing a large amount of protein and you should be concerned about this.
Choose your pet food wisely
Your pet's long term health depends on the decisions that you make about their food. We recommend choosing a brand that:
✔ Is NOT grain free
✔ Contains meat as its number one ingredient
✔ Lists a grain in the ingredient list ahead of any legumes
✔ Contains more 'traditional' and well researched ingredients
✔ Does not engage in the practice of 'ingredient splitting' on their labels - peas, pea flour and pea fibre are all peas!