What To Look For When Evaluating Different Dog Foods

Your dog deserves the best food that you can find. In simple terms, the quality of the pet’s food equates to how healthy the dog is for its entire life. With this fact in mind, it’s time to take a look at the different dog foods found in the marketplace today. There are certain features that you should look for before placing the food in front of your dog.

Main Ingredients

Look at the food’s listed ingredients. Their should be meats that are relatively familiar by name at the beginning of the list. Any chemical descriptions should be near the end of the list or omitted entirely. Although dogs are pets, they still deserve quality ingredients. Beef, chicken, liver, fish and other items might be listed.

Consider grain-free foods so that meat and produce are always the main ingredients. Grains are considered fillers in the dog-food world. Grain-free foods are often more expensive, but the dog eats less volume because it’s so filling.

Food “Description”

Those descriptions on the dog food’s retail packaging are actually precise reflections of the ingredients within. If you want a product that has at least 70 percent chicken, for example, look for descriptions that are simply “chicken.” Fancier terms, including platter or entree, usually mean that only 10 percent of the food is actually meat. “Chicken flavored” descriptions are the most deceptive terms for consumers because this equates to about 3 percent or less of a meat product.

Try to pick the product with the most meat. Filling your dog with a lot of fillers will only impede their health and contribute to weight gain.

Dietary Restrictions

Some dogs might be sensitive to certain foods. In fact, it’s not unheard of for some foods to be outright allergies for Fido. Local pet stores typically carry foods that are specially designed for these issues. Read over the dog-food label to clarify the type of ingredients. The containers usually state that they’re for “sensitive stomachs” or “food allergies.”

Don’t forget that the dog also needs a food designed for its age. Puppy, adult and senior varieties are always good mixtures to choose from as your dog ages.

Breed Considerations

The trend today is matching a dog food to the breed. It’s true that each breed has slightly different needs in comparison to the others. Try these products out, especially if you have a purebred dog. The mixtures should offer the proper nutrients for a dog breed at any age.

If you don’t find dog food that’s specifically designed for your breed, try to match the dog’s dietary needs to the general mixtures. Large breeds tend to have more skeletal issues than smaller dogs so choosing a mixture with bone-rich ingredients for your German shepherd is a good choice.

Real Fruits and Vegetables

Always pick dog food that has real fruits and vegetables within the ingredient list. Sweet potatoes, spinach and apples might be a few of the choices. Although dogs are carnivores, they do require produce as a means to fill out the rest of their nutritional needs. Grains offer some nutrition, but they’re never as good as fruits and vegetables.

Some pet owners prefer to feed their dogs raw produce outside of the everyday food. Be careful with “human” food because some produce doesn’t sit well with each breed.

Feeding Instructions

Always read the label on your new dog food. Each mixture has a slightly different feeding volume. Some products require twice- or thrice-daily feedings. When you follow the instructions on the product, it may or may not be used in a rapid manner. High-quality foods don’t need to be piled up in the dog’s bowl. In contrast, low-quality foods demand volume so that the nutrients can be distributed at a proper ratio.

Be aware that more food volume might increase the calorie intake. You want to strive for a dog food that balances nutrition and healthy calories at the same time.

It may take a few tries to find the proper food that your dog actually likes. Be patient with your pup because there will be a mixture that it likes. At the end of the day, the pup must eat at some point, and you control the quality of the meal.

Crystal Clear: A Brief Guide To Home Water Filtration

Clean water is no accident and it’s possible that even the clearest, best tasting water can harbor unexpected contaminants. If you’re worried what’s coming from your tap isn’t as pure as it should be, there is a solution – home water filtration.

Water Filtration Benefits

Most residential water is safe to drink. Municipal supplies are chemically treated and tested at the source for heavy metals and harmful microorganisms, but that doesn’t extend to aging underground pipes and old plumbing fixtures in your home. Wells are tested when a home changes hands, but may not be retested as often as necessary to ensure purity.

Other contaminants aren’t health hazards, but do cause water to taste or smell bad. Hard water contains minerals that stain laundry and fixtures, while both minerals and sediment can clog pipes and appliance filters, causing them to wear out prematurely.

How is water filtered?

Filters remove contaminants in a variety of ways, but because each method has its strengths, the best filters use a combination of two or more to combat a greater range of issues. These are the most common.

Charcoal Filters

Made with a form of active carbon, these trap chemical particles in large pores and are especially effective for fighting unpleasant tastes and odors. These are commonly used in water filtration pitchers and as pre-filters in more complex systems.

Ceramic Filters

Ceramic filters work by forcing water through small pores. Anything larger than the pore is trapped and stays out of your water.

Reverse Osmosis Filters

These force water through a membrane that excludes more large particles than other types of filters. Reverse osmosis systems usually include storage tanks to collect and purge contaminants, increasing the volume of water that can be treated and reducing the frequency of filter maintenance.

Ultraviolet Filters

UV filters use light to treat water as it flows through a glass tube. This eliminates disease-causing bacteria, but unless the system also has a mechanical filter to remove particles, it doesn’t address sediment, high mineral content, heavy metal, or chemical pollutants.

Types of Home Water Filtration Systems

From simple pitchers and faucet-mounted filters to countertop models and whole home units, there is a system for every need, but it’s important to understand how they work and what you can expect from them.

Filter Pitchers

Consisting of a glass or plastic base and a top with an integrated charcoal filter, water filtration pitchers remove many contaminants, but focus on eliminating unpleasant tastes and smells from common chemicals like chlorine.

Most pitchers don’t remove bacteria and won’t help you with hard water stains, but they do offer good drinking water without the cost or environmental impact of buying bottles.

Individual Faucet Filters

Available in a wide range of prices and filtration levels, these mount directly to a faucet or showerhead. Interior cartridges are generally ceramic and they can process substantially more water between filter changes than pitchers, however, they may decrease water flow.

Countertop Filters

Countertop water filters connect to your faucet via a hose and dispense filtered water through a spigot. If the unit is equipped with a bypass valve, the faucet can be used as normal for non-filtered water needs. This style removes more contaminants than pitchers and faucet filters, but does take valuable counter space and won’t help with most hard water or sediment problems.

Under Sink Filters

Filter systems mounted under the sink rarely affect water flow. They’re not portable, but stay out of sight and need no counter space. Better models use a combination of filtering methods to provide a high level of contaminant removal, but are still limited to just one faucet.

Whole Home Filtration Systems

Whole home systems are installed where water enters your home, giving you a filtered supply through every faucet. These range from simple sediment filters to highly complex systems for nearly every contaminant, but they are the only practical way to filter an entire household water supply.

Whether your water needs a just little help, or a lot, the right home water filtration system may be the solution you’ve been looking for.

2018’s Hottest Kitchen Essentials

Have you been searching for the best kitchen essentials of 2018? Are you wondering how you can make your kitchen stand out from the crowd? There’s never been a better time to start investing in the kitchen equipment you need to create healthy, well-rounded meals for yourself and for your family. The right kitchen equipment can help you cook more efficiently, as well as enable you to cook a more varied number of dishes and meals. Here’s what you need to know about finding the best kitchen essentials of 2018.

Shopping

When you’re ready to start looking for great new kitchen essentials, make sure you take your time. There’s no need to rush when you’re ready to shop for the best possible items for your kitchen. Consider all of your choices before finalizing your decision. This will help ensure you get something truly fantastic. It’s important to read both labels and reviews in order to choose the most fantastic products for your kitchen.

Products

It’s no secret that the KitchenAid Artisan Mini Stand Mixer is one of the best products of 2018. This mixer makes creating fantastic, unbeatable meals and dishes a simple, easy task. Whether you want to mix muffins, brownies, cakes, or something entirely different, having a reliable stand mixer is one of the most important tools your kitchen arsenal needs.

An adjustable rolling pin is also a go-to gadget this season. Rolling pins are usable for a variety of meals and recipes and are effective because they give you full control. Whether you want to roll something thickly or thinly, you’ll be able to do it with this style of rolling pin.

If you’re a tea drinker, make sure you consider a special tea-focused gadget this year: the Teforia Infuser. This infuser is designed to brew one of the best cups of tea you’ve ever had in your life. It’s easy to use, easy to enjoy, and easy to clean. If you love drinking tea, consider adding this to your list of kitchen must-haves.

Selection

When you’re ready to select unbeatable products for your kitchen, make sure you start shopping as soon as possible. The right items can make an incredible difference in how you prepare and enjoy your meals. Take your time choosing devices and appliances you can use over and over again. The more versatile an item is, the more likely you are to use it frequently.

Always pay attention when you buy a new kitchen device. Whether you’re purchasing something you’ve used before or the item is completely new, make sure you know what your rights and responsibilities are as a consumer. Some devices come with a warranty that will offer you protection if something goes wrong with the device, while others do not. Make sure you save your proof of purchase and find out as quickly as possible if your item comes with a manufacturer’s warranty. The retailer you purchase the item from may offer an additional warranty, as well.

No matter what type of baking or cooking you plan to do, investing in the year’s hottest kitchen essentials can be an incredible experience, so don’t wait! Start shopping today.

Tips for Planting Your First Vegetable Garden

If you are thinking about planting your first vegetable garden, you may have a long way to go before you get started. Since there are so many things that you will need to know before you can be successful with your efforts, you need to pay close attention to what the seasoned gardeners are saying. Specifically, because there are some tried and proven tips that you can go by to do your best. With this in mind, here are 5 great tips that can help virtually anyone with planting a vegetable garden that you will be proud of.

Tip #1 – Start Small

Even though you may be tempted to grow a large crop that has a variety of different types of vegetables, it is important that you think these things thru. This is especially true for you that have limited knowledge about what vegetables should be planted and those that may not do well at all. That said, you need to start with a relatively small vegetable garden to see how these vegetable gardens are being planted. For instance, you can get better results when you do not try to grow a farm overnight. Instead, all you need to plant is a couple of beds of vegetables so that they you can begin to get the experience that you need.

Tip #2 – Create Raised Beds to Avoid Weeds that Kill

When you are getting started with your first planting season, you want to make sure that you are doing a proper job. Therefore, to avoid specific types of common problems, you must be able to raise the beds high so that the plants will not be unnecessarily compromised. For instance, if the beds are not raised enough from the ground, you may begin to see and experience certain woes. One of the more commonly known includes having the weeds to grow up and interfere with the planting.

Tip #3 – Determine an Exact Time When you Should Plant Your Vegetables

If you think that you can begin planting your vegetables at any time of the year, you are probably not familiar with how to get started. This is because not all planting seasons are the same since each region in the U.S. or abroad have certain rules and guidelines that must be followed to get the best or proper results. Therefore, you need to do your research in advance to see when it is best to get started. For example, if you live in the state of Tennessee or Alabama, the planting season for you may fall in the month of April. The month of April will give the gardener an opportunity to watch their vegetables grow before they are adversely affected by the heat of the sun.

Tip #4 – Learn the Different Types of Gardens

Because there is more than one type of garden that can be planted for your vegetables, you can do your research to see which one will best fit your needs. For instance, if you want to build a small garden of vegetables for your family, you may find that a container garden will fit your specific needs. Container gardens can be planted in a variety of different forms including buckets, boxes and the like. All of which are ideal for those who are not considering using a hose to till the ground.

Tip #5 – Make Sure You Know Which Vegetables to Plant

Just like there are certain times for planting your vegetables, it is also important to know which vegetables should be planted and when. Since there are some vegetables that grow to maturity easily during specific types of weather, you need to know exactly which ones are considered to be cold weather vegetables and which ones fit into the category of mid-summer season vegetables. For instance, if you like and want to plant broccoli, you should get ready for the cold season to begin this type of garden. Also, you go to a popular resource to find the information that you need. Again, for the state of Tennessee, you should go to the Old Farmer Almanac to find the guidelines that you will need to complete your garden with a certain amount of ease and success.

Summertime Birthday Gifts For Mom

If you’ve been searching for the perfect summertime birthday gifts for your mom, it’s important to know that you have a wide variety of options. The gift you choose for your mother should be sentimental, meaningful, and most importantly, something she can use on a regular basis. Choosing a gift might seem tricky, but there are several incredible options you can choose from when it comes to giving your mom an unforgettable gift. Here’s what you need to know.

First off, consider choosing a gift that has a special meaning to your mother. Does she have fond memories of a childhood beach vacation? Why not give her a scrapbook full of stories she’s told you about the trip or pictures from the adventure? If she loves to garden, you could choose a picture of a mother gardening during the summer. If your mom has a favorite band or movie, you could choose something related to that. Choosing a meaningful gift lets your mother know you’ve been thinking of her and that you value her as a person.

Another option would be to choose a memory-making kind of gift. This means that you choose something you and your mom can do together in order to make new memories. For example, you and your mother could take a knitting class together, go camping for a weekend, or even sign up for dance classes. There are plenty of fantastic ways you can make new memories together that don’t have to be expensive, pricey, or time consuming. If your mother loves to try new things and have adventures, the possibilities will be endless. Try to come up with an idea you can both enjoy and, most importantly, that lets you spend time together.

If your mother isn’t one to try new things, you could offer a special, yet simple birthday gift: a night on the town. Why not take your mother to a lovely dinner at her favorite restaurant? You could follow this up by seeing a local play, visiting a theater, or even going to a movie. If she enjoys the opera, you could take her to a show. Another option would be to take her to the ballet. The possibilities are absolutely endless, so don’t be afraid to get creative when you’re thinking up new ideas for your mother’s birthday gift.

No summertime birthday gift is complete with a special card, so make sure you take the time to create a lovely card for your mother. The card you give should have several important features and elements in order to be meaningful and memorable for your mother’s summertime birthday celebration.

First off, consider making the card yourself. You can choose lovely paper that comes in your mother’s favorite color and use stylish scissors to taper the ends of the paper. Then use a special pen or markers to write something special for your mother. Even if it’s just a short and simple greeting, making the card yourself is a very special way to show your mother that you care.

You may prefer to buy the card for your mother’s gift. This is also acceptable. For some people, words don’t come easy. That’s why greeting cards exist. Consider giving your mother a card if she loves tradition or if you simply aren’t sure what to say. There are plenty of choices available when it comes to giving a professionally-designed birthday card.

Finally, consider slipping an additional small gift inside the card. Does your mother like to read? Give her a bookmark. Does she love to craft? Give her a gift card to a local craft store. Does she like poetry? Slip a poem inside. Something small can go a long way in demonstrating meaningfulness.

No matter what you choose to give your mother for her birthday, remember that something thought-out and meaningful will go a long way. It’s important to make every day count, so don’t be afraid to go all out when it comes to celebrating your mother’s special day with her in style. A fantastic gift coupled with an unbeatable card will make this birthday one she’ll never forget.