Hill's Science Diet

Chicken by-product, corn gluten meal, and whole ground corn?!! Yeah, I'm NOT feeding my cat that, sorry. Googling "corn gluten meal" shows that it is used as an herbicide according to U.S. Patent # 5,030,268. If you Google "U.S. Patent 5,030,268" you will find out. By-products are all the nasty parts of the chicken, turkey that humans won't eat: feet, neck, spleen, intestines that have bad effects on health. After all there are reasons why humans don't eat these parts, correct? So why should our pets? A good book that explains about by-products and manufacturing is The New Natural Cat by Anitra Frazier. Because of these ingredients being in most cat foods, I buy Tractor Supply's 4HEALTH INDOOR dry food. Compare the ingredients in the Science Diet food to 4HEALTH and you will see the differences. 4HEALTH is a much better quality product with no corn, wheat or soy at HALF the price.

I use this food for my foster cats and kittens because the shelter I work with feeds it exclusively. That's the only reason I use this product. The bag smells like it came from a fast food establishment. It is so greasy. I suspect that's they only way they can get cats to eat the corn and by-products. The main ingredient is corn, which is not a natural diet for a cat. It is slightly more digestible than by-products. But when you're comparing by-products and corn, it's really not worth discussing. The price for this junk food is ridiculous. If you want to feed corn and by-products, you can find much cheaper options. On a positive note, it's easy to find this food. Just walk into any veterinarian's office and their shelves will be filled with it. The pieces are also small enough that the cats don't even need to chew. This makes it a nice option for weaning kittens.

For two long years, I believed that I was feeding my pets the greatest thing in the world by going with Hills products. Then someone told me that Science Diet was poor quality, and used sound logic and nutritional facts to show me why Science Diet was junk. I didn't believe her. You see, I had believed all that time that I was just Miss Amazingly Responsible and Intelligent Person for feeding this stuff. My pride blocked my vision. I suspect that I'm not the only one with that problem. Science Diet does not use only liver, heart, lung etc. in their by-products. If they did, they would list "liver", "heart" and "lung" like every other pet food who uses organs does. Or they would list them like Bil Jac : chicken by-products (organ meat only). Science Diet has nothing to gain by leaving the identities fresh, healthy ingredients hidden by a general term like "by-products". Something you'll see in most, if not all, Science Diet formulas is the use of plant protein sources, like corn g... Read more

I realily like this brand I think alot of people are choosing natural foods with fruits and veggies but does this realily benefit your pet? I have been feeding Hills brand for years and have always had happy healthy pets. I just think it is a great brand and my vet recoomends it.

I am so happy that my vet recomended this. I had my cats on Whiskas and my vet stated "I don't usually rag on food, but every cat I've ever had that's been blocked (refering to urinary blockage) has been on that crap". So I looked into Science Diet. I thought that the cost would be astronomical, since a bag that was smaller cost 2x as much, but much to my delight, my little kittens (all 4 of them) have saved me money on this food. Why you might ask? Well when there are no fillers in a food you eat less of it, we have spent $52 for this 7.5 kg bag of food and it's lasted well over a month. We used to spend $22 every two weeks so my savings are adding up. On top of that my cats are much healthier. Two of them were over weight and now have dropped a bit of the pounds. Their coats are shinier, and the flakey skin that used to plauge them has disappeared. And the litter box... FANTASTIC, it smells much less, and there is less mess to clean up. I also no longer have to chase after my one cat... Read more

Do not like this food at all. It uses lots of corn, glueten, by products that dont even specify the type of poultry or meat used, has powdered cellulose lots of carbs and scary low protein levels. I hate how they charge an arm and a leg. Some formulas cost the same amount as EVO. So the company is making alot of money off each bag because it does not cost them that much to make this food. I also can not stand that that the reason vets state how good this food is, is because the only nutrition they get in school is from the Hills company. Of course they will rant and rave about what makes corn and all the other crap so good. They also sponsor all the vet schools. I work at a vet clinic and see cats on this food. They look terrible. Dull, dingy coat, lack of energy, they shed alot, huge stinky stool filled with corn kernels btw. There is nothing good about this food.

Do NOT feed this is to your cat! Not unless you want to deal with a painful slow death from intestinal tumors and intestinal lymphoma down the road. Hills knowingly adds a known carcinogen, Ethoxyquin, as a preservative to this dry food. When the public got angry 10 years ago, Hills took advantage of a labeling loophole and now buys one of their ingredients from a supplier who adds the ethoxyquin in for them. Therefore, Hills no longer has to list it on their ingredient list. They are purposely deceiving the public. I e-mailed with them back and forth, and it is true that the ethoxyquin is still in their although they claim not enough research has been done to convince them it's carcinogenic to dogs and cats (as it is in humans!) Of the 10 cats I had in my stray and feral cat colony 8 of them have developed intestinal lymphoma! Of the cats who came to the colony after I switched to another kibble, NONE of have developed intestinal cancers. Go on-line and talk to other people w... Read more

This is absolutly the worst food you could buy for your cat! I had been feeding my cat this then, all of a sudden, they completely changed the formula. Profits became more important than your pet's health. I went to buy a new bag after running out of Nature's Best formula and discovered that the food was a different color, and looked completely different! Thought nothing of it at the time and fed it to my cat. he got diarhea and developed a cough. Runny stools are not fun with a persian! He was lethargic. And he started throwing up. I imagine they started getting the food from China to increase the profits. When I asked at the petfood store if they had any complaints from others and the girl wide-eyed said YES! Lots of complaints and returns! I also noticed that the shelf for the food was almost devoid of the garbage....they were not buying it anymore. Also, my vet changed to a different food to send home with pet owners. (they used to recommend SD) Vet recommended???? Not anymore!!! T... Read more

Pure JUNK! And costs almost as much as excellent, high-quality dog food (Wellness, Natural Balance). My brother died recently, leaving behind his two labrador retrievers. They were taken to the shelter by Animal Control and stayed there a few days until I could drive out to pick them up. That shelter feeds Science Diet (donated), so I bought a bag so as not to change their diet - they didn't need any more changes in their lives, poor babies! I've never liked Science Diet (for my dogs or my cats), so I immediately started to gradually mix in the Wellness & Natural Balance foods that I feed my own dogs. I happened to read the ingredients in the Science Diet Large Breed dog food and was absolutely horrified! The first 6 ingredients are: Ground Whole Grain Corn Chicken By-Product Meal Soybean Meal Animal Fat (preserved with mixed tocopherols and citric acid) Soybean Oil Chicken Liver Flavor Plus, the recommended "serving" was more than 6 cups for an 80-lb dog - more than double wh... Read more

Please - have any of you guys had to try it for what it is prescribed for? doesn't look like it - Prescription Hills SD helped my dog greatly. It is designed to change the ph level of a dogs urine long enough to try to dissolve struvite stones along with antibiotic treatment to avoid surgery!!! It will tell you right on the web site it is not a complete nutritionally balance and can not be considered a long term food - you feed for 1 to 2 months to see if it will work with your dog. While the dog also gets antibiotics -- it is a nutritional medician. IF your dog responds - viola - no need for putting him under and doing a bladder surgery. Please don't review if you have never tried things yourself -- it's like me writing a review on Edmunds for a Lamborgini or something.

It gets one star simply because there's no option for no stars. I worked as a vet tech for 8 years, through college. Science Diet is recommended by vets largely because they sponsor most of the nutrition for veterinary schools and provide BIG discounts on their products for vets and clinic staff. Vets generally only take a class or two in nutrition and guess who provides the info??? Some vets choose to spend more time with continuing education in nutrition. These are the folks that don't sell SD. (I'm not knocking vets at all... they're expected to be internal medicine practicioners, pediatrics, radiologists, dentists, general surgeons, etc. all in one. There's simply too much else for them to focus on!) For the money, you'd be better off feeding Purina One or ProPlan. There are MUCH better diets out there in a similar price range. Try Blue Buffalo, Nature's Variety, Evo, Bil-Jac or Healthwise!

First of all...I think you have to realize what pet food industy is trually about and that is easy to place ingredients over nutrition into food. I mean blueberries and watemelon sounds amazing for humans...but hot tip maybe no the best for the health of your pet. By-products are in almost in every pet ingredient. Guess what jello, lamb meal, turkey gizzards alll have in common ...there all by-products. there are good by-products and bad. To say that corn is the grain of all evil is soo offside. It's in the processing of the corn it's 95% degestive and the least allergetic grain. There are a lot of misconceptions on what causes food allergies. Scientific data shows that in dogs 95%and in cats 80% There a myths that allergies are caused by ingredients such as corn but that is not the case. To say that something is a filler would imply it has no nutritional value; when in fact corn is a superb source of nutrients. There is a misconception that whole corn is used – in fact the cor... Read more

I work in a pet health food store, and a woman came in the other day that almost cried while talking to me, telling me her American Eskimo was has been on Hill's vet food its entire life and now it has less than a week to live before the kidneys completely fail.How ironic. It was a young dog too. I didn't have the heart to tell her it was most likely the food in the first place that caused this problem!

Hated because they use by products. However they only use: Heart, Lung, and liver. Which according to many human nutritionists is much healthier to eat than actual meat from the bone. I've fed Science Diet Indoor to two of my cats for 18 years now and they are doing great. Also little history. Science Diet was the company who invented that dog and cat food should be devided into Puppy, Adult, Senior before that all the companies just made general food for all ages. Shortly after most companies followed the idea.

I have raised my 2 dogs on Science Diet and they are doing great! I have a 14 yr old and also a 7 mth old German Shepherd. They haven't had any health issues. My 14 yr old male hasn't had any joint or athritis problems and I don't give him any supplements. Both of their coats look great! So in my opinion I give S.D 5 stars!!! I also work at a veterinary clinic and I can tell everyone we do NOT get a kick back from selling S.D. I would also like to tell everyone the biggest things you want to watch isnt so much the ingredients its the NUTRIENTS. The most important nutrients you want to watch are the Protein-Phophorus- and calcium. (most dog foods don't list the phosphorus and calcium you need to call the company and ask). My fiance just switched his 5 Belgian Malinois from Taste of the Wild to S.D about 2 months ago and he has seen a big improvement. He switched them because when he did his older dogs Bloodwork his phosphorus levels where to high. We rechecked the bloodwork on monday an... Read more

Science Diet dog food is not healthy food for dogs! I started my 8 month old puppies on Science Diet and in two months they started chewing non edible items in the house and in the yard. They had never done this before. One of them became very ill and got much worse within two days. I took the pup for emergency surgery for impacted gut, costing hundreds of dollars. They found two acorns, unchewed. These were from a Chinkapin oak in my yard. The acorns are small and slick. At first I thought it was a puppy thing. I started thinking that one acorn might have been an accident, but twohad to have been on purpose. A couple of days later when I was at a feed store I found Science Diet dog food on sale at half price. They were getting rid of it and selling other brands. Two reasons: One, they couldnt compete with all the veternarians who were also selling it. Two, because it was not good nutrition for dogs. They told me to look at the lablecontains mostly corngoes right through the dogs. Long... Read more

i work at a pet store and let me tell u i have first hand acounts of science diet "bribing" (giving generous charitable contributions) to my local vets to sell this stuff. unforchantly cat food nutriton is not realy covered in your basic vet schooling, so not to many know how bad it is for your cat., and others just do not care. any normal low cost cat food will be just as good as the science diet. if you want to do something super good for your cat get him some wellness, blue buff, or evo.

I have had my dog on this for years. When I adopted my dog from a pound his coat was in bad shape. It now looks wonderful.

Virtually worthless. Good, informed vets won't sell it. If you find it at your vet's office, ask him or her WHY it's there. If your vet recommends it, find another vet. Processed corn has no place in a dog's diet (a few kernels of fresh corn every now and then is fine). By-products have no place in a dog's diet. Just because your dog eats it doesn't mean it's a good food. Here are the first 10 ingredients of the Original Flavor Adult Formula: Chicken, Ground Whole Grain Corn, Ground Whole Grain Sorghum, Ground Whole Grain Wheat, Chicken By-Product Meal, Soybean Meal, Animal Fat (preserved with mixed tocopherols and citric acid), Corn Gluten Meal, Brewers Rice, and Chicken Liver Flavor.

Science Diet is a pet food tragedy to me, because they've done such a good job at advertising their brand and making their package seem as if their food is top quality for your loved pet.  They've also bought off many vets to recommend their products because money talks.  You'd think that for the exorbitant price that it'd be a pretty good product.  After all, since it can exceed 3 dollars a pound, they've got to be accounting for that price somewhere.Well, I'm still looking.  The main meat source are cheap by-products that you wouldn't feed directly to your cat and certainly wouldn't even go near yourself.  There are two instances of corn, the worst filler of all, within the first 5 ingredients.  Brewers rice, which is the worthless leftover of the alcohol brewing process is the 3rd biggest ingredient.They have "chicken liver flavor" listed as well.  Why the "flavor"?  Why  not just put the damn liver in there for the nutritional value?  Ugh.It's such a waste too.  I've given it a sec... Read more

The main ingredient in this food is water.

Finally reviews that confirm I am not mad. My dog Oliver has had bladderstone problems for 2 out of his 5 years now. Last year he was operated on and given a diet (albeit not Hills Science) but gradually the problems returned until a month ago he was rushed to hospital because his bladder was completely blocked. After an emergency operation which included re-engineering his water works and castrating him we were told he would be fine and advised to put him on Hills Science U/D. Since then he is always hungry and suffers from near constant diarrhea. I mentioned some of the facts I had read on this website and didn't get much sense from the vet either. I too have now taken him off the diet and am now looking for alternatives (suggestions are welcome). In the meantime Oliver is eating meat and rice and seems to be a happy dog again.

We started our puppies on Science Diet for the same reason  many others do ... reccomendations from vets (after all, it must be good, it has SCIENCE right there in the name!).   Our pups (5 month old Lab mix and 7 month old Boxer/Beagle) developed nasty cases of diarrhea for weeks on end.  We could not figure out what was causing it, and after eliminating every other possibility, determined it must be the food.  We decided to switch to Purina Pro Plan (Large Breed Puppy), and in a matter of DAYS, their stools firmed up, and they seemed moreactive and playful.  I will never again waste my money on Science Diet, and would warn others to staty away as well.

Read the ingredient list....one of the main ingredients is CORN, a cheap filler.  Most dogs don't handle corn well at all.  I had my dogs on this food under the direction of my former vet, and they were itching and scratching so bad I had to take them back for a shot.  I wised up, got them off Science Diet, and changed vets.

I have two puppies one 4 months old and the onther 2 months old and the only thing that they eat is hill science diet. they seem to learn faster than the other dogs in my household. they are the only dogs that i have ever feed this to and having 5 dogs i would know good dog food.

My vet reccomended Prescription Diet J/D for my American Bulldog. Since it is suppose to be good for the joints, I also put my German Shepherd on it. After about a month of being on the food (3 bags at $60/bag), my American Bulldog has no improvements and my German Shepherd developed EPI (involves severe weight loss, soft serve stool, and hair loss). There is too much fat in this food for the stomach of a German Shepherd to digest and the food goes straight through as diarhea. I am not saying that it might not be good for other breeds but German Shepherds are prone to EPI and this food aggravates their digestive process. EPI seems to be hard to diagnose and we, like many others I have seen online, spent a lot of money before knowing what the problem was. The medicine for EPI that the dog is suppose to be on for life is $150 (approx every 3 months).

My mother and father FINALLY switched their American Eskimo off this mess to Canidae Life Stages after 8 years of giving this garbage food to her. Since 2000, my dad added up their vet bills for skin/allergy vet visits and it totaled $4,670.08. Now get ready for the stunner... They switched her over to Canidae on the last week in July, since then, her fur has grown to become an incredible thick shiny white coat, no more scratching to speak of (just as what happened when I switched my dog over from Nutro) and her allergies have "magically" dissapeared. Her energy level as my mom can surely atest to, has gone off the chart. Unfortunately had we all known then what we know now of these dog food brands, their dog might live another year or more extra had it been or a really good food.

This is not a good food just because your vet recommends it, the only reason that vets recommend science diet is because they get commission off the food, just thought id let u know that

I would give it a zero if I could.

My vet recommended that I put my Chihuahua on S.D. Sensitive Stomach because she had chronic diarrhea and vomiting. I had her on a Purina brand prior to this. After many months of continuing to have chronic episodes of this on the S.D. formula, I decided to research alternative brands because my dog had no energy, was shedding terribly, she lacked luster in her hair and she was losing weight (she weighed 3-1/2 pounds) and would have terrible stomach pains and you could hear her gut from several feet away. I felt terrible but I thought I was doing everything the Vet told me to do. When I decided to research alternative foods and I learned about the ingredients in S.D. (corn, byproducts, etc) I was horrified to know that this was probably why she was sick. I changed her to Blue Buffalo, a natural dog food that had NO CORN, NO WHEAT, NO SOY, NO By-PRODUCTS, and within two weeks on the new diet, she no longer had diahrrea, no stomach pains, and no gut rumbling. Her hair is now shinn... Read more

This food has no nutritional value.  I had to put my dog on this for a medical reason because he had struvite bladder stones, it was a low proten food which helped break up the stones.  Before I had him on Solid Gold food.  He lost 2 lbs. in one month.  Now that his stones are gone the vet is telling me to keep him on this just a different variety, I refuse!

When I adopted my dog 3 years ago I tried with no avail to change him to Science Diet since our other 2 dogs (at the time) were eating Science Diet. As soon as I got him to 100% science diet he refused to eat for days on end, he once went almost 14 days without eating. I had to change him back to the food he was eating at his foster home so that he would eat on a regular basis. It's not to say that Science Diet is a bad food becuase our other 3 dogs (the 2 original dogs from 3 years ago and a recent addition that ate the Science Diet Puppy small bites untill her 1st birthday last week) all liked Science Diet except for mine, but I did go through 4 different brands of dog food prior to change him back to his foster home food.

This food has too much corn used as a filler! The more filler a food has the more the dog has to consume in order to get all nutrients needed. More food eaten means more money and more poo.

(Thanks Dr Science and Duck's breath mystery theater)I feed my dog only Science Diet but I'm wondering if feeding him from some of the other disciplines might make him more well rounded?

This stuff should have skull and crossbones on the package!

Corn, by-products and other low-quality grains should be in such an expensive food! especially if they are using BHA/BHT/ethoxyquin for preservatives! they are banned for use in human food, so why is it OK for our dogs? Not mine! Why are those ingredients illegal in human food? Simple. Carcinogens. In other words---they cause cancer. That's a damned good reason to not feed this food. Aside from the fact that my dog means more to me than anything and he gets the best dog nutrition has to offer. And it sure isnt this garbage.

Keeps my dog very healthy and helps with her weak stomach.

For all those who said that Hill's Science Diet/Prescription Diet is a good food, please read this. I am the owner of a pet health food store and have been researching the veterinarian/Hill's scandal for many years. Veterinarians belong to the Veterinarian Association (a Union for Vets), in belonging to said union, the vet must promote Hill's Science Diet/Prescription Diet and/or Eukanuba. This is, in part, because the Veterinary Association owns stock in both Hill's and Eukanuba (aka Colgate and Proctor and Gamble) For those of you who don't know, the Hill's Company was bought by Colgate and Eukanuba/Iams was bought by Proctor and Gamble. The other reason why Veterinarians support Hill's is because if our pets are healthy, they don't make money. Thirty years ago, dogs and Cats were living to be 20 and 25, now 15 is considered old. This is because of the many poor ingredients used in Hill's Science Diet/Prescription Diet. Corn is one of the most allergenic substances to dogs, it is ... Read more

Super-crappy food loaded with corn and by-products. Dont buy it.