Review Summary

If you want to offer your puppy nutritionally dense food that tastes great, Taste of the Wild is worth looking into. Taste of the Wild focuses on quality, affordable dog and cat food with protein sources that mimic your pet’s natural diet. Hence, the company calls its food Taste of the Wild!

This food has many animal-based ingredients like bison, boar, duck, venison, and many others you don’t typically find in traditional pet foods. It’s a great way to mix it up with your pet’s food. Plus, you can diversify the nutritional value instead of sticking with the same recipe.

Today, we’re reviewing their High Prairie puppy recipe, which is different from their “standard” recipe for adult dogs. This recipe has added nutritional elements to help your puppy grow big and strong.

Overall, we think this is a great recipe to feed your puppy. But no recipe is perfect, so let’s take a closer look at the pros and cons.

At A Glance: Taste of the Wild High Prairie Puppy Food Recipe

Taste of the Wild High Prairie Puppy Food Reviewed

Who Makes Taste of the Wild and Where Is It Produced?

Although this brand claims to be a family-owned pet food business, it’s not made in a mom-and-pop shop down the street. Like many pet foods, Taste of the Wild is one of several brands manufactured by a larger company. In this case, it’s Diamond Pet Foods.

Diamond Pet Foods has six locations across the country. Two facilities are in California, one in Kansas, Missouri, Arkansas, and South Carolina.

Which Type of Dog Is Taste of the Wild Best Suited For?

Puppies of any breed can enjoy Taste of the High Prairie puppy food. The puppy stage lasts longer for big dog breeds than for smaller breeds. Small breed puppies are only puppies between 9–12 months. The puppy phase for medium to large breeds puppies lasts between 12–15 months.

If your dog is past the puppy phase, it’s best to transition to adult dog food. The reason for this is the ingredients (we’ll get to that later).

Which Types of Dogs Might Do Better with a Different Brand?

Currently, Taste of the Wild doesn’t offer any recipes for senior dogs, and all but one of their recipes are grain-free. They also don’t provide any weight-management recipes.

American Journey, on the other hand, checks all these boxes. American Journey offers almost identical recipes to Taste of the Wild, and they’re about the same price. You can find a puppy formula, weight management formula, and several senior recipes.

Most of these recipes are grain-free, but there is a grain-inclusive option for mixing it up.

Discussion of the Primary Ingredients (Good and Bad)

The ingredients are why we stick with a brand. We want the best for our pups! Let’s look under the microscope at the High Prairie Puppy Food ingredients and characteristics and see what’s cooking.

High-Protein, High-Fat

Puppies are very active and burn many calories, so they need a high-quality source of fat and protein to convert into energy and amino acids.

Like many puppy foods, the High Prairie Puppy Food is high in protein (28%) and high in fat (17%). The primary protein sources are water buffalo, lamb meal, egg product, and pea protein.

Water buffalo is an excellent choice for this product. It’s higher in protein content than beef but also lower in fat content. You’ll notice they’ve added chicken fat to increase the fat content.

Chicken Fat

Although there is no chicken meat in this recipe, there is chicken fat for added fat content. Pets with chicken sensitivities usually do fine eating food with chicken fat. But chicken fat doesn’t disqualify this recipe for dogs that are sensitive to chicken protein—at least not all dogs.

However, it’s best to consult your veterinarian before trying this food.

DHA

DHA stands for Docosahexaenoic acid, an essential omega-3 fatty acid usually found in cold-water, fatty fish like salmon. In this recipe, salmon oil is the source of DHA.

DHA has several health benefits like many fatty acids, but the most important is brain function. DHA is fundamental for every cell in your body. DHA helps the body send and receive electrical signals to the brain, making the entire nervous system faster and more functional.

Obviously, DHA is important. But why is it crucial for puppies? Because DHA plays a major role in brain development.

In animals, low amounts of DHA inhibit new nerve cells and impair learning and eyesight. Including DHA is one of the reasons this Taste of the Wild recipe is so great!

Species-Specific Probiotics

Probiotics are good bacteria that help balance the microbiome in the gut. This helps keep everything else balanced, like the immune system and digestion. But it’s not enough to just throw a probiotic in the food and call it good. The probiotic species matters.

Each strain helps balance intestinal bacteria and reduces intestinal ailments like diarrhea and infection. And yes—they are 100% safe for puppies!

Grain-Free

Taste of the Wild is grain-free, so it doesn’t contain any rice, corn, or wheat. Most grain-free diets replace these grains with legumes so dogs can get their daily amount of glucose. But the problem is legumes may be linked to Canine Dilated Cardiomyopathy. Thankfully, this recipe doesn’t include a heavy amount of legumes. The brand uses peas and it’s the sixth ingredient listed.

Recall History

Taste of the Wild only has one recall incident on their record. In 2012, several of their dog and cat food recipes were recalled for potential salmonella poisoning. However, this brand has had other cases involving the FDA.

Between January 2014 and April 2019, the FDA received 524 reports of several cats and dogs diagnosed with Dilated Cardiomyopathy (DCM). These dog and cat breeds weren’t predisposed to this condition, so the FDA announced an investigation in 2019 of 16 brands of grain-free dog food linked to this condition.

Taste of the Wild consequently fell on this list since they’re one of the top grain-free pet food recipes. This is still an ongoing investigation to determine whether or not grain-free diets are linked to DCM.

Until we have solidified evidence, it’s best to feed your dog a grain-inclusive diet or switch between a grain-free and grain-inclusive diet.

Taste of the Wild High Prairie Puppy Food Review

Taste of the Wild High Prairie Puppy Food

Taste of the Wild High Protein Puppy Food’s main ingredients are water buffalo, lamb meal, and sweet potato. This recipe contains no artificial colors, flavors, or preservatives, but it does contain GMOs if that’s important to you.

There is chicken fat in this recipe, so dogs with chicken allergies should check with their veterinarian before offering this to their puppy.

Additionally, you can expect about 4 cups per pound of kibble. The kibble is hard and crunchy to help keep your puppy’s teeth clean, but small enough so your puppy can chew properly.

As we mentioned earlier, we love this recipe because it contains DHA, an essential fatty acid for brain development. It is a little pricey, but it’s not the most expensive high-quality dog food on the market.

Ingredients Analysis

Calories per cup breakdown:

What Other Users Are Saying

Let’s take a look at what dog owners are saying about Taste of the Wild High Prairie Puppy Food:

In Conclusion

Ultimately, Taste of the Wild’s High Prairie puppy food is one of the best recipes you can feed your dog. Omega-3 and omega-6 fatty acids, high-quality fat and protein, and species-specific probiotics all work together to help your puppy stay fit and healthy.

Most importantly, the DHA will help your puppy’s brain develop properly. Not every puppy food has this added omega-3 fatty acid, so we love that Taste of the Wild adds it to their food.

Of course, the flavor has a lot to do with this recipe’s success, and puppies go crazy for it. The small kibble is perfect for tiny mouths and will help you keep your puppy’s teeth clean.

We give this puppy food two paws up!

• See also: What Ingredients to Avoid in Dog Food: 6 Additives to Stay Away From