Treats should make up no more than 10 percent of the day's calories
The most important rule before you choose treats is about quantity, not flavour. The widely held recommendation among vets is that treats and snacks should make up at most around 10 percent of a dog's total daily calorie intake. The rest should come from a complete food that is formulated to cover all nutritional needs. The reason is that treats are rarely nutritionally complete: if you give too many, you dilute the balanced diet, and over time this can lead to both being overweight and to deficiencies.
In practice, this means the number depends entirely on the size of the dog and on how calorie-dense the individual treat is. A small five-kilo terrier can afford far fewer calories from snacks than a thirty-kilo Labrador. A rule of thumb is therefore: the smaller the dog, the fewer and the smaller the treats. For training, where many rewards are handed out in a short time, it is better to break the treats into small pieces than to give them whole. If you want to read more about how to work it out for your particular dog, we have a rundown of how many treats a dog is allowed.
How to read the ingredient list on a bag of treats
A treat is not automatically healthy just because your dog loves it. Look at the ingredient list in the same way you would with your dog's daily food. Meat or fish should be high up and preferably named, that is "salmon" or "beef" rather than unspecified "meat and animal by-products". If there is added sugar, artificial colouring or a long list of E-numbers you cannot make sense of, it is a sign of a product where taste and appearance have been prioritised over content.
At Essential Foods, the treats are built on the same principle as the meals: named ingredients and no unnecessary additives. Ranges such as the finest range consist of recognisable pieces of meat and fish, for example FINEST SLICED LAMB & BLACKBERRY and FINEST SALMON & PARSLEY SMALL SAUSAGES, where you can see what you are giving. If your dog is sensitive to grains, you can stick to grain-free and to the grain-free treats in grain free treats.
Training treats should be small, soft and quick to eat
Training calls for entirely different requirements than a treat enjoyed on the sofa. A good training treat is small, soft and can be swallowed in an instant, so the dog is ready for the next exercise straight away and does not have to stand and chew for half a minute. Timing is everything in learning, and a treat that takes a long time to eat ruins the precise link between the desired behaviour and the reward.
That is why it makes sense to keep training snacks separate from the rest. In training treats you will find treats in a format designed for exactly this, and small crackers such as LAKE & SEA TINY CRACKERS and FARM & FIELDS TINY CRACKERS are well suited because they are small enough for many repetitions. If you have a small dog, you can also look at for small dogs, where the format better suits a small mouth.
Treats with dental care can reduce plaque
Some treats are developed for more than just reward. Chew treats, where the dog has to work to get them down, can help mechanically scrape plaque off the teeth while it chews. The effect depends on the treat actually requiring chewing over a little time, and it does not replace tooth brushing, but it can be a useful supplement, especially for dogs that are difficult to brush.
Essential Foods gathers this type in the dental range, where you will find products such as GRAIN-FREE CLASSIC DENTAL DELIGHTS and COLLAGEN & CURCUMA TEETH DELIGHTS. If you want to give your dog something that keeps it occupied for longer, you can look at long chewing time. Note that heavy chew treats are often more calorie-dense, so they count correspondingly more towards the day's ten percent.
Puppies can have treats, but the quantity and type must be adjusted
Puppies are allowed to have treats, and rewarding with something tasty is a fixed part of early training. But a puppy is smaller and has a developing stomach, so both the quantity and the type must be kept down. Stick to small, soft treats without hard pieces that are difficult to chew for a young set of teeth, and give fewer of them than you would to an adult dog of the same expected size.
If you are in doubt about when you can start and what is appropriate, we have gathered it in the articles about when puppies are allowed treats and what puppies are allowed as treats. For the smallest ones, you can also look at mini delights, where the format is adapted to small mouths.
Fish, beef, game or poultry: how to choose the protein source
The protein source in the treat is worth thinking about, both for the sake of taste and tolerance. If your dog has reacted to certain ingredients, it can be an advantage to choose a treat with a single, more unusual protein source such as game or rabbit, rather than the most common ones. Variety across the week is also a simple way to make the reward more interesting for the dog.
The selection covers most flavours. Fish lovers can have SMALL COD FISH DELIGHTS and the chewy NORTH SEA CHEWY FISH DELIGHTS, while DUCK SENSATIONS and RABBIT & ROSEMARY SENSATIONS offer poultry and game. For beef you can look at BEEF DELIGHTS. You will find all the treats gathered under treats.
Treats for overweight dogs or dogs with a sensitive stomach
If your dog needs to lose weight or maintain its weight, treats do not have to be completely off the table, but they should be chosen with a low fat content and given in smaller quantities. Low-fat treats make it easier to reward without blowing the calorie budget, and they are gathered under low fat content. If the dog is genuinely sensitive in the stomach, it can pay off to stick to few, simple ingredients and avoid fatty, rich treats.
For dogs that react to certain ingredients, allergy-friendly is a good place to start, and if your dog has a sensitive stomach in general, you can read more about feeding in our article about a dog with a sensitive stomach. Whatever the case, a new treat should be introduced in small quantities so you can see how the dog tolerates it before you make it a fixed part of everyday life.
