Which chew, which benefit?

Cleaning teeth is a mechanical business. A chew only works like a toothbrush if it is hard enough to abrade the tooth and lasts long enough to keep at it, which is why antler, hoof and yak sit at the top of the list and why something swallowed in a minute does nothing at all. One hard chew most days is the habit worth building. The back molars are where tartar starts. None of this replaces brushing, but it is the part your dog will not fight you over.

How long a chew lasts comes down to how dense it is and how much of it there is. Antler and hoof are the hardest things we sell and will keep most dogs busy well past the hour. Pizzle and trachea sit in the middle. Ears and skins are a two-minute pleasure, and there is no shame in that. Size matters as much as type, so a big dog needs the big version of the same chew rather than a different one. Use this filter when you are buying peace and quiet rather than nutrition.

Most reactions are to something added rather than to the meat itself, and most supermarket treats have plenty of additions. A single-ingredient dried chew takes the variables away. If your dog reacts to chicken or beef, which are the usual suspects, move to something it has never met: rabbit, duck, goat, ostrich or fish. Run one protein at a time and give it a fortnight before you decide, because a week is not long enough to tell you anything.

Air-drying takes the water out and leaves the protein behind, so a dried natural chew is a far denser source than anything baked or extruded. Nearly everything we sell qualifies, which tells you more about air-drying than it does about us. For an active dog that is simply good news. For a dog with kidney trouble, or one on a diet the vet set, it is worth a look at the numbers first, which is why crude protein, fat, ash and moisture are printed on every product page rather than kept to ourselves.

These are the leanest, most concentrated things we sell, and they are what to reach for with a working dog, a dog putting condition back on, or a fussy eater who needs persuading that food is interesting. The catch is that a lot of calories arrive in a very small package, so count them as part of the day's food rather than a freebie on top of it.

Fat across our range runs from 0.1% to 37.8%, which is an enormous spread, and it is the one number to look at if your dog needs to lose a bit or has had pancreatitis. Lean chews let you keep the ritual without the calories. And because a chew takes real time to get through, one of these usually satisfies a dog far better than a handful of biscuits inhaled in four seconds.

The real question with any chew is what happens once it has been swallowed. Everything in this group breaks down properly in the gut, which is the main reason people moved away from rawhide in the first place. Tripe and trachea are the standouts, both given to dogs with unreliable stomachs long before anybody thought to market them. Introduce a new chew on its own and give it a couple of days before you add another.

Puppies chew because they are teething and because they are working out what the world is made of. Give them something built for it and your furniture stands a chance. From about four months, softer chews like rabbit ears, fish skins and chicken wings are right. Antler and hoof are not, and will not be until the adult teeth are properly through. Supervise every one, and take it away once it is small enough to swallow whole.

Trachea, tendon, chicken feet and paddywack are connective tissue, and connective tissue is where naturally occurring glucosamine and chondroitin live. We are not going to pretend a chew is a treatment, and a dog with diagnosed arthritis needs a vet rather than a shopping list. But if you are buying chews anyway, choosing the ones made of cartilage costs nothing extra and is a sensible default for an older or a larger dog.

Fish skin is the obvious one: naturally oily, and full of the fatty acids that keep skin supple and a coat glossy. This is a slow benefit and the honest unit is weeks rather than days. Worth the patience for a dog with a dry, flaky or tired-looking coat. As it happens these are among the leanest chews we sell, so it is a benefit you can add without adding weight.

Omega-3 is the fatty acid dogs cannot make for themselves, and it turns up in skin, coat, joints and cognitive function all at once. Oily fish is the best natural source there is. Only a handful of ours carry it in a quantity worth mentioning, which makes this a small collection but a precise one, and an easy addition for a dog already eating fish.

Organ meat is the most nutrient-dense part of any animal, carrying vitamin A, B vitamins, iron and zinc at levels muscle meat never reaches. Only a handful of chews qualify. The claim here is a modest one and it is going to stay modest: a varied diet with some offal in it supports a dog's general health better than a monotonous one, and that is as far as anybody honest will take it.

Two things are going on here. Nutritionally, the omega fats in fish and the nutrients in organ meat are the ones associated with cognitive function, which matters most at both ends of a dog's life. Behaviourally, chewing is self-soothing and lowers arousal, which is why a chew is such a useful thing to hand over before the fireworks start rather than after.

This is the smallest collection on the site and the one to be most careful about. Every chew here keeps its fur, and the theory is an old one: the hair passes through undigested and takes passengers out with it. It is a pleasant enough thing to give a dog and there is no harm in it. It is not a wormer. If you think your dog has worms, your vet has something that actually works, and these sit alongside it rather than instead of it.