Review: Omega Treats

Every so often, a company will contact me through my blog to ask me to review a product that they make or market. This is done for two reasons - One, to get honest feedback from someone who is not affiliated with their company, and, Two, to spread word about their product to other pet owners. Let's face it - these days, blogs are as commonly used as a source of information as television and newspapers.

A little while ago, I was contacted by Fucini Productions, a company that does marketing for pet supply manufacturers, and asked whether I would be interested in reviewing Omega Treats. From the description and ingredients list, they sounded like the kind of treats that I would buy for my dogs, so I was happy to give them a try.


Product Name
Pet Botanics Omega Treats

Manufacturer
Cardinal Pet

Price
$4.99 (resealable 3 oz. bag)


What it Promises

From Fucini Productions' email: "Omega Treats are different from other dog treats on the market - they are a layered, hand-rolled dog snack that has the look, aroma and great taste of sushi, and are made from high-quality, all-natural, human-grade ingredients, free from ingredients typically found in pet food, like by-products and fillers, wheat, soybean, BHA, BHT, glutens and artificial colors.

Each treat has just 9 calories and 8 ingredients that you might find in your own diet, including codfish, real poultry or fish, sweet potato, and vitamin E. They're also loaded with Omega 3 and 6 fatty acids, which are important for cardiovascular and joint health, and have a wealth of anti-oxidants, protein, vitamins and minerals.

Best of all, dogs just love Omega Treats - as soon as they catch a whiff of the fish, they're more excited than I've ever seen them to be at the prospect of a treat. Plus, since Omega Treats are healthy and low in calories, you don't have to worry about overfeeding or using as a training reward."


Ingredients

Omega Treats are available in four distinct flavors: chicken, duck, tuna and salmon. Because both of my girls are on a fish-based diet, Taste of the Wild Pacific Stream, and duck tends to cause tummy problems in dogs with sensitive digestive systems (duck being very "rich"), we opted to try the tuna and salmon flavor for our review.

Tuna Flavor
tuna, sweet potatoes, cod, cane sugar, glycerin, salt, potassium sorbate, mixed tocopherols (vitamin e).

Salmon Flavor
salmon, sweet potatoes, cod, cane sugar, glycerin, salt, potassium sorbate, mixed tocopherols (vitamin e).


Packaging

Omega Treats are sold in fully resealable, foil-lined pouches - which is a great idea because the ability to reseal the pouch keeps the treats fresh and moist, and the foil-lined packaging keeps little dog noses away from the product when it's closed, since it also seals in most of the smell.


Size

As far as size is concerned, the treats are slightly larger than the top part of my thumb, which makes them fairly compact and a good size for an occasional reward for my two large dogs.


However, if I were to use these treats as my primary training treats, I would probably cut them into two or three pieces, because they are much too large for use in training. This is especially the case if you have small dogs, such as Shelties, or even smaller dogs, such as Chihuahuas, but it's also true for my two dogs, a German Shepherd and a Belgian Malinois.

Remember that a training treat should be tiny, tiny, tiny - just enough for a taste and to entice the dog to "want more". They should never require the dog to chew the treat. Something that is the size of my small fingernail - or even smaller! - would be an ideal training treat.

Unfortunately for the Omega Treats, they can't be easily broken or crumbled into smaller parts during training (and definitely not with one hand), so they would require extra time spent cutting them into tiny pieces prior to training sessions would I want to use them as my primary training food reward.


Performance

I will have to disagree with Fucini Productions that the treats "look and smell" like sushi, but I have to agree that dogs go gaga over them as soon as they catch a whiff of the fish smell!

Once I opened the first bag and set it down to take the photo at the top of the review, little dog noses began popping up to my left and right to check out the delectable smell they had detected. Out of the two flavors we tested, the salmon flavor has the strongest smell, which did not just attract my dogs, but my cats as well. The tuna, on the other hand, has a much milder smell.

The taste also met with thorough approval from my two test subjects, who were more than happy to run through their entire repertoire of tricks in hopes that one of them may be sufficient for a treat reward. Although they're generally enthusiastic about training treats (and training in general), the Omega Treats took that enthusiasm to a whole new level of butt-quivering, hovering and drooling!

If dogs could shout "Gimme! Gimme! Gimme!", they would have.



The Verdict

It's paws up for Omega Treats from both Abby and Ronja who loved the smell and definitely loved the taste.

I am also giving the product two thumbs up, although I would very much like to see cane sugar removed from the list of ingredients. Sugars of any kind are not necessarily a needed ingredient in pet foods and can, if fed in large amounts, contribute to all sorts of issues, including tooth decay and hyperglycemia. Of course, if these treats are used primarily for training or the occasional reward, and given in metered amounts, it's unlikely to be an issue.