Beef Jerky for Dogs

Beef jerky for dogs is dried beef made without the salt, pepper and marinade that people jerky carries, and that difference decides most of what is worth knowing. The rest is shape and thickness: strips, sticks or chips, thin enough to train with or thick enough to last through a car ride.

People jerky and dog jerky are different foods

Start with one number. USDA FoodData Central lists beef jerky, chopped and formed, at about 1,780 milligrams of sodium per 100 grams. Worked out from that USDA figure, a 30 gram piece of people jerky holds a little over 530 milligrams of sodium. For comparison, the same USDA database lists raw beef heart, an unseasoned meat, at about 98 milligrams of sodium per 100 grams.

Drying explains part of the gap. Taking water out leaves the same salt in less weight, so a dried strip is saltier per gram than the wet meat it started as, before anyone adds a marinade. People jerky is then built around the marinade: soy, sugar, pepper, smoke, sometimes onion or garlic powder. Dog jerky skips all of it and is dried beef and little else. You will find the strips gathered in jerky dog treats.

That is why the front of the bag matters less than the back.

Salt, pepper and marinade on a label

Turn the bag over and read the ingredient panel from the top. FDA says ingredients on a pet food label are listed by weight, heaviest first, so beef should lead and nothing sweet or saucy should follow it closely. A dog jerky can be beef and a short, plain list. When the panel reads like a kitchen cabinet, you are holding people jerky with a dog photo on the bag.

Two things deserve a second look. The first is onion powder and garlic powder: the Merck Veterinary Manual reports dogs affected by raw, cooked, dehydrated and granulated onion and garlic, and ties poisoning most often to concentrated forms such as powders, which is reason enough to leave a jerky on the shelf if its panel names either one. The second is the word jerky itself, which names a method of drying and says nothing at all about the seasoning.

Many bags also print a guaranteed analysis box with a maximum for moisture. The lower that maximum, the drier the strip is meant to be. Pepper is the line that catches the eye. The sodium line is the one with arithmetic behind it.

Strips, sticks and chips

Thin strips, about the width of two fingers, tear in your hand into training pieces. Thick sticks, closer to a pencil in diameter, are a chew: a dog pins one between the front paws and works at it for a good while. Chips and small squares arrive already cut to training size and will happily empty into the bottom of a coat pocket.

Here is the trade off, plainly: thick jerky lasts and thin jerky trains. A thick stick used for a recall exercise ends the session after one reward, and a thin strip handed over as an evening chew is gone before you have sat back down. Pick the shape for the job first, then check the size against your dog.

Weigh before you buy, if you can. A bag that says 4 ounces holds the same weight whether it is 40 thin strips or eight thick sticks, and the count decides how many rewards you get out of it. Thin strips cut into pea size pieces stretch a long way, while a stick is one reward and then it is gone.

Hold a piece beside your dog's muzzle. If the whole piece would vanish in one go, it is a training piece. If the dog has to turn it over and work at it, it is a chew, and you should stay in the room while it does.

Cutting jerky for a small dog

Kitchen shears beat a knife for this. Dried jerky slides across a board and a knife skids on it, while shears bite straight through a strip held over a plate. Snip pieces about the size of a pea for a small dog, a little larger for a medium one, and cut a handful ahead of time into a lidded jar so the walk does not start with scissors.

Keep one pair of shears for treats only, and wash it with warm soapy water after each use. The handling advice in our raw feeding notice says to wash any bowl, scoop or surface a treat has touched, and a pair of shears counts.

A cutting board with a lip, a jar with a lid and a pair of shears kept for treats is the whole kit. For a very small dog, cut each piece twice, once across and once along, so that it has to be chewed once or twice before it goes down. Thick sticks stay whole. There is nothing to cut, only a dog to watch.

Beef jerky next to freeze dried beef

Freeze dried beef is a different texture altogether. Jerky bends and tears, and a freeze dried piece is light, dry and breaks with a crumble. Both are beef, and the beef dog treats collection holds the other ways to give the same animal.

The cleanest comparison is the ingredient panel. A bag of freeze dried beef heart lists one ingredient, and a bag of jerky strips lists beef and whatever else the maker used. Put the two side by side and read down both. The shorter list is the plainer treat, and the longer one is not wrong, only different.

Sniff and Shift freeze dries beef heart in small batches in Malvern, a single ingredient made from beef from Pennsylvania farms, and it is the house beef option beside the jerky; the piece to read next is beef heart for dogs.

Choose by the job. Thin jerky strips go in the pocket for the walk, a thick stick waits for the evening, and a bag of freeze dried cubes lives in the pouch by the door. Whichever you buy, the panel on the back tells you whether it is beef or a marinade with some beef in it, and reading that panel is a 30 second job you only need to do once per product.

Common questions

Can I give my dog the jerky I buy for myself?

Jerky made for people is built around salt and seasoning, and the USDA sodium figure for people jerky is the reason to read the panel before you share. If the ingredients name onion powder or garlic powder, leave it out. A short, unseasoned dog jerky is the better match.

How many pieces of jerky make a dog treat?

Count by size rather than number: pieces about the size of a pea for training, a single strip for an occasional chew. VCA Hospitals advises keeping treats to a small share of the day's calories, so a dog that gets jerky at noon can have a little less at dinner. A licensed professional who cares for your dog can give a figure for one dog.

What is the difference between jerky and freeze dried beef?

Jerky is dried until it is tough and bends in your hand. Freeze dried beef is frozen and then dried under vacuum until it is light and crisp, and it breaks rather than bends. Either one is only what the ingredient panel says it is, so read the panel.

How should I store opened dog jerky?

Keep it sealed in its bag or in a lidded jar, away from heat and damp air. Thin strips go soft or leathery in a humid kitchen sooner than thick sticks do. Follow the storage line printed on the bag.