How To Get The Most Value Out Of Your Dog Chew

If your dog is a power chewer, the costs of keeping them entertained can add up. While we try to provide affordable dog chews, it’s still important to get the most bang for your buck. Here are some tips to get the most use and the best experience from your dog chews.

Limit Chew Sessions

Instead of letting your dog chew for hours at a time, consider providing a chew for 15-30 minutes. This will help them get the calming dopamine and serotonin that relaxes them, while also extending the life of the chew. Not every chew works exactly the same, but Ugly Chew’s hide rolls soften as the dog chews on them. If you take the chew away for a few hours between sessions, it will reharden, which will make it last much longer.

There are a lot of benefits to limited chew sessions beyond just the life of the chew. It makes it easier for you to monitor your dog, which makes chewing safer. Every chew comes with some amount of choking risk, so it’s important to keep an eye on your dog while they’re chewing. That’s easier to do over short sessions. Chew sessions also increase the net benefit for your dog. Dogs get a lot of emotional benefits from chewing, but they don’t need to chew a lot to get them. Usually, 30 minutes of chewing is enough to calm most dogs down and leave them chill and relaxed. They may keep chewing after that, but they aren’t getting as much of the benefit. Think of it like having a cookie. If you eat a cookie, you really enjoy it. You probably enjoy a second cookie. By the seventh cookie, you probably aren’t enjoying the cookie near as much as the first one. It would be better to have one or two cookies, then save the rest for later when you’ll enjoy them more.

If you want to get the most value from your chews, do multiple short chew sessions, not one long one. We often hear from our customers that one Ugly Chew will last their dog several days when spaced out across a few chew sessions per day.

Understand Your Dog’s Emotional State

As we just mentioned, chewing provides anxiety relief for your dog. It’s a destresser that changes their brain chemistry. One Ugly Chews customer described his first experience giving his dog one of our chews. He said she chewed on it for a few minutes, but then just kind of cuddled it for a while. That was just before they left town on a big trip. He gave her the chew again after the long weekend spent with family, toddlers, and other dogs, and she went nuts and chewed it like crazy. This is a great example of the role emotions play in chewing. Think of a chew like your comfort food, caffeine, alcohol, or even some recreational drug. Humans use a lot of coping mechanisms to deal with stress. You may turn to any of those mechanisms when you’re having a hard time. You may like a glass of wine with dinner on many nights, but after a particularly hard day, you may want more than one glass. Your dog is the same way. Most days they’ll enjoy something to chew on for a bit. But when they are stressed, anxious, or have been cooped up, they will really be looking for an outlet. And the dopamine and serotonin that comes from chewing make a huge difference.

Get A Properly Sized Chew

It’s very tempting to fall into the trap of buying a smaller chew for your dog. Maybe it’s because you don’t want them to chew too much. Maybe it’s because smaller chews are cheaper. Regardless of your reason, always make sure that the chew you purchase is appropriately sized for your dog. When in doubt, err on the side of a larger chew. Chews that are too small can increase the risk of choking. If the dog can fit the entire chew in their mouth, they are more likely to choke. The smaller the chew, the sooner it reaches this “high choke risk” size.

In addition to safety, smaller chews simply don’t last as long, especially for larger dogs. You’ll get fewer sessions out of them, if you get multiple sessions at all.

Always Monitor Your Dog

You know your dog. You know how they work. Online advice can only go so far. Keep an eye on them and see how they do with any chew that you give them. You’ll find horror stories for almost every type of chew out there, but most of those horror stories happen because people were careless. Keep an eye on your dog.

Puppy loves them!

My Shiba Inu puppy is super picky when it comes to chews, but she seems to really enjoy these! I received a sample pack of chips, chunks, and scraps and she loves them! It also came with way more pieces that I had expected for such a great price! It feels super great to support a small business as well. Thank you for making such great chews that my pup enjoys!

Awesome Collar

I bought the Turquoise and Grey collar for my American Bully nearly one year ago and even with daily wear it still looks new. Quality is excellent.

So smelly but so good!

My dogs LOVED these. They are both super chewer pitties and these were awesome for them. As they get all slobbery, the smell is awful but normal and my dog’s love stinky things so it was all good. I just moved them out onto the porch for chewing sessions. Will be ordering more! Thanks!

George loves them!

My 8 month old is happily chewing his ugly chew as I write this. I’ll be ordering more!

Love the chips

The chips and pieces are perfect for my little dogs.

Best chews!

My retriever loves the hair on rolls! The shipping was quick, they fit perfectly into his JW ball & chew-holders, they also last for days! Definitely some of my favorite chews to give!

Not a good purchase for my crew

I wanted to like these- I bought the largest rolls as well as a few other varieties for my pack of dogs who range from 10-50lbs. I over-estimated how tough these were after reading other reviews- my two middle-aged bigger dogs ate the entire rolls within 20 minutes. Thankfully they digested them ok, but not an experience I anticipated nor was happy about. My smaller dogs found the pieces too thick to chew on so they lost interest quickly. Now I have a bunch of pieces that are too dangerous for my big dogs and my small dogs won’t touch. I regret purchasing such a large order. Lesson learned for me.

These are probably most suitable for gentle big dog chewers or strong smaller dogs.

My senior dog loves these!

I have an 11 year old American pitbull terrier. We used to get him cow hide when he was younger and he loved it, but the person we got it from stopped selling it. I recently saw an ad on Instagram for these and decided to try it. My dog literally expects his chew after dinner every evening. We give it to him for about 30 min - 1hr.
We got the large and one crew last him about 1 month (he has 4 missing molars on one side). Once the hide gets soft, its very easy for him to chew. We recently got the thin chews and those ones will not last as long, but he loves them all the same. Make sure to let them dry between chewing so they last longer.

Aussie-tastic!

My working bred Aussies enjoy down time in the evenings and Ugly Chews are a huge hit!

I found it in the mailbox

My dog loves it ,!

Hair on hide

Our lab LOVES the hair-on-hide rolls. He is a big chewer and the rolls provide comfort and eliminate his need to chew.

My four dogs love the scraps!

I tried these scraps because the dogs already love the full size chews - and these were a hit! They were a variety of sizes and each one was finished with zest!

6 months still going strong!

That’s right SIX MONTHS!!! And our super chewer hasn’t even put a dent in these bad boys! This is her all time favorite chew as well as her fav toy. She has to have it with her at all times. Love these! No odor, love that they don’t waste the animal and afordable! Honestly feel like we will still have the original ones in a year, it’s wild how long they are lasting!!

My older dog’s new favorite!

My dog loves these! In her frosted face years she has slowed down and doesn’t find the rolls as appetizing. Dave helped me figure out what was right for my dog and she is happily chewing away once again. Thank you so much will certainly be ordering more when she has finished these.

The dogs love these!

My four Aussies love Ugly Chews - and so do I! They digest well and last much longer than other chews. We moved into a subscription because they love them that much.

Dogs love them!

I think they’re great! But they do kind of stink…. It’s ok. It’s better than the bully sticks!

Rocko approves 🐾🐾🐾

We received our package today! Missing a chew in the bag, customer service was absolutely excellent! Emailed me back within mins! You have gained a customer for life! Here’s the baby Rocko with his! The other ones were busy napping, he had this 2x today and loves it, now he’s hording it in his crate lol!

Absolutely love!

My boy absolutely loves these, he forgets to breathe when chewing on them :D

They’re a hit!!

Colt loves these chews. I think he could smell them and knew whatever was in the package was for him. It lasted about 15 minutes. I will for sure be buying them again!

15 week old Malinios

Puppy enjoying it so far.

Great, but smaller then imagined

My dog looooves the large 12 inch hide chews. It's cheaper then the natural raw hides I got from Raw feeding miami, I just wish they were as thick as the ones I get from RDM, just cause my big boy has a very strong jaw and can go through one pretty fast. But still just bought more because my dog loves them!

Great healthy treats

My pups can't get enough of the chews. As soon as they pick up it's scent they are beyond excited. I love that they love them and they're good for them as well.

Yum yum yum

The chew was absolutely delicious and lasted our corgi multiple chewing sessions. Definitely will be repurchasing!!

Great

Dogs love your chews- always fast delivery, products I can trust!

The highlight of my dog’s day

There’s nothing more exciting for these guys than some new ugly chews! I have two big lab mixes who are super chewers, these last quite a few chew sessions, and I feel good about the benefits to their teeth and digestive systems! We are forever customers.