Plastic, Ceramic Or Metal Bowls

[Skruffy n Flea]

i've used all three including melamine and now it's plastic for food and metal for water...

lately i've read that plastic food bowls aren't necessarily healthy for our pets because the 'whatevers' leach out of the plastic and into the food [in this house, food doesn't sit in the bowl very long] but upstairs i do have a plastic type bowl for water [while those downstairs are metal].

what do you use and what's the theory behind your choice?

is there a valid argument for one material over another?

tia :)

[pipsqueak]

Metal - easy to clean. Plastic gives one of our dogs "pimples" around his mouth.

[Staffyluv]

I have ceramic bowls.

2 food bowls, one for wet and one for dry (or if we have foster dogs, they just get one each)

1 large one for water. It seems to keep the water cooler in summer.

[HazyWal]

For food bowls Stan has a plastic "scoff stopper" and Maddie has metal.Water bowl is the ceramic bowl from a crockpot.Get them at the op-shop for a couple of bucks and they are the best water bowl I've had.Too heavy to knock over,easy to clean and keeps water cool in summer.

[Tilly]

I find plastic get little scratches and becomes hard to clean ... and it is easierly chewed.

We use a heavy duty metal dish. I had a ceramic water bowl but now have a concrete molded one that i brought from a garden shop ... it looks likea half barrel.

Edited May 25, 2012 by Tilly

[Nevafollo]

Metal! I think my guys would eat a plastic bowl and I dont trust them not to break a ceramic bowl :laugh:

[Gretel]

Mine have stainless steel. We've had plastic but they get chewed. I have a couple of ceramic ones that I sometimes use as extra water bowls but I manage to drop them and they don't bounce too well :laugh:

[espinay2]

Stainless steel mostly for food. They last. I have bowls 20 years old and more that still look almost as good as the day I bought them. They are easy to clean and don't damage easily.

I also have a few old enamel dishes (like the stuff in camping stores) - old as the hills (maybe 40 or 50 years? - given to me years ago by my Grandmother) and still going strong!

I don't like plastic for food dishes as it doesnt last and isnt as easy to clean. I don't like ceramic as they tend to be heavy and can break (and if you have problem handls like mine, and multiple bowls to juggle - they are definitely not practical!)

For water - inside I do use a plastic bowl because I use a 'Road Refresher' (which has prevented a LOT of water being put all over the floor). I wish it wasn't plastic, but it was a compromise (benefits outweight my objection to what it is made of!)

For outside water I have stainless steel buckets near the taps, and in the runs I use large glazed pottery water pots (from garden centres) as they are heavy, can't be tipped over, hold lots and keep the water cool. They are easy to clean out and refill with a hose or bucket.

Edited May 25, 2012 by espinay2

[Jumabaar]

I found steel took the fur off my dogs noses. I tried ceramic but multiple kelpies...... lets just say RIP bowls.

I have now found very heavy bowls and with the exception of two that have been trashed the others have all remained in good condition. I do chuck them in the dishwasher regularly and they come out sparkly clean :D

I have big ceramic water bowls that the dogs can't knock over. I bought proper pet ones so that I knew they didn't have any metals in the glaze that could cause problems.

[Esky the husky]

I've got plastic for food, food doesn't stay in the bowl long enough anyway, it's raw so she just drags it out and chews it.

With solid chunks of meat I won't even bother with a bowl half the time.

Water goes in a metal bowl, outside it's in a bucket.

I've always got 2 plastic bowls in the car too, for camping and racing. Don't give a damn if the get left behind, broken or run over since they're cheap.

[trinabean]

Metal - easy to clean. Plastic gives one of our dogs "pimples" around his mouth.

Funny you should say that. I recently ditched a plastic food dish and replaced it with a heavy-duty stoneware one. My dog was getting a lot of pimples around his muzzle but they've cleared up. :)

[Guest english.ivy]

BPA free plastic bowls for food; food and bowls are kept in the carport away from dogs so I don't have to worry about chewing.

Cat food is fed from ceramic, though I'm good at breaking those.

[Crisovar]

Stainless steel for dogs and cats here, like Espinay some of ours are very old but still in excellent condition. Easy to clean and unbreakable.

[wuffles]

Food bowls are metal because they last forever and are easy to clean.

Outside water bowl is ceramic because they like to dig in their water and the heavier, the better to avoid it being tipped over.

[dotdashdot]

Had a metal bowl for Cleo, until I found a beautiful ceramic Fuzzyard one (it has dots, like her!)

I prefer the practical-ness of the metal, I can drop it no problem, etc but it doesn't look as nice as my ceramic one! (and she can't push the ceramic one around, the metal one gets pushed around and that noise bugs me)

The water bowl is a huge ceramic pot, but the one in our house is a Petsafe Water thing....has a plastic reservoir but the part they drink from is metal.

[Dxenion]

Metal bowls for food and a stainless steel one for their water. Easy to clean, more light weight and durable than ceramic and more chewproof than plastic.

[Zug Zug]

Heavy ceramic - because it stays put

[zeebie]

I have an 8 litre large bottle water dispenser which drip feeds into plastic (BPA free) attached bowl, Both dogs have ceramic based with s/s metal insert bowls which keeps them stay put, remove easy to clean and holder bowls can also be used for water or other food if needed. apart from the chewing (which I have never had a problem with)I find the metal bowls more hygenic and food does not stick to bowl if there are any left overs. Pink for the girl blue for the boy and both know exactly which bowl belongs to who :laugh: In the crates I use the kennel mate bowls which are great because if you have the base plates on other crates or pen etc the bowls can be interchanged, also use these on airline crate (BPA free).

When I was growing up dogs drank water from any available source usually sheep trough, creek, mud puddles around property and no harm came out of it that I recall, they even got dipped with the sheep to keep them tick and flea free - no fancy products back then, and no fancy food/water containers either. The food was scraps from the table and odd fresh meat if a roo was killed and it was tossed out on the shed floor, strangely enough our working dogs lived a long and productive life.

[Guest Clover]

Stainless steel for food and ceramic and buckets for water.

[halfthewords]

We quickly learned our lesson about ceramic food bowls here. :laugh: Jag has a habit of jumping up onto the TV cabinet where they're kept; he's broken 3 already. So we use plastic. We have a ceramic water bowl and one plastic one.