Why we ran this test
Petsmont Buddy Guard has quietly become a go-to organic mushroom powder for dogs. It runs $42.95 a tub, ships fast, and has a loyal base of more than 21,000 pet parents behind it. For a lot of owners worried about a new lump, it is the obvious first try, and honestly, for an organic nine-mushroom blend, I get it.
Then a reader pointed me to Lumiqour Turkey Tail+ Probiotic. It is $49.99 a jar (with a buy-one-get-one offer running), built around a single big 1,000 mg dose of Turkey Tail mushroom plus a billion CFU of live probiotic, and it is bacon-flavored so picky dogs actually eat it. I wanted to know whether the probiotic and the flavor were worth it, or whether a straightforward organic mushroom tub was already good enough for most senior dogs.
So I ran both for three months. Two senior dogs with benign fatty lumps. Scoops measured. Bowls watched. Lumps checked weekly. Here is what I learned.
At a glance: Lumiqour vs. Petsmont Buddy Guard
The two formulas side by side before I get into the day-to-day details.
| Spec | Lumiqour Turkey Tail+ | Petsmont Buddy Guard |
|---|---|---|
| Price | $49.99/jar, Buy 1 Get 1 Free (~$25 effective) | $42.95 per single 60g tub |
| Mushroom Dose | 1,000 mg Turkey Tail, single-mushroom focus | 500 mg total across a 9-mushroom blend |
| Added Probiotic | 1 Billion CFU L. acidophilus per scoop | None, mushrooms only |
| Mushroom Variety | One, Turkey Tail at a meaningful dose | Nine organic mushrooms in the blend |
| Flavor | Bacon flavored, picky-eater approved | Unflavored powder, relies on food |
| Certification | Organic, Non-GMO, vet-formulated | USDA Organic, certified by Oregon Tilth |
| Made For | Dogs of all ages and sizes | A general dog and cat blend |
| Money-Back Guarantee | 90-day results-or-refund guarantee | No money-back guarantee stated |
| Vet Backing | Vet-formulated, named DVMs on record | Organic certified, no clinical citations |
Green marks the better pick in each row.
Formula quality and potency
This is the part I cared about most. Your dog eats this every single day, so the dose and whether they actually absorb it matter more than anything on the label. I weighed scoops, read both ingredient panels, and tracked how each one went down over 90 days.
- A full 1,000 mg of organic Turkey Tail in every scoop, a real working dose rather than a token sprinkle
- A billion CFU of L. acidophilus rides along to help break down the mushroom's tough cell walls
- The whole pitch is probiotic-activated absorption: built to be taken up by the gut, not pass straight through
- Two ingredients only, so your vet can read the entire label in one glance
- Bacon flavor means the dose actually gets eaten instead of left sitting in the bowl
- A 500 mg proprietary blend of nine organic mushrooms, Turkey Tail and Reishi included
- Guarantees 37%+ beta-glucans, which is a genuinely strong spec for a mushroom powder
- No probiotic in the formula, so absorption rides entirely on your dog's own digestion
- Spreading 500 mg across nine mushrooms means a smaller share of each individual one
- Unflavored, so whether it gets eaten comes down to what you can mix it into
Both are real mushroom formulas, so this comes down to focus and absorption. Lumiqour bets everything on one big 1,000 mg Turkey Tail dose plus a probiotic to actually unlock it. Buddy Guard spreads a smaller 500 mg total across nine mushrooms with no probiotic to help the gut use them. If broad-spectrum variety is the goal, Buddy Guard delivers more kinds of mushroom. If you want a meaningful Turkey Tail dose your dog can absorb, Lumiqour's design makes more sense.
What's actually in each scoop
Both lean on organic mushrooms, but how they build the formula is where they split. The ingredient count, the sourcing, and what each one leaves out tell you most of what you need to know.
- Just two ingredients: organic Turkey Tail mushroom and Lactobacillus acidophilus
- No fillers, no synthetic binders, nothing added to pad out the scoop
- Organic Certified, Non-GMO, and formulated with practicing veterinarians
- Turkey Tail is the one mushroom with the deepest research behind it for immune support
- Every jar ships with a free e-guide: monitoring charts and questions to ask your vet
- Bacon-flavored so the scoop disappears into dinner without a fight
- Nine organic mushrooms: Turkey Tail, Shiitake, Reishi, Chaga, Lion's Mane, Maitake, Agaricus Blazei, Cordyceps, Tremella
- USDA Organic and certified by Oregon Tilth, with no fillers or synthetics
- Label leans on fruiting bodies for maximum strength, which is the part that matters in mushrooms
- A wooden measuring spoon is tucked into the tub
- No probiotic and no flavoring, just the straight mushroom blend
- 500 mg total per serving, which is modest once it is split nine ways
This is where Buddy Guard earns real credit. Nine organic mushrooms under a formal USDA Organic seal is a clean, honest label, and the beta-glucan guarantee is a nice touch. Lumiqour keeps it to two ingredients on purpose, betting that one well-dosed mushroom plus a probiotic beats a thinner spread of nine. Both skip the fillers. If a broad mushroom stack is what you want, Buddy Guard is the more complete blend. If you'd rather a focused dose plus the probiotic that helps absorb it, Lumiqour is built for exactly that.
Taste and how the dogs reacted
A supplement your dog won't eat is just expensive powder in the cupboard. I tracked how fast each one got eaten, whether the picky tester balked, and how that held up over the 90 days. Taste is the main reason a daily scoop quietly stops happening.
- Both testers ate it mixed into dinner from day one, no coaxing required
- The bacon flavor is doing real work; even the fussy one licked the bowl clean
- Powder is fine enough that it coats the food instead of settling at the bottom of the bowl
- A quick scoop into dinner and the bacon smell pulled both dogs straight to the bowl
- The smell is meaty rather than mushroomy, which seems to be what won the dogs over
- Mixed into wet food it disappeared fine, no fuss at all
- Once it was stirred into something tasty, both dogs ate it without complaint
- Unflavored, so the first few days were hit or miss until I found the right food to hide it in
- The mushroom smell is mild but noticeable, and a fussy eater will clock it
- On plain kibble alone, one of my dogs left a little behind the first week
Palatability is where the bacon flavor pays off. Lumiqour went down clean from the start, even with my picky tester. Buddy Guard is unflavored, so it leans on whatever you mix it into; in wet food it was a non-issue, but on plain kibble it needed help. If your dog inhales everything, this won't matter to you. If you've got a fussy senior who noses around new smells, the flavored scoop saves you a daily standoff.
Daily use and dosing
This is the routine you actually live with every morning, from getting it into the bowl to keeping it stocked. Both dose by weight, so the real difference is everything that happens around the scoop.
- One to three scoops a day set by your dog’s weight, so the dose scales up for bigger dogs
- The scoop sits right in the jar, so portioning it into dinner takes a couple of seconds
- Thirty servings per jar, about a month for a smaller dog and less for a big one
- The buy-one-get-one offer means you're rarely down to your last scoop
- Reseal the jar and the powder stays dry, no clumping over the month
- The free e-guide includes a simple chart to track the lump week by week
- A 60g tub stretches a long way for a small dog
- Reseal the lid and the powder keeps fine between servings
- Dosing is by weight: a quarter teaspoon per 25 pounds, so a big dog goes through it faster
- The wooden spoon helps, but you're eyeballing fractions of a teaspoon every day
- The powder is fine and a little staticky, so pour slowly to avoid waste
- No flavor to manage, though also nothing there to help a reluctant eater
Both ask you to measure to your dog’s weight, so neither is truly hands-off. Where Lumiqour pulls ahead is everything around the scoop: the bacon flavor means it actually gets eaten, a printed care guide comes in the jar, and the buy-one-get-one offer keeps you from running out. Buddy Guard’s unflavored powder and wooden spoon do the job, but the routine leans more on your dog cooperating at the bowl.
Vet backing and safety
Both brands talk about immune support and lumps in their copy. We pulled apart what each company actually puts behind those promises, and who, if anyone, stands behind the formula.
- Formulated with practicing veterinarians who see fatty lipomas in senior dogs every week
- Built around Turkey Tail and gut-immune research in dogs, framed as wellness support rather than a cure
- Named DVMs on record, with input from veterinary oncology, canine gastroenterology, and orthopedic surgery
- Two simple ingredients at doses a vet can read in one glance, which makes it easy to clear with your own vet
- Positioned to be used alongside regular checkups and monitoring, not as a replacement for veterinary care
- The free e-guide literally includes questions to ask your vet, which I genuinely appreciated
- Carries a real USDA Organic seal certified by Oregon Tilth, a meaningful third-party check on sourcing
- Leans on a 21,000-strong customer base and general mushroom-wellness claims rather than dog-specific studies
- Markets immune support for both dogs and cats, but doesn't name the veterinarians behind the formula
- No clinical citations or named veterinarians on the product page that I could track down
- The safe-for-dogs-and-cats positioning and organic label are reassuring on the safety front
- Mushroom blends like this are generally well tolerated, though there's no published dog trial to point to
Lumiqour is the one that names its vets and frames the claims carefully: support for lumps, not a promise to dissolve them, with the disclaimer that it works alongside your vet rather than instead of one. Buddy Guard's USDA Organic seal is genuinely reassuring on sourcing and safety, but the dog-specific backing is thinner and there are no named veterinarians or citations. If you want a formula you can hand your vet and talk through, Lumiqour gives you more to work with. For a clean organic label you can trust on purity, Buddy Guard holds up.
Guarantee and returns
A money-back guarantee is the cheapest signal you get about how a company sees its own product. The gap between these two is wide.
- A 90-day results-or-your-money-back guarantee, which is a long runway for a daily supplement
- The guarantee is tied to using it daily, so it rewards giving the formula a fair, consistent run
- Returns and refunds go directly through Lumiqour rather than a third-party marketplace
- Free worldwide shipping kicks in on the multi-jar bundles
- Sold through its own store and major marketplaces, so returns follow the retailer's standard policy
- No published results-based money-back guarantee on the product itself
- The organic certification gives you confidence in what's inside, even without a satisfaction guarantee
- If a tub doesn't agree with your dog, you're leaning on the store's return window, not a brand promise
A guarantee tells you how much a company believes its own product. Lumiqour puts a 90-day money-back promise behind the results, which is a real commitment for a supplement you have to use consistently to judge. Buddy Guard doesn't advertise a results guarantee, so you're covered by whatever return policy the store you bought from offers. The organic seal is reassuring on quality, but if you want a no-risk way to test whether it actually helps your dog's lump, the 90-day window is the safer bet.
The real cost of ownership
Buddy Guard’s $42.95 tub is the cheaper sticker, and for a small dog it stretches a long way. Both supplements are dosed by weight, so a bigger dog goes through either one faster. The real lever is Lumiqour’s buy-one-get-one offer, which halves its effective price to around $25 a jar. Here is how a year of daily use compares once you factor that in.
Per serving, Buddy Guard is the cheaper powder, no question. But Lumiqour’s buy-one-get-one offer brings its effective price down to about $25 a jar, which lands it right alongside Buddy Guard over a year of daily use, sometimes a touch under. And every Lumiqour scoop carries double the Turkey Tail plus a probiotic that Buddy Guard does not include. You pay a similar amount for more in each serving.
Price and value
This is the part most buyers skip. Here is exactly what you get at checkout and what a month of daily use actually costs.
- ✅ 1,000 mg of organic Turkey Tail mushroom in every scoop
- ✅ 1 Billion CFU Lactobacillus acidophilus for probiotic-activated absorption
- ✅ Just two ingredients, with no fillers or synthetic binders
- ✅ Bacon flavored, so even picky senior dogs finish their scoop
- ✅ A focused single-mushroom formula, not a thin nine-way blend
- ✅ Organic Certified, Non-GMO, and formulated with veterinarians
- ✅ Buy 1 Get 1 Free brings the effective cost to about $25 a jar
- ✅ Free worldwide shipping on the multi-jar bundles
- ✅ Free e-guide with monitoring charts and vet questions in every order
- ✅ 90-day results-or-your-money-back guarantee
- ✅ 4.8 out of 5 from more than 14,932 reviews
- ✅ Nine organic mushrooms including Turkey Tail, Reishi, and Lion's Mane
- ✅ Guaranteed 37%+ beta-glucans, a strong mushroom spec
- ✅ USDA Organic, certified by Oregon Tilth
- ❌ No probiotic, so absorption relies on your dog's own gut
- ✅ Works for both dogs and cats of all ages
- ❌ Unflavored powder that a picky eater can refuse
- ❌ Dosed by weight, so a large dog runs through a tub quickly
- ✅ Wooden measuring spoon included in the tub
- ✅ No fillers or synthetic ingredients
- ❌ Only 500 mg total mushrooms, split nine ways
- ❌ No results-based money-back guarantee
- Trusted by more than 21,000 pet parents
At checkout the gap is small. Buddy Guard is $42.95, Lumiqour is $49.99 a jar but ships buy-one-get-one, so you’re really paying about $25 a jar. Ounce for ounce Buddy Guard is the cheaper serving, no question. But Lumiqour puts double the Turkey Tail in every scoop, adds the probiotic and the bacon flavor, and the buy-one-get-one offer narrows the price gap. If you only care about the lowest sticker, Buddy Guard wins it. If you want more active mushroom and a probiotic in every serving, Lumiqour is the pick.