Repost: Healthy food makes a healthy pet

Things are a little crazy in Lisa Land right now. I have an important meeting at work tomorrow night that I am preparing for and a few tests to study for.

I thought a little reposting was in order since I have NO TIME today. Also, I have some new readers and some of you might not have read this informative post.

I saw a segment on Good Morning America this morning about obese pets and how it’s an epidemic in our country. Shocker, I know. It reminded me of a post I did last year about what should be in your pets food. I know many of us our animal lovers and our pets health is important to us. However, a large majority of us aren’t feeding our pets what we should be feeding them. We pride ourselves on what we put into our bodies, so why not try and do the same for our fur babies?

If you look at the bag of dog or cat food, you’d think there were bountiful amounts of lean meats, grains, fruits, and vegetables. That’s not QUITE the case though.

Unfortunately, pet food provides a convenient way for slaughterhouse offal, grains considered “unfit for human consumption,” and similar waste products to be turned into profit. This waste includes intestines, udders, heads, hooves, and possibly diseased and cancerous animal parts.

The Pet Food Industry is much like our meat industry today. The pet food market has been dominated in the last few years by the acquisition of big companies by even bigger companies.

• Nestlé’s bought Purina to form Nestlé Purina Petcare Company (Fancy Feast, Alpo, Friskies, Mighty Dog, Dog Chow, Cat Chow, Puppy Chow, Kitten Chow, Beneful, One, ProPlan, DeliCat, HiPro, Kit’n’Kaboodle, Tender Vittles, Purina Veterinary Diets).
• Del Monte gobbled up Heinz (MeowMix, Gravy Train, Kibbles ’n Bits, Wagwells, 9Lives, Cycle, Skippy, Nature’s Recipe, and pet treats Milk Bone, Pup-Peroni, Snausages, Pounce).
• MasterFoods owns Mars, Inc., which consumed Royal Canin (Pedigree, Waltham’s, Cesar, Sheba, Temptations, Goodlife Recipe, Sensible Choice, Excel).

Private labelers (who make food for “house” brands like Kroger and Wal-Mart) and co-packers (who produce food for other pet food makers) are also major players. Three major companies are Doane Pet Care, Diamond, and Menu Foods; they produce food for dozens of private label and brand names. Interestingly, all 3 of these companies have been involved in pet food recalls that sickened or killed many pets.

With all the by-products and additives added to pet food, you might wonder what you should actually be looking for in your pet’s food.

What to look for:

• No Generic Fats or Proteins: e.g., animal fat or meat meal) — instead, look for named sources such as beef fat, chicken fat or lamb meal (the generic term indicates a mixture coming from a number of sources, a sign of a very poor quality food). Never feed a food that uses the generic ingredients “meat meal”, “meat and bone meal”, or “animal fat”.
• Human grade ingredients (USDA approved). This item is somewhat controversial, as dog foods by law cannot be labeled human grade, but look for companies that use human grade meats (not meats that were rejected by the human food industry). For even higher quality, look for hormone- and antibiotic-free meats, especially those that are free-range or pasture-raised (note that all poultry is hormone-free, as it is against regulations to give hormones to poultry).
• Avoid foods that use corn gluten meal, a cheap waste product from the human food industry that provides incomplete protein for your animal.  This ingredient is one of the hallmarks of poor quality foods.Wheat gluten meal, one of the ingredients that caused illness and death due to contamination in the recent Menu Foods recall, is similar — a cheap source of poor quality protein used primarily by the lower-quality foods. Rice protein concentrate, which was also involved in the pet food recalls, is a little better quality than the other two, but still provides incomplete plant protein rather than the more desirable animal protein. Soy protein has the same problem.
• No meat by-products or digest (meal is OK). There is some disagreement whether whole meat is preferable to meal. Meal has been rendered, but it is also dried, so if a meal is listed as the first ingredient, there is greater likelihood that the food contains more meat than grains. When whole meats such as chicken, lamb, turkey, etc. are listed as the first ingredient, there may actually be much less meat due to the weight of the moisture in the meat. Both whole meats and meals are considered acceptable as long as they are identified and not generic (e.g., not ”meat meal” or “meat and bone meal”). By-products may be OK if the company specifies that they are human-grade organs such as liver and kidney, but otherwise they usually signify parts not considered fit for human consumption.
• No BHA, BHT or Ethoxyquin (artificial preservatives), another sign of a low quality food. Ethoxyquin is banned from use in foods for human consumption except for the use of very small quantities as a color preservative for spices. Note that ethoxyquin is used to preserve fish meal, which will not be disclosed on the dog food label since it is added before the fish meal reaches the manufacturing plant. In general, unless the manufacturer provides a statement on their web site that the fish meal in their food does not contain ethoxyquin, you can assume that is does. Contact the manufacturer if you are unsure.
• No artificial colors, no sugars and sweeteners (such as corn syrup, sucrose, ammoniated glycyrrhizin), no propylene glycol (added to some chewy foods to keep them moist, toxic in large amounts).
• As few grains as possible (a whole-meat source should be one of the first two ingredients, preferably two of the top three) — watch for splitting, such as listing ground yellow corn and corn gluten meal as separate ingredients which together might add up to more than the first ingredient. Note that canned foods often have fewer grains than dry.
• Added taurine. Taurine was added to cat foods in the 70′s when cats began going blind and dying due to taurine deficiency. Taurine is thought not to be an “essential” amino acid in dogs because they can convert carnitine to taurine. However, links are now being found between problems such as dilated cardiomyopathy and taurine deficiencies. Some dog food companies have begun adding taurine to their foods, and this is probably a good idea. Taurine is affected by heat, so there would not usually be enough natural taurine in processed dog foods, though foods that have a lot of meat will have more natural taurine.

It is better for your pet to get a variety of foods, rather than just one food for its whole life. Feeding different commercial diets can help fill in nutritional gaps that a particular food or brand might have, as well as making it less likely that your dog will develop food allergies.

Rather than trying to find a single, “best” food, I recommend that you choose at least two or three different brands, using different protein sources, and rotate between them, anywhere from a daily basis to every few months. Variety is always better than feeding any single food, as it helps to guarantee that all of your dogs’ nutritional needs are met and is more interesting for your animal.

In addition, try adding some fresh foods to the diet, no matter what you feed, including eggs and meat (raw or cooked), canned fish with bones (jack mackerel, pink salmon, sardines), dairy (yogurt, kefir, cottage cheese) and healthy leftovers (see Adding Fresh Foods for more info). This can be used to improve the quality of whatever diet you feed.

When you feed the same food continuously for a month or more, be sure to make the switch gradually to avoid digestive upset, but dogs that are used to getting different foods all the time rarely have any problems with it.

So, try your best and feed your pets as healthy as possible. I know it’s tough with trying to stick to a budget, so do your best within your means. They will thank you for it…

Sources:

http://www.dogaware.com/diet/index.html

http://www.bornfreeusa.org/facts.php?more=1&p=359

Hope that was a little helpful to you!

What do you feed your animals? I recently (over the past 6 months) started feeding my dogs Blue Buffalo. Their fur shinier, skin is in better condition, and their poops are much more….”uniform.”