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http://web.archive.org/web/20030502044857/http://members.shaw.ca/petlife/rawpaper.htm (http://web.archive.org/web/20030502044857/http://members.shaw.ca/petlife/rawpaper.htm)
The Truth About Raw Foods For Our Dogs and Cats
John Peloza, Pet Life Inc.
This paper was inspired by the vast amount of misinformation that is given to professionals responsible for animal care, by professionals in the pet food industry, friends and family, and the guy down at the off leash park. It was also inspired by a deep love of animals.
The information in this paper provides what detractors of a raw diet have been demanding proof. In this article you will find independent studies, and studies done by pet food manufacturers themselves, demonstrating that diets including raw ingredients are superior. You will also find direct quotes from the veterinary bodies in both Canada and the U.S., and the organizations that are tasking with policing the pet food industry. The body of proof in this article demonstrates two things. First, it shows that the food many people take for granted as complete and balanced is, in fact, potentially dangerous to your pets health. Second, it shows conclusively that a raw diet is a healthy option for your dog or cat.
Be Careful Who You Ask For Nutritional Advice
The sales and marketing efforts of various pet food companies are sophisticated. So sophisticated, in fact, that they have manipulated our most trusted partners in pet care our veterinarians.
When looking for answers regarding pets health, most people turn to their veterinarian for advice. While vets are a critical partner in the overall well-being of our pets, they are just that a partner. Why does this matter? Many vets make recommendations on nutritional matters for our pets with little grounding or education in the subject. And what education does exist is biased as it is largely funded and conducted by pet food manufacturers.
Hill's, for example, funds professorships and scholarships at each of the 27 veterinary schools in the U.S. It writes textbooks and provides them free to students, and helps fund students� educations by providing what is essentially free pet food while they are in school. Hill's sends practicing vets on seminars on wringing more profit from clinics and offer its own nutrition certification program.[1]
But what's worse is that much of the teaching itself is done by representatives of manufacturers. Dr. Corinne Chapman, a graduate of the Western College of Veterinary Medicine in Saskatoon explains. My clearest recollection of Small Animal Nutrition was evening seminars put on by Iams, Hills & Science Diet, Medi-Cal, Waltham, and Purina. They fed us pop and pizza, then bored us to death with chemical analysis� Sadly, a lack of knowledge concerning nutrition has become the basis for recommending processed pet food. I have yet to go to a veterinary seminar on nutrition that wasn't hosted by a multimillion dollar pet food company.� Dr. Ian Buffett, another veterinarian, spoke about the problem on the November 7, 2001 episode of Marketplace on CBC: "The clinical nutrition that we got was provided by actually a representative of one of the pet food companies, so there certainly was a bias there, and I don't remember any mention of homemade diets." According to the host of that same CBC show, the veterinary colleges they contacted said that there's often no one qualified on staff, so they ask nutritionists from the pet food companies to teach. Since the companies aren't interested in raw diets, the students don't learn about them.
Decisions we make on behalf of our pets should be made carefully, by weighing facts from a variety of sources. One of those sources should definitely be your veterinarian. There is a lot of misinformation about feeding raw foods to our pets, both promoting and attacking the practice. As guardians to our pets, it's up to us to make informed decisions and to make those decisions for ourselves.
An Inherent Conflict Of Interest
If you go to a doctor for yourself, and he tells you that you should be eating only one type of food, and that you can pick up a bag in the waiting room, how would you feel? The majority of vets have their clients best interests at heart. But they are put in a dangerous situation (by the sales and marketing pitches from pet food companies) by receiving money for medical advice, and receiving money from the sales of recommended/prescribed products.
The power and influence of our veterinarians has been exploited by pet food manufacturers. John Steel, retired VP of Global Marketing and Sales explains: It's just like taking drugs: You go to the doctor and he prescribes something for you and you don't much question what the doctor says. It's the same with animals."[2]
It's this conflict of interest that can lead to disaster. The Wall Street Journal reported that the marketing and sales activities of Hill's Pet Foods include a bounty on the pets in a given veterinary clinic. For each pet that was put on a special diet, the clinic received a kickback. The clinic would have a quota of pets to get on the diet each day, and then use that money for it's own purpose (a party, etc.).[3] The recommendation of the food may or may not have been the best thing for the pet. This shocking report even featured direct quotes from sales reps and vets who obviously saw no problem with this practice. If this were ever to come to light in the human health industry, the company and doctor would both be disgraced and the doctor would surely lose his license and be banished from the community. So why are our pets deserving of any less?
The above is not to suggest that every vet has a quota based on a bounty he/she will receive from a pet food company. But obviously some do. It's a situation that is unregulated, and consumers should not be subjected to a system that is subject to such alarming abuse.
It doesn't make it any easier on vets when they have pet food manufacturers coaching them on how to sell their product. Medi-Cal, for example, tells vets to focus on veterinary-exclusive products because they encourage people to visit the clinic more often resulting in increased revenue and compliance. They also coach vets to limit customer choice, and to lower the markup of puppy/kitten food so customers will be more likely to start their pets on the Medi-Cal brand.[4]
Pet Foods Are Manufactured Using Guesswork
The people responsible for producing food for your pet, and even worse, the people responsible for policing the manufacturers, really have no idea what the optimal diet is for your dog or cat. In the U.S., where the majority of the manufacturing for North America is done, the FDA governs the industry. It operates through a group known as AAFCO (Association of American Feed Control Officials). This group sets the standards for ingredients and nutritional guidelines for pet food.
The need to question the standards becomes apparent when you listen to the industry regulators:
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Dr. David Dzanis, FDA Center for Veterinary Medicine: The formulation method does not account for palatability or availability of nutrients. Yet a feeding trial can miss some chronic deficiencies or toxicities.
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Animalhealthcare.ca (the official site of the veterinary profession in Canada): Despite advances in nutrition research, little remains known about what exactly constitutes an optimal diet for the cat. While guidelines do exist regarding the minimum and maximum requirements for a feline diet, much still needs to be done to determine the effects of various excesses and deficiencies on feline nutrition.[5]
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Dr. Quinton Rogers, DVM, PhD, one of the AAFCO panel experts: Although the AAFCO profiles are better than nothing, they provide false securities. I don't know of any studies showing their adequacies and inadequacies. Rogers also states that some of the foods which pass AAFCO feeding trials are actually inadequate for long term nutrition, but there is no way of knowing which foods these are under present regulations.[6]
AAFCO regulations, in the words of AAFCO themselves, are not based entirely in knowledge:
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The absence of (nutrient level) maximums should not be interpreted to mean that those nutrients are safe at any level. Rather, it reflects the lack of information on nutrient toxicity in dogs and cats.[7]
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Although a true requirement of crude fat per se has not been established��[8]
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Sodium minimum level was more a matter of convention than as was supported by data.[9]
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Levels of copper, iron, and zinc for dogs are set based on tolerance in swine.[10]
Even the science that AAFCO does have isn't used to create useable guidelines for pet food manufacturers. The recommended calcium/phosphorus ratio is between 1.2:1 and 1.4:1. Yet the maximum limit is set at 2:1.[11] Why such a wide range? The ranges for specific vitamins are even wider. The maximum allowable levels for vitamins A, D and E respectively are 50, 10 and 20 times the minimum amounts. In cats, the ranges are the same except for vitamin A which is 150 times the minimum allowable limit.[12]
The "studies" carried out by pet food manufacturers are little more than exercises in marketing and public relations. Take a recent result quoted by Hill's about their Science Diet product. "The double-masked, randomized, two-year study of 38 dogs concluded that dogs fed Prescription Diet k/d live twice as long as dogs fed a composite grocery dog food brand. At the study's conclusion, four times as many dogs fed Prescription Dietk/d� were still living."[13]
The study above proves nothing. First, what exactly is a "composite grocery store food brand"? And why on earth would Hill's choose to test against it? Second, when it says their dogs live twice as long, how long is that exactly? Third, what kind of an endorsement is "... four times as many dogs were still living"? All this study shows is that their product kills fewer dogs than the composite grocery store brand.
Companies like Hill's are quick to denounce raw diets (although many high quality kibble manufacturers do in fact recommend that their food be supplemented with raw products). But ask yourself why, with all the resources at their disposal to conduct ridiculous studies against grocery store composite brands, they never test their products against raw diets.
The standards that govern the pet food industry are always evolving, and manufacturers constantly learn more about what is essential. In the 60�s, we saw sick Alpo Dogs; dogs that were fed an all-meat diet promoted by pet food companies as being complete and balanced. In the 60s and 70s we saw sick cats until manufacturers realized that taurine was an essential amino acid. In the pet food regulations in 1978, the vitamin A minimum level for cats was 10,000 IU/kg. In 1985 it was 3,333 IU/kg. Now it�s 5,000 IU/kg.[14] Science is a continuum. Are we so arrogant to assume that we have now learned everything there is to learn, that we can learn nothing new?
Nutritionists recommend switching among two or three different pet food products every few months. The FDA Centre for Veterinary Medicine, in their newsletter to consumers, says nutritional advice for people to eat a wide variety of foods also applies to pets. Doing so helps ensure that a deficiency doesn't develop for some as yet unknown nutrient required for good health. [15] But then later in the exact same article, the following appears: The nutritional adequacy statement assures consumers that a product meets all of a pet's nutritional needs. What is missing is the statement as far as we know, which may be very little.
What is credible science today was laughable yesterday. For 100 years doctors scoffed at the idea that ulcers could be caused by bacteria, and cured by simple antibiotics. Meanwhile, millions of people suffered. Of course we now know that the majority of ulcers are caused by bacteria, and can easily be cured in the course of 10-14 days. This learning shows us the importance of ensuring that we continually learn with an open mind. We don't know everything, and we likely never will.
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The Standards Governing The Pet Food Business Are Abysmal
Even within the framework of guessing at what is the optimal diet for a dog or a cat, the standards that govern production and ingredients are questionable at best. The majority of the pet food that is manufactured in North America follows the protocols of AAFCO. These standards, when met, allow the manufacturer to claim that his product is complete and balanced and it is supposed to be the criteria that the consumer uses to make informed choices.
Unfortunately the standards fall short of providing even the slightest reassurance to anyone who questions them. The first point to consider is that if one wishes to receive a copy of the AAFCO handbook, which contains the feeding protocols, allowable ingredients, etc., one must pay $65 U.S. for it. Shouldn't such information, vital to our decisions for our pets, be in the public domain and available free of charge?
According to the 2003 AAFCO Handbook, there are four ways to meet the AAFCO protocols:
1. Feeding trials
2. Chemical analysis
3. Products that are in the same family as approved foods
4. Products that pass growth or gestation protocols do not need to pass maintenance (adult) protocols.
The feeding trial is obviously the most strenuous of all the methods, but the feeding trials provide little confidence for consumers interested in their pets� health. In the feeding trials 8 dogs (or cats) over the age of 1 and of optimal body weight and in good health� are fed only the food being tested for a period of 26 weeks.[16] Only water is added. A passing grade is given based on the following conditions:
1. No obvious nutritional deficiencies. But with a test of only 26 weeks many deficiencies may not be apparent at the end of the test, and many may not yet be �obvious.�
2. 6 out of the 8 animals that entered the test must remain at the end of the test. Animals may be removed for poor food intake. The protocols do not provide a definition of poor food intake but I've never heard of a dog suffering from anything like this.
3. No dog shall lose more than 15% of his body weight, and the average body weight loss of the dogs that finish the trial must not be more than 10%. How can a food that causes double-digit weight loss in only 26 weeks in an animal that is of optimal body weightr when they enter the test be considered healthy?
4. Hemoglobin, PCV, albumin, serum alkaline phosphatase (and in the case of cats, taurine), must also not drop by extreme proportions (similar to the body weight levels above).
In the case of puppies and kittens the quality of the test is even worse. Puppies must be at least 75% of the average weight for their breed, and kittens must be at least 80% of their average.[17] How can a diet be considered quality if it results in body weights as low as of the average? What's worse, there is no upper limit on how far above the average pets in the test are allowed to weigh.
The second way that a food can pass is to avoid the feeding trial altogether and show on paper that the food has the same end nutrients to match foods that would pass the trials. But this process assumes that the end nutrient composition of feed is all that matters, not the source of the nutrients. And even pet food manufacturers, such as Medi-Cal, acknowledge this fact: The Guaranteed Analysis is an analysis performed in a laboratory. It tells us nothing about ingredient quality. Shoe leather, hair, feathers, beaks and chicken feet would be high in crude protein, but provide poor nutrient value for your pet.[18] Worse yet, AAFCO themselves acknowledge that foods can pass feeding trials yet fail the chemical analysis.[19]
The Canadian Veterinary Medical Association goes so far as to say: "Whether the reference is to the NRC (National Research Council) or to AAFCO, it must be borne in mind that neither one of these organizations tests pet foods, and statements that the product meets NRC or AAFCO standards do not imply endorsement by either group or that the product in fact meets the nutrition standards set by them."[20]
It also surprises many people to learn of the kind of products that receive the complete and balanced seal of approval. Many people recoil at the idea of feeding their dog or cat the no name stuff from the grocery store. But the Canadian Veterinary Medical Association, under their certification program, says that No Name Special Dinner is all you need to feed your dog. It is designed to be complete and balanced and meet all the nutritional needs of your dog/cat. By the rules defined by the CVMA themselves, using the name No Name Special Dinner requires the manufacturer to use no minimum percentage of meat in the formula. (If the name were to be Special Dinner With Beef than they would be required to have a whopping 3% of the product be actual beef.)[21]
But the CVMA wants you to know that No-Name Special Dinner, while less expensive meets optimum standards of nutrition and consistently prove their quality in independent feeding trials.[22] The CVMA also wants you to know that there are no government regulations for assuring food quality and consistency of pet foods in the Canadian marketplace. Commercial pet foods on the market are generally good; however, there can be extreme variations in their nutritional quality.[23] Extreme indeed.
Think the label tells you what you need to know? Think again. In a New York Times article dated December 16, 1990 Dr Bruce Little, executive vice president of the American Veterinary Medical Association said about pet food, " 'Natural' is a figment of the advertising industry's imagination." In the same article Richard Sellers, chairman of AAFCO�s pet food committee said, "Labeling is a marketing tool. You can list everything that's in a can of food and that still won't tell the consumer anything about what the animal will actually ingest." He gave as an example rawhide, an indigestible byproduct of leather, which is frequently found in inexpensive pet food and listed as protein.
The minimums that are set are enough to only prevent the appearance of obvious deficiency symptoms. What's more, there is no law governing that nutrient levels be kept below safe maximums. For example, since palatability would suffer, no maximum level of sodium is given.[24]
Flavours are often added to get animals to eat what would otherwise be passed over. If a label says chicken flavour then there only has to be enough flavour so that pets can pick out that it tastes like chicken. [25] Upon questioning, the authors of the report, The Pet Food Institute, could not explain exactly how they get dogs to pick out chicken versus other flavours.
Of course there are good kibble products out there, products that have consistency and high quality proteins and other ingredients, and that are preserved naturally. But unfortunately the labels and the industry standards don't tell you which ones they are.
Survive Or Thrive?
Our pets, dogs in particular, can be described in a few choice words: scavenger, hunter, opportunist. In other words, dogs have the ability to survive on some very minimal requirements. Your dog can probably live for a year or more simply on what he finds in your weekly garbage. But this brings up an important distinction between survive and thrive. As pet guardians, it's our responsibility to provide our pets a diet that will allow them to thrive, not merely survive. The entire regulatory industry, as we have seen from the AAFCO handbook, is built around the MINIMUM amount of nutrition required to keep a dog alive. If your pet seems fine, consider the long term. Consider the increases in obesity we have seen over the years, to the point that it has been estimated that 44% of the North American dog population is obese.[26] Consider the fact that 86% of pets over the age of one have periodontal disease.[27] Consider the fact that 20% of all dogs over the age of one have some form of osteoarthritis.[28] Consider the rise of chronic illnesses, cancer, and diabetes in our pets.
Grain makes up a considerable portion of both commercial and many homemade diets. It has been stated that, "dogs do not have a dietary requirement for carbohydrate" and "grains are used only because they are a less expensive source of energy than fat or protein."[29] These foods will keep your pet alive, but they will never allow him to thrive.
Complete And Balanced Is A Myth
There is no single food that is complete and balanced. If there were we would all be eating it right now. Our dogs and cats, like us, were designed to eat a variety of healthy foods over time. A wild dog would eat a diet largely comprised of meat but also of internal organs, fruits and vegetables, pre-digested grains perhaps, bugs, grass, dirt, and even feces. They would never ever eat a meal that was all at once all of the above items. A wolf doesn't finish eating a rabbit and say hmmm, I think I'm a little short on zinc today, I'd better go find some.
The corresponding myth to complete and balanced is that a pet guardian couldn't possibly know how to feed a dog or cat, as they lack the specialized skill and training required to make those decisions. The first problem with this is as we have seen, the pet food industry and even veterinarians shouldn't be our sole source of information. But what about the millions of mothers out there, both human and animal, that have raised their babies, puppies and kittens into strong, healthy beings? How many of them had degrees in nutritional science?
The wild ancestors of our dogs and cats have survived for millions of years without our help. They have something valuable in their natural diet that has allowed them to thrive for so long at the top of the food chain.
Your Dog Is A Wolf. Your Cat is Wild
Research tells us that our pets are really just wild animals in disguise. Their disguises have come as a result of selective breeding, much of it for aesthetics. But what hasn't changed is their biology. Not for any breed, from Chihuahua to Great Dane.[30] Researchers now know that the DNA of canis lupus familiaris (domesticated dog) and canis lupus (wolf) differ by less than 1%. Note that they are both considered the same species, with the dog being a subspecies of the other. The dog and wolf are even more closely related to each other than the wolf is to the coyote.[31]
A look at their respective digestive systems shows that our dogs and cats today are designed to consume the same diets as their wild cousins. They both have short intestinal tracts (about 1/3 the length of humans) and acidic stomachs (pH is approximately 5 times our human stomachs). This is how they are able to handle the nasty bacteria they pick up from each others� anuses, filthy carcuses in the park, and yes, things like salmonella in raw meat. In fact, about 1/3 of all dogs naturally have salmonella in their digestive tract.[32] Despite carrying this bacteria in their intestines, they show no signs of disease.[33] Our healthy dogs contain normal flora in their intestinal tracts, no doubt the result of millions of years of scavenging and opportunistic feeding patterns.
According to Dr. Stephanie Wong, spokesperson for the Center for Disease Control, salmonella is not a problem for dogs and cats: If dogs and cats do suffer any effects from salmonella, the illness will most often be a mild gastrointestinal disorder." Further, she states that it is not a risk to humans: "Potentially dogs and cats can transmit salmonellosis to humans, but it is extremely unlikely."[34] In the September/October 2000 issue of Consumer Magazine, the FDA agrees that healthy pets rarely become ill from the bacteria.
The wild cousins of our domesticated dogs and cats, contrary to some reports, do live long, healthy lives. One of the world's foremost wolf researchers, L.D. Mech states "in the wild, wolves can live to be about 16 years of age."[35] Certainly the animals must have some degree of health as they have been able to sustain themselves at the top of the food chain for millions of years. Wolves in captivity are fed raw diets and regularly live as long as 20 years.
Even Waltham (a subsidiary of the Mars Corporation, makers of Pedigree Pet Food, Uncle Ben�s Rice, etc.) agrees: Throughout the ages of domestication dogs have had to survive on a mixed diet of hunting, scavenging and handouts from man. Those which were able to pick out the best things to eat have survived, whereas those which could not will have failed to breed, particularly since pregnancy and lactation are the most nutritionally demanding times in the animal's life. The process of learning which foods to eat requires considerable skill to ensure that only those food items which are nutritionally beneficial and non-toxic are incorporated into the diet.[36] In other words, every day Nature shows us the optimal diet for our dogs and cats.
Finally, from the May/June 1999 issue of the FDA Veterinary Newsletter: Just by comparing the dentition of dogs and cats with that of humans and herbivores (plant-eaters, such as cattle and horses), it is readily apparent that their teeth are designed by nature for eating a diet largely comprised of animal tissue. Their short intestinal tracts compared to humans and especially to animals like sheep or horses also indicate that they are not designed to accommodate diets containing large amounts of plant materials. Their nutritional requirements, such as the need for relatively high amounts of protein and calcium, reflect these dietary limitations.� From the same newsletter: To be honest, all commercial pet foods are to varying degrees "unnatural" (no company sells raw, whole rodents or small birds as "cat food").� Well, actually, there are lots of companies that do just that.
People who claim that Fido or Fluffy are different from their wild ancestors are confusing emotion with fact. Most importantly, they have yet to provide any evidence to suggest that our pets differ from their wild cousins when it comes to nutrition.
Just like a tree is genetically adapted to absorb certain nutrients, so are our pets. The majority of foods fed to pets today (kibble) have only been in existence for about 150 years. The natural genetically-adapted food for pets (or any living creature) must pre-date their existence. In other words, how could animals exist before the food they needed to survive existed? The simplicity of this logic is its beauty.
Some people claim that raw food and cooked food are nutritionally identical. This is not true. Cooking alters and binds nutrients, making them either less digestible or useless to our pets.[37] Even the Canadian Veterinary Medical Association admits liver is most nutritious when fed raw (especially to sick, anemic or weak pets)�[38] and that cooking may also deplete certain nutrients and result in a deficient diet.[39] Through the process of rendering, raw animal by-products are chemically transformed. Even watch what happens to animal fat when it is fried in a hamburger or bacon? Higher temperatures with low moisture content can damage the protein quality. The availability of essential amino acids (i.e. those required from food to sustain life) has been found to decline as the processing temperature increases.[40] Cats eating heat-processed foods have been shown to have lower plasma taurine concentrations.[41],[42] AAFCO, the organization that sets the guiding principles for pet foods, is forced to make allowances for nutritional degradation due to processing.[43] AAFCO also provides specific examples of nutrients that are lost due to processing: Processing may destroy up to 90% of the thiamine in a diet for dogs and cats,[44] with canned food resulting in even greater deficiencies than kibble, requiring even more additive nutrients.[45]
Variety May Be The Most Important Factor
We have already heard from the FDA about the need to keep variety in your pets diet. You ensure that a wide range of nutrients is available to your pet by feeding a variety of proteins and other ingredients through a wide variety of foods. A truly natural diet would consist of at least a few different sources of protein. One day might be a rabbit, the next couple days might be a calf, etc. The important thing is that our animals naturally eat a variety of foods over time, and grains do not comprise the majority of their diet. Cooked grains are never part of their diet.
Many pet food companies (and even vets) will recommend that a pets food not be changed, or that if a change is made that it be made slowly. The reason behind this recommendation is the potential for upset to the digestive system of the dog. But when you consider the origins of the dog, and the words we use to describe the dog hunter, opportunist, scavenger their natural diets are varied. Any healthy dog would have no problem immediately adapting to new foods. That's what they are designed to do.
A varied diet will help avoid allergies in your pet. Lamb and rice foods were originally introduced as foods for pets that had developed allergies from eating solely chicken or beef for such a long time. At the time, lamb was a novel protein. Ensuring your pet is regularly exposed to a wide variety of proteins can help protect him.
You help avoid food addictions by keeping a varied diet. The Whole Cat Journal, in its October 2001 issue, cites the case of a cat that was addicted to a particular flavor of a particular brand of cat food, right down to a specific factory and lot number! This kind of addiction can be difficult to deal with when that last can is gone, but can be easily avoided by feeding a variety of foods from the start. If fed only one type of food or flavour, imprinting can be severe enough to result in some cats choosing to starve rather than switch diets. Nutritional deficiencies (and excesses) are also less likely to manifest themselves later on in life if a variety of diets are fed.[46]
Finally, let's consider our pets' mental health and enjoyment. Why wouldn't our pets enjoy a variety of tastes and experiences in their food as much as we enjoy variety in ours? But manufacturers, all looking to gain a lifelong customer, discourage the process. Medi-Cal goes so far as to irresponsibly claim dogs really do not mind having the same meal time and time again.�[47] Apart from being unhealthy and unnatural, it's boring. We know dogs and cats feel and express emotion, why would anyone doubt their ability to enjoy food?
Anyone that has seen a dog or cat eat raw food can empathize with their joy simply by looking at their body language, their wagging tails, and the way they devour the food. A raw diet ensures that the pet guardian maintains control over the pets diet, and ensures variety.
What About Bones?
The old myth about never feeding bones to your pet has been distorted. While it's true that cooked bones present a great danger to your pet, raw bones are nutritious and in fact essential to keeping your pets teeth clean. For millions of years, wolves managed to keep their teeth for tearing into prey without the benefit of a dental cleaning under anesthetic every 6 months, or a guardian to gently brush their teeth and gums.
There can be no dispute that our dogs and cats are designed to eat and digest bones. Wild or feral cats and dogs will consume a variety of foods, and even when consuming a prey, they will consume the digestive tract, hide and bones in addition to the meat.[48]
Research has consistently proven the value of bones: In the study "Control of Dental Calculus in Experimental Beagles," by Brown and Park in 1968 it was shown that manual removal of calculus was not required when dogs were fed one-half or one whole oxtail per week.[49]
Even some of the people you would expect to tell you bones are bad have come on board. PC Higgins, Veterinary Advisor to Uncle Ben's of Australia (makers of Pedigree and Walthams) said in 1987: Uncooked bones had the most marked effect followed by rawhide chews and super hard baked biscuits. It is imperative that in addition to this basic commercial diet bones, preferably, or rawhide chews or super hard baked biscuits be added to it so that periodontal disease can be prevented.
But what about the myth that hard kibble keeps our dogs and cats teeth clean? It's not true according to the official site of the veterinary profession in Canada, animalhealthcare.ca: Numerous studies have demonstrated that feeding a regular dry diet alone, when compared to a canned diet, will reduce the rate of plaque and subsequent calculus formation. However, what is not thoroughly understood is whether this effect is due to the mild abrasive action of the diet, or the greater likelihood of canned food to become entrapped in the gum tissue, leading to greater accumulation of plaque. Because dental calculus is so hard due to its mineral content, it usually is not removed when a pet eats hard kibble. [50]
The dramatic difference in food form represented by commercial dog and cat foods as compared to the natural prey of wild canids and felids (dogs and cats) is often implicated as a significant cause of the degree of periodontal disease diagnosed in domestic dogs and cats. Colyer examined 1,157 wild canid skulls and reported that suggestive evidence of periodontal disease was present in only 2% of specimens.[51] Compare that to modern estimates that 86% of adult dogs suffer from periodontal disease.
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The Science Behind The Hype
The Pottenger Cat study, done over a 10 year period in the 30's and 40's, is the best example of a study showing the benefits of raw meat to cats. In his study Dr. Francis Pottenger (at the time President of the L.A. County Medical Board) showed that cats who were fed a raw diet thrived while cats fed a cooked diet suffered from chronic illnesses, many of the same illnesses that plague our pets today.[52]
In discussions with one veterinarian about the results of this research, his response was taurine was not known to be an essential nutrient for cats at that time. But he missed the whole point of the research. There is no need to build a diet that replicates the optimal diet, we already have the optimal diet! Instead of acknowledging the superior diet, the industry has spent the last 60 years since the Pottenger research trying to recreate it. Based on research presented in this paper, they have not yet succeeded.
But let's turn our perspective on the practice of feeding our pets cooked food, and interrogate the science behind that practice. The cooked food industry for our pets began in 1860 in England by James Spratt, an electrician from Ohio. He was in London trying to sell lightning rods when he saw dogs being given left-over ship's biscuits. This electrician thought he could do better with a preparation of wheat, vegetables, beetroot and meat. Formulation was based more on guesswork than science. But his company thrived and an entire industry was born, with no one ever looking back or questioning why the practice began in the first place. Many people are shocked to learn that the practice they depend on for their pets health is less than 150 years old, and didn't originate in lab, a university, or even a veterinary clinic. It began with an electrician entrepreneur from Ohio who was trying to make a living in London, England. And it began as a business opportunity with nothing to do with science, or even the benefit of pets.[53]
Unfortunately some of the science that is used to attack the practice of feeding a raw diet is suspect and does nothing to move the debate forward. Some readers may have been referred to the study "Evaluation of Raw Food Diets For Dogs" (page 705, March 1, 2001 JAVMA) by Freeman and Michel. This study supposedly showed that raw diets were nutritionally inadequate (although I refer back to the AAFCO standards of what is nutritionally adequate and question that assumption overall). But what most people don't know about that study is that authors/veterinarians Freeman and Michel admit their analysis was not based on exact recipes from the diets and only a portion of the week or month of individual meals constituting the complete diets. Rather the assays were based on one meal of each diet fed to five different dogs. No assay of bio- availability was done on the raw samples and none are available for comparison from commercial kibble manufacturers. A raw diet features variety, and any one component of the diet at any one time may be in fact deficient. But over days and weeks, much like the diets of our pets� wild cousins, the balance is gained.
Another, even less meaningful study, showed that dog feces and raw meat contain salmonella.[54] In a 2002 study the authors showed that raw chicken contains salmonella, and that dog feces contains salmonella, and somehow try to use this as a rationale against a raw diet! Anyone will tell you that salmonella is often present in raw chicken, whether it is for our dogs or for us. But as you have learned, these bacteria are not a problem for healthy dogs. In fact, this 2002 study inadvertently proved that salmonella is not harmful to dogs. None of the 10 test dogs suffered any ill effects despite salmonella being present in 80% of the raw food. And the fact that salmonella is found in dog feces should not come as a surprise. Again, about 1/3 of dogs normally carry the bacteria in their system. And besides, who is eating dog feces?
A raw diet has been proven to be beneficial to our dogs and cats. The exaggerated claims of the dangers of feeding raw diets have been promoted by those with self-interests in selling their own brand of food. Objective science demonstrates that not only is raw food not dangerous, it has numerous health benefits for your pet.
One Last Ting To Consider
The information in this document comes from Pet Life Inc. who is in the business of selling pet food. For dogs and cats we sell raw food AND kibble/canned diets. This is important for you to remember because we encourage everyone with pets to understand and question the source of the information they are using to make decisions. The facts in this document, however, are not ours. They are public facts that we have merely gathered and presented.
A raw diet isn't right for every pet. Our objective with this information is to clear the misperceptions and misinformation that are sometimes quoted when discussing what has become an emotional subject. And it should be emotional. It�s your pet we�re talking about. But don�t let emotion guide your decisions. Your pet is depending on you to make the right choices.
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Endnotes:
[1] Wall Street Journal, Monday November 3, 1997, Why Vets Recommend Designer Chow.
[2] Wall Street Journal, Monday November 3, 1997, Why Vets Recommend Designer Chow.
[3] Wall Street Journal, Monday November 3, 1997, Why Vets Recommend Designer Chow.
[4] Canadian Practice Management Insights, Veterinary Medical Diets (VMD), July/December 2002.
[5] Feeding The Young Cat, animalhealthcare.ca, 2003.
[6] Changes and Challenges in Feline Nutrition, Smith C.A. JAVMA, 1993; 203:1395-1400.
[7] AAFCO Official Publication, 2003, pg 126.
[8] AAFCO Official Publication, 2003, pg 127 and pg 132.
[9] AAFCO Official Publication, 2003, pg 128.
[10] AAFCO Official Publication, 2003, pg 129.
[11] AAFCO Official Publication, 2003, pg 128.
[12] AAFCO Official Publication, 2003, pg 129 and 132.
[13] Clinical Study Results, Prescription Diet k/d, hillspet.com, 2002.
[14] AAFCO Official Publication, 2003, pg 134.
[15] FDA Consumer Newsletter, May/June 2001.
[16] AAFCO Official Publication, 2003, pg 142.
[17] AAFCO Official Publication, 2003, pg 145.
[18] Pet Nutrition, medi-cal.ca, 2003.
[19] AAFCO Official Publication, 2003, pg 125.
[20] Common Sense Guide To Feeding Your Dog Or Cat, Canadian Veterinary Medical Association.
[21] Canadian Veterinary Medical Association Certification Program, 1999, and AAFCO Official Publication, 2003, pg 170.
[22] Dishing Out The Facts, Canadian Veterinary Medical Association publication, May 2001.
[23] Common Sense Guide To Feeding Your Dog Or Cat, CVMA.
[24] AAFCO Official Publication, 2003, pg 128.
[25] A Consumer�s Guide To Pet Foods, Pet Food Institute, 2003.
[26] Obesity in Dogs, The Waltham Corporation, 2001.
[27] The Impact of Diet on Oral Health, animalhealthcare.ca, 2003.
[28] Glucosamine, Medi-cal.ca, John Hilton, Veterinary Medical Diets, 2003.
[29] Merck Veterinary Manual, 7th edition as defined by AAFCO.
[30] Can You ID Your Dog With DNA?, Ray Coppinger, 1991.
[31] From Wolf To Woof, National Geographic, January, 2002.
[32] Home Prepared Dog and Cat Diets, Donald R. Strombeck D.V.M., 1999.
[33] Human Health Concerns Associated With Hatching Poultry, Teresa Morishita, Ohio State University, Veterinary Preventative Medicine, 2001.
[34] Reptiles, Small Children Shouldn�t Cohabitate, Center For Disease Control, 2002.
[35] The Smithsonian Book of North American Mammals, 1999, Gray Wolf, pages 141-143, D.E. Wilson and S. Ruff (eds).
[36] Experience and Learning, The Waltham Corporation, 2001.
[37] The Role of Diet In The Health of Feline Intestinal Tract, Glasgow et al, Winn Foundation, 2002.
[38] Supplementing Your Pets Diet Is Not Necessarily Beneficial, animalhealthcare.ca.
[39] Common Sense Guide To Feeding Your Dog Or Cat, CVMA.
[40] Pet Food Ingredients and Ingredient Processing Affect Dietary Protein Quality, Patil et al, University of Illinois, 1998 (presented at the Purina Nutrition Forum no less!).
[41] Effect of Processing On The Fate Of Dietary Taurine in Cats, J Nutrition, Vol. 120, No. 9, 1990, pp. 995 � 1000.
[42] Dietary Antibiotics Decrease Taurine Loss In Cats Fed A Canned Heat-Processed Diet, J Nutrition, Vol. 126, No. 2, (1996) pp. 509-515
[43] AAFCO Official Publication, 2003, pg 125.
[44] AAFCO Official Publication, 2003, pg 127 and pg 132.
[45] AAFCO Official Publication, 2003, pg 134.
[46] Feeding The Young Cat, animalhealthcare.ca, 2003.
[47] Nutrition and Development in Large Breed Puppies, medi-cal.ca, 2002.
[48] The Problems Associated With Raw Meat Consumption In Cats And Dogs, John Hilton, Veterinary Medical Diets (Medi-Cal), 2002.
[49] Lab Animal Care, Volume 18, No. 5, 1968.
[50] The Impact of Diet on Oral Health, animalhealthcare.ca.
[51] Dietary Influences on Periodontal Health, Logan et al, 1997 (from the Mark Morris Institute, a.k.a. Hill�s Pet Food).
[52] Pottenger�s Cats, Francis Pottenger M.D., 1995.
[53] The History of Pet Food, The Pet Food Institute, 2001.
[54] Preliminary Assessment Of The Risk of Salmonella Infection In Dogs Fed Raw Chicken Diets, Joffe, Daniel and Schleslinger, Daniel, Can Vet Journal, Vol. 43, June 2002, pp. 441 � 442.
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epic copy and paste skills captain crayola ::)
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when i had my dog, we used to make him food. we would feed him chicken and rice, carrots, he ate well. Hell he ate healthier than i did. We took him to the vet for his shots and the vet asked us what we fed him since he was in great health and good coat, etc. He was surprised.
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epic copy and paste skills captain crayola ::)
Sorry, I don't have time to write and get articles published. So here are my original not c/p thoughts:
Dogs and Cats are carnivores. Crap-in-a-bag sucks, feed a species appropriate diet.
:)
how silly of me to think that maybe people would like to read studies and articles for themselves and to think for themselves. ::)
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The Pottenger Study referenced:
http://www.price-pottenger.org/Articles/PottsCats.html (http://www.price-pottenger.org/Articles/PottsCats.html)
Pottenger's Cats - A Study in Nutrition
by Francis M. Pottenger, Jr., MD
Between the years of 1932 and 1942, Dr. Francis Marion Pottenger, Jr. conducted a feeding experiment to determine the effects of heat-processed food on cats. His ten-year cat study was prompted by the high rate of mortality he was experiencing among his laboratory cats undergoing adrenalectomies for use in standardizing the hormone content of the adrenal extract he was making. Because there were no existent chemical procedures for standardizing biological extracts, manufacturers of such extracts necessarily had to use animals to determine their potency. As cats die without their adrenal glands, the dose of extract required to support their lives calibrated the level of the extract's potency.
In his effort to maximize the preoperative health of his laboratory animals, Francis fed them a diet of market grade raw milk, cod liver oil and cooked meat scraps from the sanitarium. These scraps included the liver, tripe, sweetbreads, brains, heart and muscle. This diet was considered to be rich in all the important nutritive substances by the experts of the day, and the surgical technique used for the adrenalectomies was the most exacting known. Therefore, Francis was perplexed as to why his cats were poor operative risks. In seeking an explanation, he began noticing that the cats showed signs of deficiency. All showed a decrease in their reproductive capacity and many of the kittens born in the laboratory had skeletal deformities and organ malfunctions.
As his neighbors in Monrovia kept donating an increasing number of cats to his laboratory, the demand for cooked meat scraps exceeded supply and he placed an order at the local meat packing plant for raw meat scraps, again including the viscera, muscle and bone. These raw meat scraps were fed to a segregated group of cats each day and within a few months this group appeared in better health than the animals being fed cooked meat scraps. Their kittens appeared more vigorous, and most interestingly, their operative mortality decreased markedly.
The contrast in the apparent health of the cats fed raw meat and those fed cooked meat was so startling, it prompted Francis to undertake a controlled experiment. What he had observed by chance, he wanted to repeat by design. He wanted to find answers to such questions as: Why did the cats eating raw meat survive their operations more readily than those eating cooked meat? Why did the kittens of the raw meat fed cats appear more vigorous? Why did a diet based on cooked meat scraps apparently fail to provide the necessary nutritional elements for good health? He felt the findings of a controlled feeding experiment might illumine new facts about optimal human nutrition.
The Cat Study of Francis M. Pottenger, Jr., MD is unique. There is no similar experiment in the medical literature. The pathological and chemical findings were supervised by Francis in consultation with Alvin G. Foord, M.D., professor of pathology at the University of Southern California and pathologist at the Huntington Memorial Hospital in Pasadena. Accordingly, the studies met the most rigorous scientific standards of the day and their protocol was observed consistently.
Since The Cat Study is unique, its findings are frequently quoted and misquoted in order to justify the ideas of others. For example, one author of a popular selling book states that 200 cats died of arthritis; this indeed did not happen. Another author states that the cats were fed sprouts and survived in full health for four continuous generations. Again, no such experiment took place, and yet this misinformation has been traced over a dozen or more different articles and books.
A frequent criticism of The Pottenger Cat Study is that it was not properly controlled. Here it is necessary to ask, "By what standards?" Every one of the studies followed strictly defined protocol. All variables in the stock of the animals were reported and explained. Because some of the test procedures may seem crude forty years later, this in no way invalidates the facts that the procedures were meticulously controlled and that the results of the experiments were reported as observed.
Another criticism is that the cats were kept in an artificial environment unrelated to real living conditions. Such a criticism overlooks the experimental necessity of maintaining a controlled environment to provide valid findings. It also overlooks the evidence that given specific living conditions, specific changes repeatedly occurred in the health of the cats under observation.
Another frequent criticism is that the experimental work done on cat nutrition has no appropriate application to human nutrition. Francis M. Pottenger, Jr., MD never stated that a one-to-one comparison could be made between his findings in cat nutrition and his findings in human nutrition. He did say: "While no attempt will be made to correlate the changes in the animals studied with malformations found in humans, the similarity is so obvious that parallel pictures will suggest themselves."
All too often, self-appointed authorities will state categorically that they do not believe other's observations and so seek to close the door on any further inquiry into these observations. They declare, "Because I do not believe the facts as presented, they are not so." Far better for science if responsible individuals maintain an attitude of open inquiry and test the observations of others before forming rigid opinions. In the case of The Cat Study, human welfare might well be served if concerned researchers made every effort to discover if valid correlation's can be made between cat nutrition and human nutrition. It must be remembered that cats and humans both are mammalian biological systems.
It would be of great value to the field of nutrition to repeat The Cat Study within the parameters of present day technology and with the use of present day antibiotics. Most of the cats on deficient diets died from infections of the kidneys, lungs and bones. If these infections were eliminated as a cause of death by antibiotics, it would allow the cats to reveal their ultimate degenerative fates. As an extension to this experiment, it would be of interest to study the effects of vitamin and mineral supplementation in the diet of cooked food fed animals.
It is our effort in this monograph to present the observations made by Francis M. Pottenger, Jr., MD on the effects of deficient and optimum nutrition in cats and human beings as recorded in his articles and clinical records written between the years of 1932 and 1956. Nothing has been added or subtracted from his findings, and for the most part, the words describing his work are his own. Though some of the scientific interpretations have not withstood the test of time, the observations are valid. A careful and selective interpretation by an inquiring mind will readily differentiate the two.
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B.A.R.F. is teh awesume... ;)
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I have no problem with the raw food diet for dogs...it just wasn't agreeing with him at the time. At this point though, he's been so good...I would hate to try & introduce anyhing else.
On a side note....he thought tripe was teh shit
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how silly of me to think that maybe people would like to read studies and articles for themselves and to think for themselves. ::)
... and to search for themselves if they was really fvcked about it?
we all know your only making all these 'googled' threads to boost numbers ::)
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boost what numbers?
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boost what numbers?
::)
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... and to search for themselves if they was really fvcked about it?
we all know your only making all these 'googled' threads to boost numbers ::)
So, a post saying:
"Raw food Rocks" would of sufficed? ::)
And there is 2 "googled" threads. This one and the vaccine one. Both having articles and studies because I think they are important topics and should have good information in them for people to read if they chose to.
It's called "getting information out there".
But I suppose "Vaccines Suck" would work too.
You just really want to be a part of this board doncha? And don't be surprised when I split this convo off so it doesn't ruin my "informative" thread.
;D
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http://www.wheaten-health-initiative.co.uk/risk.html (http://www.wheaten-health-initiative.co.uk/risk.html)
RISK, RAW FEEDING AND PATHOGENS: A REVIEW By Stacy Pober
Assessing the potential risk involved in feeding dogs raw meat is complicated. Some of the issues I’d like to discuss are assessing the potential risk of to the dogs, assessing the risk to humans who are around raw-fed dogs, and the general issue of how to evaluate risks.
RISK TO DOGS
First, the issue of risk in feeding a raw diet is not simple. ALL foods have some degree of risk, so the question isn’t whether risk exists. The question is whether the risk is unacceptable. You may think you want zero risk - but that’s not a choice you get in life, because all foods carry some type of risk. Raw meat can indeed be contaminated with e.coli 0157, camphylobacter, or other pathogens.
However, kibble can also contain diseases-causing mold and other pathogens. Studies by Bueno (2001), Gunsen (2002), and Maia (2002) found aflatoxin, a toxic mould, in pet food samples. Aflatoxin contamination of dog kibble resulted in approximately 25 dog deaths in 1998 (Texas) and vomitoxin was found in batches of Nature’s Recipe kibble in 1995 (FDA Enforcement Report). At least seven dogs have died from unknown contamination of Petcurean pet food, recalled by the manufacturer in October 2003 (Syufy, 2003).
Bacteria and mould are not the only risks involved in choosing a food for your pet. For example, there is some research that says that small particle size of food is a risk factor in bloat, so with regard to bloat, feeding large meaty bones would be less risky than feeding any kibble (Theyse, 1998). Even the packaging of commercial food can carry some risk, as one study of canned pet foods showed that Bisphenol A, an industrial chemical and suspected endocrine disruptor leached from the cans into the food (Kang, 2002).
Dogs are more resistant to most of the common raw meat pathogens than are humans. (Consider the fact that many dogs use the kitty litter box as a snack tray without ill effects. Does anyone really want to argue that cat feces are free of pathogens? Dogs are resistant - NOT immune - from the disease potential of these pathogens, and healthy dogs can harbour them without symptoms. Beutin (1993) found verotoxin producing e. coli in 4.6% of apparently health dogs and Dahlinger (1997) cultured various types of bacteria, including some forms of e. coli and salmonella from the lymph nodes of 52% of apparently healthy dogs brought in for elective spays. Most dogs can eat clean raw meat without a problem, even if the same raw meat would make humans very sick.
Still, a dog with a compromised immune system or digestive system is going to be more at risk for illness from any infectious agent than a dog who is healthy. So I would be reluctant to feed raw meat to an ill dog, a very young puppy, or a very elderly dog who has not previously been fed a raw diet.
I recently posted an article to the VETMED list about KSU’s studies on Alabama Rot (a/k/a hemolytic uremic syndrome) in Greyhounds fed raw meat. (Greyhounds, 1995) some people immediately posted “atta girl” posts to me privately. While I have no doubts about the accuracy of the KSU research, I think most of the readers of VETMED are unaware of exactly what kind of raw meat is fed to racing greyhounds.
Racing greyhounds are routinely fed raw “4-D meat” as part of their diet. 4-D meat is unfit for human consumption because the source of it is animals that died of natural causes (not via normal slaughter procedures) and includes animals which were diseased, or dying when they went into the slaughterhouse. This is meat which has either not been inspected by the USDA or it failed the inspection. This is not the quality of meat most pet owners buy if they are feeding their pets raw meat. 4-D meat is very foul stuff, and has the potential to contain much more in the way of pathogens than the meat that you buy in the supermarket. I would never feed a dog raw 4-D meat.
I don’t know of any published veterinary reports of Alabama Rot in pet dogs fed raw diets from USDA-inspected meat. It is, unfortunately, mainly a problem caused specifically by the feeding of unwholesome raw 4-D meat - not raw meat generally.
But raw meat is not alone in having bacterial contamination problems. There are case reports of pathogens found in commercially produced dog food and in dog treats such as rawhide, pig ears, jerky, and chew hooves. (Human, 2000, as well as Clark et al, 2001; White et al. 2003; Bren 2000; HHS News, 2000, Canadian Food Inspection Agency 1999 and 2000). According to the FDA, “all pet chew products of this type may pose a risk” (HHS News, 1999).
So, my personal opinion is that with regard to the dog’s health, feeding USDA graded raw meat to dogs is a reasonable choice for some owners to make as long as precautions are taken to avoid excess risk (for example, don’t let the meat sit around at room temperature before giving it to the dog.)
RISK TO HUMANS
Studies of pet dogs have shown e. coli 0157 and salmonella in the faeces of pet dogs - but most of these studies were not limited to dogs fed raw diets. So, kibble fed dogs and dogs fed rawhides, pig ears, and chew hooves also carry this risk.
However, before getting too fixated on dogs as a source of pathogens for humans, consider that the most notorious cases of food poisoning have been caused by poor hygiene from human sources - such as cooks and farmers.
While undercooked and raw meat is sometimes implicated in food poisoning cases, there have been an enormous number of cases of salmonella and e. coli from fruits and vegetables. The seemingly innocuous bean sprout has been linked to many outbreaks of food poisoning, as have melons, salads, and apple cider (Health Canada, 2002, and USDA 1995). In other words, while raw meat is a risk, so is almost ANY uncooked food that you eat. There has been one salmonella outbreak linked to almonds. (Chan et al. 2002).
So, are people at additional risk of getting pathogens from coming in contact with a dog fed raw meat? There isn’t a lot of research that is directly on topic for this. There are studies of raw-fed dogs (Joffe and Schlesinger, 2002) but these do not carefully compare the raw fed dogs to a similar population fed commercial dog food. (See the commentary on Joffe’s study by New n.d.).
I have seen studies of pet dogs that show that food-borne pathogens were present in a surprisingly large proportion of the dogs tested. Hackett and Lappin (2003) found infectious agents in the faeces of 26% of healthy Colorado dogs. As far as I can tell, this study was NOT limited to dogs eating raw diets. Fukata et al (2002) found salmonella antibodies in 15% of apparently healthy dogs.
I think that you can reduce any potential risk of food poisoning related to dogs by simply having good hygiene - scrupulously washing your hands after cleaning up after your dog and washing up thoroughly before eating. Keeping the dog itself clean probably doesn’t hurt, either. And it would make sense to avoid letting your dog lick you right after eating a chicken neck. For these reasons, I think that someone with pets and toddlers might want to avoid raw diets because small children will not follow the above rules. Kids often will let the dog lick their face any old time, and they may even try to taste the dog’s meals. (Sato et al. 2000).
RISK ASSESSMENT
Aside from the concept of ‘relative risk’ there is the question of risk versus benefit. If people were completely happy with the health of dogs from kibble feeding, the entire “raw foods” movement would have never taken root. There’s nothing more convenient than pouring kibble into a dish. So some people must be seeing a benefit from feeding raw.
I think that most veterinarians’ assessment of risk from raw diets is skewed by the fact that normal, healthy dogs are not generally seen by vets, and that most nutrition research is done using commercial diets. If there is a large population of totally healthy dogs eating raw diets, they may never be noticed by a veterinarian. On the other hand, vets will usually see the dogs who got the 3-day old chicken bones from the garbage can, or the one whose owner misguidedly thought it was a good idea to give their dog the skin and bones from their holiday turkey.
Raw diets do carry risk. These can be reduced by feeding the freshest cleanest meat the owner can buy and following all the rules about temperature, storage and hygiene (FSIS, 1999).
Kibble diets and dog treats also carry risk - and these can be reduced by buying fresh and high-quality food, rather than the cheapest stuff available, and by following proper storage and hygiene rules. But it’s worth noting that some of the priciest brands of kibble were recalled because of toxic contamination, so a high price does not ensure safety.
I don’t think there is one right way to feed dogs. I think that careful attention to nutrition and hygiene reduce the risk associated with whatever feeding regimen you choose. It’s interesting to note that feeding raw meat is intensely controversial, while feeding pig ears and jerky - which carry similar if not higher risks for contamination - is widely accepted as reasonably safe.
Incidentally, in case anyone is wondering, the main diet for my dogs is free-fed kibble. I free feed because it helps prevent gluttony, and I have never had a case of bloat in Greyhounds, which are a somewhat bloat-prone breed. I also routinely feed my dogs raw chicken parts. I feed bony chicken parts because I have found this to be the most effective way of keeping my dogs’ teeth clean. I haven’t noticed any other big change in their health, but they love the chicken parts and their teeth are clean and their breath sweet as a result. Greyhounds are notorious for foul teeth as they age, but even my oldest dog has remarkably clean teeth.
With regard to the risk, I can only share my experience, in that I’ve not seen any illnesses in the dogs I can attribute to the raw meat nor to the kibble. I made my choice because I know of more pet greyhounds that have died from the anaesthesia involved in teeth cleaning and other elective surgeries than have died from eating a raw diet.
I wrote this article to seriously examine the question a VETMED subscriber asked about the potential for risk when using raw-fed dogs as therapy dogs. As long as the dogs aren’t fed raw meat during therapy sessions, I don’t see a problem. While these dogs may carry pathogens, so may dogs fed kibble or pig ears, or rawhide. One survey found salmonella contamination of 41% of the dog treats examined. (White et al, 2003). Accordingly, it would not be logical or fair to bar raw fed dogs from a therapy dog program, unless you are also barring all dogs who are fed pig ears, rawhides, and other similar treats.
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... and to search for themselves if they was really fvcked about it?
we all know your only making all these 'googled' threads to boost numbers ::)
Your a total dork- ahhhhh I boosted my numbers ::)
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Wysong Archetype, a raw feeding alternative for those who would rather feed a freeze dried raw product rather than "butcher shop" raw. The Archetype is grain free, they do offer Archetype Buffet and other products that have grains in them, I obviously, would go no grain. This could be an expensive way to feed unless you have one dog, on page 8 there is a feeding guide chart, so you could estimate how much you would be using. And if you decide to try, check locally for it, some small petstores may carry it, or health food stores, or search the internet for the best pricing.
I have given the ferrets the ferret version with no grains and Tino LOVED it. Simon thought it was okay. I will probably put Tino back on it now that Simon is gone.
http://www.wysong.net/PDFs/archetype.pdf (http://www.wysong.net/PDFs/archetype.pdf)
http://www.wysong.net/Merchant2/merchant.mvc?Screen=PROD&Store_Code=WOTTPWS&Product_Code=WDAR7-5&Category_Code=CD&Product_Count=2 (http://www.wysong.net/Merchant2/merchant.mvc?Screen=PROD&Store_Code=WOTTPWS&Product_Code=WDAR7-5&Category_Code=CD&Product_Count=2)
INGREDIENTS:
Beef and Chicken; Beef and Chicken Liver; Ground Bone, Milk Calcium, Fish Oil (Preserved With Mixed Tocopherols), Coral Calcium, Organic Mung Bean Sprouts, Organic Quinoa Sprouts, Organic Millet Sprouts, Organic Blueberries, Organic Apples, Plums, Chlorella, Barley Grass, Wheat Grass, Dried Whey, Kelp, Dried Seaweed, Artichoke, Direct Fed Microbials (Dried Enterococcus faecium Fermentation Product, Dried Bacillus subtilis Fermentation Product, Dried Lactobacillus plantarum Fermentation Product, Dried Lactobacillus acidophilus Fermentation Product, Lactobacillus casei Fermentation Product, Dried Lactobacillus lactis Fermentation Product, Dried Saccharomyces cerevisiae Fermentation Product, Dried Aspergillus oryzae Fermentation Product, Dried Aspergillus guy Fermentation Product), Natural Extractives of Rosemary, Natural Extractives of Sage, Choline Chloride, Ascorbic Acid, Zinc Proteinate, Iron Proteinate, Calcium Pantothenate, Thiamine Mononitrate, Copper Proteinate, Pyridoxine Hydrochloride, Riboflavin Supplement, Vitamin A Acetate, Folic Acid, Biotin, Vitamin B12 Supplement, Vitamin D3 Supplement.
ANALYSIS:
Protein 50%, Fat 28%, Fiber 2.8%, Moisture 3.0%
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Wysong Archetype, a raw feeding alternative for those who would rather feed a freeze dried raw product
I've seen this at my health food store.
According to the website, Scout would get 1 1/2 cups/day. A 7.5 OUNCE bag is $14 bucks. I know the dehydration would make it really light weight. I wonder how much 1.5 cups weighs :-\
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I've seen this at my health food store.
According to the website, Scout would get 1 1/2 cups/day. A 7.5 OUNCE bag is $14 bucks. I know the dehydration would make it really light weight. I wonder how much 1.5 cups weighs :-\
It is really light. I never fed it with water, I just gave him some pieces in the bowl and he ate it. Unlike a dog, a ferret doesn't always scarf his food down so I didn't want to wet it and plus if he liked it dry then all the better!
You could always pick up a bag and check it out. Steve's Real Food is sometimes carried by local places too.
http://www.stevesrealfood.com/ (http://www.stevesrealfood.com/)
If trying Wysong, make sure to get the grain free one, the Archetype, you can get grains in regular kibble. :P
You could probably feed a mixture of the 2, the Chicken Soup and the Wysong. I would give the kibble at night, and the Wysong in the morning. They have different digestion times and kibble because of the grains takes longer. The body does a lot of it's digesting at night, so I would feed kibble then if going that route.
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What's Really in Petfood:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NHadGUXCf7I (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NHadGUXCf7I)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dkyBv2wA8tU (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dkyBv2wA8tU)
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when i had my dog, we used to make him food. we would feed him chicken and rice, carrots, he ate well. Hell he ate healthier than i did. We took him to the vet for his shots and the vet asked us what we fed him since he was in great health and good coat, etc. He was surprised.
I did the same thing for my older Dobe. It aided his digestion and he lived a long life because of the healty eating.
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Interesting paper by a Harvard Grad:
Deconstructing the Regulatory Façade:
Why Confused Consumers Feed their Pets
Ring Dings and Krispy Kremes
http://leda.law.harvard.edu/leda/data/784/Patrick06.html (http://leda.law.harvard.edu/leda/data/784/Patrick06.html)
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I wish I had a dollar for every "whole food" diet induced case of severe gastroenteritis (ie hershy squirts diarrhea and vomiting) I've diagnosed. If I did, I could retire. :P
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And I wish that I had a dollar for every dog that has had allergies or IBD and made great IMPROVEMENTS by getting grains out of it's diet.
Exactly how much on nutrition/feeding were you taught in school, and who helped fund it? Hills? What do you push in your office? Science Death? What is your "incentive"?
Hear about the acetaminophen found in Science Death recently? What about all those recent deaths and health affects from all the tainted pet food? Kibble has killed or injured many times over any harm done by raw feeding. Now if someone thinks raw feeding is just throwing some hamburger down, then yes, there will be problems. It is not hard, but it does take a bit of basic knowledge.
A carnivore is a carnivore, and just because man decided to make an "easier" way to feed does not change that fact.
At least if you are going to push a kibble, do it with a better quality one. One that at least 3, if not 4, of the first 4 ingredients is meat. It's a shame that even that no brainer is too hard to comprehend for most vets. Of course then you couldn't treat for the skin problems, allergies, IBD, and other problems as a result of that poor diet.
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On a side note....he thought tripe was teh shit
The butcher at the grocery store is ordering in some tripe for me. It comes in 1# frozen packs. I think he said it's white. I seem to recall you guys saying it was green. Am I getting the wrong stuff? What should I do with it and how much at a time?
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The butcher at the grocery store is ordering in some tripe for me. It comes in 1# frozen packs. I think he said it's white. I seem to recall you guys saying it was green. Am I getting the wrong stuff? What should I do with it and how much at a time?
That is cleaned and bleached and all the goodness taken out of it. :( Cancel the order if you can.
Green Tripe is not for human consumption and would not be sold in a grocery store or butchers.
check out www.greentripe.com or www.aplaceforpaws.com to order.
Greentripe.com west coast, aplaceforpaws.com east cost (for shipping costs reasons)
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The butcher at the grocery store is ordering in some tripe for me. It comes in 1# frozen packs. I think he said it's white. I seem to recall you guys saying it was green. Am I getting the wrong stuff? What should I do with it and how much at a time?
Yes...you do not want white (bleeched) tripe
All of the good stuff is gone.
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What's Really in Petfood:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NHadGUXCf7I (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NHadGUXCf7I)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dkyBv2wA8tU (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dkyBv2wA8tU)
I'm afraid to click on these.....are these like "how a hotdog is made" videos?
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I'm afraid to click on these.....are these like "how a hotdog is made" videos?
lolz!! There is nothing graphic on either of those links.
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That is cleaned and bleached and all the goodness taken out of it. :( Cancel the order if you can.
Damnit >:(
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Green Tripe will smell like cow shit.....
but man...will your pooch go bonkers!
I wouldn't of dreamed in a million years they would act that way.
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And I wish that I had a dollar for every dog that has had allergies or IBD and made great IMPROVEMENTS by getting grains out of it's diet.
Exactly how much on nutrition/feeding were you taught in school, and who helped fund it? Hills? What do you push in your office? Science Death? What is your "incentive"?
Hear about the acetaminophen found in Science Death recently? What about all those recent deaths and health affects from all the tainted pet food? Kibble has killed or injured many times over any harm done by raw feeding. Now if someone thinks raw feeding is just throwing some hamburger down, then yes, there will be problems. It is not hard, but it does take a bit of basic knowledge.
A carnivore is a carnivore, and just because man decided to make an "easier" way to feed does not change that fact.
At least if you are going to push a kibble, do it with a better quality one. One that at least 3, if not 4, of the first 4 ingredients is meat. It's a shame that even that no brainer is too hard to comprehend for most vets. Of course then you couldn't treat for the skin problems, allergies, IBD, and other problems as a result of that poor diet.
I have no specific brand loyalty. I also do not push a specific brand of dog or cat food, except for prescription diets, which are used for specific medical conditions and are based on the needs of the individual animal, not on something that a pet food company is trying to sell. Pet food companies have come full circle... they used to give and give and give to veterinarians in an effort to encourage veterinarians to push their particular brands. That alone made me very suspicious, because again, its the needs of the individual patient that should determine prescription diets. Over the last few years Eukanuba and Science Diet have both essentially yanked many of the "incentives" that they gave veterinary students 10 years ago. Vet students cant even get discounts on basic diets anymore, which if anything is making more and more of them suspicious of the big food companies. I can't remember the last time I got something free from a pet food company other than an ink pen.
Since you asked, with the patients I see, I work with three nutritionists, one from Ohio, one from Kansas, and one from Missouri with determining dietary needs of my patients. I'm in a very specialized field, so I think its worth it for my patients to get that level of care. And just so you know, with my patients, the majority of thier food could be labeled "whole food" if you want to get technical. I have a fairly strong background in animal nutrition---primarily based on the more exotic species nutrition as a result of classes I've taken voluntarily that were not part of a "required" veterinary school cirriculum.
I just think that owners need to be very careful jumping on a "whole food" bandwagon. Many of the diets I've seen praised on the internet are lacking in nutrient or the owners decide to cut corners and don't add all of the ingredients. Over time, that is going to lead to health problems. One of the worst I can think of off the top of my head are the owners of felid species or crocodilians who insist on feeding raw hamburger as the primary source of protein/nutrition. Metabolic bone disease is a terrible disease. The other huge issue is obesity. A "small" piece of chicken for a human is not the same as "a small" piece of chicken for a pomeranian. In my experience, obesity is a huge issue with these types of diets.
You bring up the absolute best point of all with encouraging owners to read the labels of what they are feeding their animals. I always read food labels on everything I eat. I do the same for my pets. I think the issues with melamine should drive that home for everyone. READ YOUR LABELS and understand them.
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So what do you exactly label "Whole Foods?"
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So what do you exactly label "Whole Foods?"
Sorry, I use that term very, very loosely as meaning any noncommerically available/nonprocessed diet. These include home formulated and homemade diets in addition to minimally processed diets.
Basically I consider Science Diet a commercial diet, others are whole food.
Does that make sense?
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Since you asked, with the patients I see, I work with three nutritionists, one from Ohio, one from Kansas, and one from Missouri with determining dietary needs of my patients. I'm in a very specialized field, so I think its worth it for my patients to get that level of care. And just so you know, with my patients, the majority of thier food could be labeled "whole food" if you want to get technical. I have a fairly strong background in animal nutrition---primarily based on the more exotic species nutrition as a result of classes I've taken voluntarily that were not part of a "required" veterinary school cirriculum.
I just think that owners need to be very careful jumping on a "whole food" bandwagon. Many of the diets I've seen praised on the internet are lacking in nutrient or the owners decide to cut corners and don't add all of the ingredients. Over time, that is going to lead to health problems. One of the worst I can think of off the top of my head are the owners of felid species or crocodilians who insist on feeding raw hamburger as the primary source of protein/nutrition. Metabolic bone disease is a terrible disease. The other huge issue is obesity. A "small" piece of chicken for a human is not the same as "a small" piece of chicken for a pomeranian. In my experience, obesity is a huge issue with these types of diets.
If this was true, you would not have made your original comment about "whole food" diets. I personally prefer the term "species appropriate". I agree, and said so, that someone just feeding hamburger and thinking that is fine, is not the correct way to feed and will result in problems. But if you want to lump all "whole feeders" in together, then I will lump all vets into substandard kibble pushers.
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If this was true, you would not have made your original comment about "whole food" diets. I personally prefer the term "species appropriate". I agree, and said so, that someone just feeding hamburger and thinking that is fine, is not the correct way to feed and will result in problems. But if you want to lump all "whole feeders" in together, then I will lump all vets into substandard kibble pushers.
What is your issue? Seriously.
You are making this a personal attack.
All I've tried to do is come to this section of the board---one I was invited too by another member and share information from my perspective. If you want to make it a battle, honey, I'm always up for a good fight. You are presenting a large amount of what appears to be very one sided, very biased information. I'm trying to encourage people to think about it instead of taking some of the crap you are posting up as gospel.
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Sorry, I use that term very, very loosely as meaning any noncommerically available/nonprocessed diet. These include home formulated and homemade diets in addition to minimally processed diets.
Basically I consider Science Diet a commercial diet, others are whole food.
Does that make sense?
I guess :-\
but are you categorizing raw food & cooked food under "whole foods?"
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I guess :-\
but are you categorizing raw food & cooked food under "whole foods?"
Yes, I am, but if you want to get technical, they are very different because cooking will alter the nutritional content and it will decrease the risk of infectious disease (from meat sources). Again, I'm using that term, very, very loosely.
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What is your issue? Seriously.
You are making this a personal attack.
All I've tried to do is come to this section of the board---one I was invited too by another member and share information from my perspective. If you want to make it a battle, honey, I'm always up for a good fight. You are presenting a large amount of what appears to be very one sided, very biased information. I'm trying to encourage people to think about it instead of taking some of the crap you are posting up as gospel.
Well, not taking sides...but I do like the debates...seems like I get more from it.
I never liked the medical community. I've always found Doctors/Vets/Medical Field 'witch craft'
Why I say that...is because something comes out as the end all cure one month & the next month it's tossed out as being old information.
I do find some findings 'intersting'...but I never believe everything a "Doctor, Lawyer, Car Salesman" pitch me.
I think you can understand that & won't take it personally
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Yes, I am, but if you want to get technical, they are very different because cooking will alter the nutritional content and it will decrease the risk of infectious disease (from meat sources). Again, I'm using that term, very, very loosely.
Well..thats where I was heading.
When you lump them together in category...it's easy for someone to interpret it wrong.
Thats all
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What is your issue? Seriously.
You are making this a personal attack.
All I've tried to do is come to this section of the board---one I was invited too by another member and share information from my perspective. If you want to make it a battle, honey, I'm always up for a good fight. You are presenting a large amount of what appears to be very one sided, very biased information. I'm trying to encourage people to think about it instead of taking some of the crap you are posting up as gospel.
And what do you think I am trying to do? To let people know they may just be intelligent enough to not have to feed from a bag. If you have read other posts from me you would see that I have also provided information on choosing a better kibble. I know raw feeding is not for everyone, so I try and educate on kibble also.
Unlike most close minded vets who preach the horrors of raw feeding, putting out fear mongering tactics and misinformation. You many not push Science Death but how many vets do? That is one of the bottom of the barrel foods in my opinion.
Remember, you made the "if I had a dollar" statement and just left it at that.
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Yes, I am, but if you want to get technical, they are very different because cooking will alter the nutritional content and it will decrease the risk of infectious disease (from meat sources). Again, I'm using that term, very, very loosely.
I don't advocate cooking. I think it is too hard too make up for the cal/phos and other nutrients from the cooking.
Infectious disease from a meat source is more of a concern to the person feeding than the animal eating. But if you can manage to handle meat for your family and yourself, I think most people can manage it for their pets.
And as we can see by the continued headlines of contaminated kibble, at least by raw feeding you know what you are feeding.
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Well, not taking sides...but I do like the debates...seems like I get more from it.
I never liked the medical community. I've always found Doctors/Vets/Medical Field 'witch craft'
Why I say that...is because something comes out as the end all cure one month & the next month it's tossed out as being old information.
I do find some findings 'intersting'...but I never believe everything a "Doctor, Lawyer, Car Salesman" pitch me.
I think you can understand that & won't take it personally
Nah, I don't take it personally.
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Remember, you made the "if I had a dollar" statement and just left it at that.
Sarcasm honey, sarcasm....
Seriously, I've seen way too many cases to even remotely keep track of of dogs with gastroenteritis secondary to feeding a variety of diets. Thats what I was referring too. I think there may be value to whole food diets---ie homemade diets, but you absolutely cannot forget that the average diet for the average American is by and large crap with too much fat, too much salt, and way too much sugar. How can you expect them to feed their pets any better? Its soemthing to think about.
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Sarcasm honey, sarcasm....
Seriously, I've seen way too many cases to even remotely keep track of of dogs with gastroenteritis secondary to feeding a variety of diets. Thats what I was referring too. I think there may be value to whole food diets---ie homemade diets, but you absolutely cannot forget that the average diet for the average American is by and large crap with too much fat, too much salt, and way too much sugar. How can you expect them to feed their pets any better? Its soemthing to think about.
And I know to many people that have dogs with skin problems and gastro problems that eat that crap. I have lost count of how many people I have heard say the dramatic change when they got off the crap in a bag, and especially away from the grains.
You want to stick to your "people are too stupid to feed an animal" theory fine, but don't find fault with people like me that actually try and educate and enlighten.
You think their may be value to a "whole foods diet"? yes, feeding a carnivore like a carnivore, and the way it's digestive system is designed for, just might have some value.
sarcasm, yeah I know it.
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And I know to many people that have dogs with skin problems and gastro problems that eat that crap. I have lost count of how many people I have heard say the dramatic change when they got off the crap in a bag, and especially away from the grains.
You want to stick to your "people are too stupid to feed an animal" theory fine, but don't find fault with people like me that actually try and educate and enlighten.
You think their may be value to a "whole foods diet"? yes, feeding a carnivore like a carnivore, and the way it's digestive system is designed for, just might have some value.
sarcasm, yeah I know it.
Ok, a quick question. Are domestic dogs a carnivore?
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Ok, a quick question. Are domestic dogs a carnivore?
Yes, though one could argue they are scavengers or opportunistic eaters, it still does not change their digestion system, which is how you would classify them.
Unless you have some evidence that their digestive system has changed since domestication don't even bother. What an animal can live on, is not the same as what it is best to live on.
Now a question for you, why is it such an affront to most vets that a person chooses to feed an unprocessed diet? I agree that not everyone should feed this way if they are not going to educated themselves, but why discourage or find fault with those that chose the healthier way? In one statement you criticize people for the way they eat, yet don't encourage and actually discourage people for feeding an animal the way it is designed to eat.
That just makes no sense. :-\
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You can pick this apart and point out the flaws:
http://dogtorj.tripod.com/id51.html (http://dogtorj.tripod.com/id51.html)
Dogs are Carnivores
by Jeannie Thomason
I feel this bares repeating these days as so many people are thinking and treating their dogs like they are humans. I too love my dogs like they are my children but we need to remember they are not humans. Nor do they think like humans nor eat like humans. God created dogs to be carnivores to help keep nature in balance.
The assumption that dogs are omnivores remains to be proven, whereas the truth about dogs being natural carnivores is very well-supported by the evidence available to us.
Like humans, dogs have two sets of teeth in their lives. The 28 baby teeth erupt through the gums between the third and sixth weeks of age. Puppies molars. Puppy teeth begin to shed and be replaced by permanent adult teeth at about four months of age. Although there is some variation in breeds, most adult dogs have 42 teeth, with the premolars coming last, at about six or seven months.
Look into your dog mouth. Those huge impressive teeth (or tiny needle sharp teeth) are designed for grabbing, ripping, tearing, shredding, and shearing meat (Feldhamer, G.A. 1999. Mammology: Adaptation, Diversity, and Ecology. McGraw-Hill. pg 258.). They are not equipped with large flat molars for grinding up plant matter. Their molars are pointed and situated in a scissors bite (along with the rest of their teeth) that powerfully disposes of meat, bone, and hide. Carnivores are equipped with a peculiar set of teeth that includes the presence of carnassial teeth: the fourth upper premolar and first lower molar.
Hence, dogs do not chew, they are designed to bite, rip, shred, crunch and swallow.
Canine teeth or as some people call them, Fangs for grabbing and puncturing, incisors for nibbling, premolars for tearing, and molars for crushing (not chewing or masticating) bone -- although the family dog may appear to be far more civilized than his wild relatives, he still has the same equipment for eating, grooming, greeting, and defense.
Four premolars line each side of the upper and lower jaws in back of the canines. These are the shearing teeth, used to rip great hunks of flesh from prey animals. Although they no longer hunt for survival, dogs can still eat in the manner of wolves - by grabbing meat with the premolars and ripping it off the bone.
The top jaw has two molars on each side, and the bottom jaw has three. These are the crushing teeth, use by wolves to crack caribou bones.
Their jaws hinge open widely, allowing them to gulp large chunks of meat and bone. The skull and jaw design of a carnivore: a deep and C-shaped mandibular fossa prevents lateral movement of the jaw (lateral movement is necessary for eating plant matter). Yes, I emphasize the "gulp". Dogs do not "chew" their food. In the wild resources are scarce, they are designed to be able to gorge and fast for this purpose; as they are hard wired for this no amount of thinking "he knows he gets fed twice a day" etc will change the dog's perspective. He may crunch down once or twice but is just not designed to "chew" his/her food. Many people new to raw feeding freak out that their dog might swallow the meat and/or bones whole. YES, they will pretty much do that. They will tear large chunks of meat off the bone and then if the bone is smaller such as a chicken or turkey bone, they will crush the bone by chomping down once or twice and swallow. God designed the dog's stomach acids to be much stronger than ours and they are designed for digesting large lumps of meat and even good size pieces of RAW bone.
However much we humans have done to tinker with and change theirs body design (resulting in varying sizes and conformations), we have done nothing to change the internal anatomy and physiology of our carnivorous canines.
Dogs have the internal anatomy and physiology of a carnivore (Feldhamer, G.A. 1999. Mammology: Adaptation, Diversity, and Ecology. McGraw-Hill. pg 260.). They have a highly elastic stomach designed to hold large quantities of meat, bone, organs, and hide. Their stomachs are simple, with an undeveloped caecum (Feldhamer, G.A. 1999. Mammology: Adaptation, Diversity, and Ecology. McGraw-Hill. pg 260.). They have a relatively short foregut and a short, smooth, unsacculated colon. This means food passes through quickly. Vegetable and plant matter, however, needs time to sit and ferment. This equates to longer, sacculated colons, larger and longer small intestines, and occasionally the presence of a caecum. Dogs have none of these, but have the shorter foregut and hindgut consistent with carnivorous animals. This explains why plant matter comes out the same way it came in; there was no time for it to be broken down and digested (among other things). People know this; this is why they tell you that vegetables and grains have to be preprocessed for your dog to get anything out of them. But even then, feeding vegetables and grains to a carnivorous animal is a highly questionable practice.
You see, dogs do not normally produce the necessary enzymes in their saliva (amylase, for example) to start the break-down of carbohydrates and starches; amylase in saliva is something omnivorous and herbivorous animals possess, but not carnivorous animals. This places the burden entirely on the pancreas, forcing it to produce large amounts of amylase to deal with the starch, cellulose, and carbohydrates in plant matter. Neither does the carnivore's pancreas secrete cellulase to split the cellulose into glucose molecules, nor have dogs become efficient at digesting and assimilating and utilizing plant material as a source of high quality protein. Herbivores do those sorts of things Canine and Feline Nutrition Case, Carey and Hirakawa Published by Mosby, 1995
Thus, feeding dogs as though they were humans (omnivores) taxes the pancreas and places extra strain on it, as it must work harder for the dog to digest the starchy, carbohydrate-filled food instead of just producing normal amounts of the enzymes needed to digest proteins and fats (which, when fed raw, begin to "self-digest" when the cells are crushed through crushing and tearing and their enzymes are released).
Nor do dogs have the kinds of friendly bacteria that break down cellulose and starch for them. As a result, most of the nutrients contained in plant matter—even preprocessed plant matter—are unavailable to dogs. This is why dog food manufacturers have to add such high amounts of synthetic vitamins and minerals (the fact that cooking destroys all the vitamins and minerals and thus creates the need for supplementation aside) to their dog foods. If a dog can only digest 40-60% of its grain-based food, then it will only be receiving 40-60% (ideally!) of the vitamins and minerals it needs. To compensate for this, the manufacturer must add a higher concentration of vitamins and minerals than the dog actually needs. The result of feeding dogs a highly processed, grain-based food is a suppressed immune system and the underproduction of the enzymes necessary to thoroughly digest raw meaty bones (Lonsdale, T. 2001. Raw Meaty Bones).
Dogs are so much like wolves physiologically that they are frequently used in wolf studies as a physiological model for wolf body processes (Mech, L.D. 2003. Wolves: Behavior, Ecology, and Conservation). Additionally, dogs and wolves share 99.8% of their mitochondrial DNA (Wayne, R.K. Molecular Evolution of the Dog Family). This next quote is from Robert K. Wayne, Ph.D., and his discussion on canine genetics (taken from www.fiu.edu/~milesk/Genetics.html).
"The domestic dog is an extremely close relative of the gray wolf, differing from it by at most 0.2% of mDNA sequence..."
Dogs have recently been reclassified as Canis lupus familiaris by the Smithsonian Institute (Wayne, R.K. "What is a Wolfdog?" www.fiu.edu/~milesk/Genetics.html), placing it in the same species as the gray wolf, Canis lupus. The dog is, by all scientific standards and by evolutionary history, a domesticated wolf (Feldhamer, G.A. 1999. Mammology: Adaptation, Diversity, and Ecology. McGraw-Hill. pg 472.). Those who insist dogs did not descend from wolves must disprove the litany of scientific evidence that concludes wolves are the ancestors of dogs. And, as we have already established, the wolf is a carnivore. Since a dog's internal physiology does not differ from a wolf, dogs have the same physiological and nutritional needs as those carnivorous predators, which, remember, "need to ingest all the major parts of their herbivorous prey, except the plants in the digestive system" to "grow and maintain their own bodies" (Mech, L.D. 2003. Wolves: Behavior, Ecology, and Conservation.).
Some people are under the impression that the bacteria in raw meat may hurt the dog. IF your dog has an innunocompromised system or some underlying health problem then the bacteria may cause a problem.
Sadly, Raw diets have also been blamed for causing things like pancreatitis and kidney disease, when in reality the underlying disease was already there and is was simply brought to light by the change in diet. Dogs are surprisingly well-equipped to deal with bacteria. Their saliva has antibacterial properties; it contains lysozyme, an enzyme that lyses and destroys harmful bacteria. Their short digestive tract is designed to push through food and bacteria quickly without giving bacteria time to colonize. The extremely acidic environment in the gut is also a good bacteria colonization deterrent. People often point to the fact that dogs shed salmonella in their feces, (but, then again, even kibble-fed dogs do this) without showing any ill effects as proof that the dog is infected with salmonella. In reality, all this proves is that the dog has effectively passed the salmonella through its system with no problems. Yes, the dog can act as a salmonella carrier, but the solution is simple—do not eat dog poop and wash your hands after picking up after your dog.
As mentioned above, even kibble-fed dogs can and do regularly shed salmonella and other bacteria. Most of the documented cases of severe bacterial septicemia though are from kibble-fed animals or animals suffering from reactions to vaccines. Commercial pet foods have been pulled off shelves more than once because of bacteria AND molds that produce a deadly toxin. The solution? Use common sense. Clean up well and wash your hands. And think about your dog—this is an animal that can lick itself, lick other dogs, eat a variety of disgusting rotting things, and ingest its own feces or those of other animals with no ill effects. The dog, plain and simple, can handle greater bacterial loads than we can.
Let's face it, a healthy dog will not suffer from bacterial infections or bacterial septicemia. it is just common sense. A dog suffering from "salmonella poisoning" is obviously not healthy, especially when compared to a dog that ate the same food with the same salmonella load but is perfectly healthy and unaffected. The first dog has suffered a 'breakdown' in its health that allowed the bacteria to become a problem; if one is talking in homeopathic medicine terminology, this is simply one more symptom that shows the dog is suffering from chronic disease.
I believe that it is the kibble, not the raw meat, that causes bacterial problems. Kibble in the pet's intestine not only irritates the lining of the bowels but also provides the perfect warm, wet environment with plenty of undigested sugars and starches as food for bacteria. This is why thousands of processed food-fed animals suffer from a condition called Small Intestinal Bacterial Overgrowth, or SIBO (Lonsdale, T. 2001. Raw Meaty Bones. pg 85). Raw meaty bones, however, create a very inhospitable environment for bacteria, as RMBs are easily digestible and have no carbohydrates, starches, or sugars to feed the bacteria.
What about Cooked diets?
"There are several aspects of cooked diets that pose problems. Tom Lonsdale deals with this in depth in Chapter 4 of his book Raw Meaty Bones.
Okay, now to the effects of heat. If you burn your finger, what happens? The skin tissue dies. Overly apply heat to food and the nutrients are progressively killed/destroyed.
First of all, the act of cooking alters the proteins, vitamins, fats, and minerals in a food. This alteration can make some nutrients more readily available and others less available. Cooking can alter fats to the point of being toxic and carcinogenic (The American Society for Nutritional Sciences. April 2004. Meat Consumption Patterns and Preparation, Genetic Variants of Metabolic Enzymes, and Their Association with Rectal Cancer in Men and Women. Journal of Nutrition. 134:776-784.), and cooked proteins can be altered to the point where they cause allergic reactions whereas raw proteins do not (Clark, W.R. 1995. Hypersensitivity and Allergy, in At War Within: The double edged sword of immunity, Oxford University Press, New York. pg 88.). If an animal has an "allergy" to chicken or beef, it may very often be cooked chicken or beef and not the raw form.
It should be well understood and recognized in scientific literature that heat breaks down vitamins, amino acids and produces undesirable cross-linkages in proteins, particularly in meat.
At 110 degrees Fahrenheit (approximately 43 degrees Centigrade) two of the 8 essential amino acids, tryptophan and lysine, are destroyed.
When food is cooked above 117 degrees F for three minutes or longer, the following deleterious changes begin, and progressively cause increased nutritional damage as higher temperatures are applied over prolonged periods of time:
*proteins coagulate
*high temperatures denature protein molecular structure, leading to deficiency of some essential amino acids
*carbohydrates caramelize
*overly heated fats generate numerous carcinogens including acrolein, nitrosamines, hydrocarbons, and benzopyrene (one of the most potent cancer-causing agents known)
*natural fibers break down, cellulose is completely changed from its natural condition: it loses its ability to sweep the alimentary canal clean
* 30% to 50% of vitamins and minerals are destroyed
*100% of enzymes are damaged, the body’s enzyme potential is depleted which drains energy needed to maintain and repair tissue and organ systems, thereby shortening the life span.
Dr. Kouchakoff of Switzerland conducted over 300 detailed experiments, which pinpointed the pathogenic nature of cooked and processed foods. Food heated to temperatures of just 120 to 190 degrees F (a range usually relegated to warming rather than cooking which, nevertheless destroys all enzymes), causes leukocytosis in the body. Leukocytosis is a term applied to an abnormally high white corpuscle count.
Second, cooked food lacks all the benefits of raw food. Cooked food is deficient in vitamins, minerals, and enzymes, because the very act of cooking destroys or alters much of them (exceptions to this are things like lightly steamed broccoli or tomatoes, but these are not appropriate foods for carnivores!). This decreases the bioavailability of these valuable chemicals and makes them less available to the animal. This is why these things have to be added back into pet foods and why a variety of supplements need to be added to home-cooked pet food—and why a variety of species inappropriate items are utilized as ingredients in these meals!
Vitamins and minerals can be added back into cooked food, but finding the appropriate balance is incredibly difficult. Synthetic vitamins and minerals do not always exhibit the same chirality (three dimensional structure) that the natural forms had, which means their efficiency and use to the body are substantially decreased. This is compensated by oversupplementation, which then results in the inhibited uptake of other necessary vitamins and minerals. For example, excess inorganic calcium reduces the availability of iron, copper, iodine, and zinc (Lonsdale, T. 2001. Raw Meaty Bones. pg 88). If you are feeding a cooked, home-made diet, how can you be sure that your pet's needs are being sufficiently met if the very act of cooking destroys much of what is beneficial to your pet? Essentially, once you cook your pet's food you are now guessing which vitamins or minerals have been destroyed, how much of these might have been destroyed (which means you would have to know how much was present in the food in the first place), and how much supplementation your pet needs. Then you run into another problem: no one really knows what our pets REALLY need and use in terms of vitamins and minerals. We only know what amounts are too much and what amounts are too little OVER A SIX-MONTH PERIOD, not over a period of years. Additionally, how can we be sure that researchers have discovered all the nutrients necessary for our pets? This still is an on-going process (such as Eukanuba adding DHA to their foods; DHA is found in raw prey, so any dog or canid eating raw prey has been receiving appropriate levels of DHA), and since cooking food destroys minerals and vitamins and enzymes, researchers may be missing some very important nutrients. Feeding cooked food also causes pets to miss out on these 'unknown' nutrients, whereas raw food contains them in appropriate amounts.
People try to compensate for vitamin and mineral deficiencies without resorting to supplements. Instead, they simply add vegetables, grains, and dairy products to their carnivores' diets. Complex recipes are developed that create a wide range of foods for the dog (or cat) that must be cooked, steamed, blended, etc. in order for the dog to receive proper nutrition. Our carnivores once again have an omnivorous diet forced upon them in order to help them obtain all the appropriate nutrition that could simply be had by feeding a variety of raw meaty bones and organ meats. Simplicity and perfection are traded for complexity and imperfection. Raw food, however, has the perfect balance of vitamins and minerals if fed as a part of a prey-model diet (i.e. a whole rabbit) (Lonsdale, T. 2001. Raw Meaty Bones. Chapter 4.)
Raw food also has unaltered proteins and nutrients, and the bioavailability of these nutrients is very high. And raw food—particularly whole carcasses and raw meaty bones—provide the NECESSARY teeth-cleaning effects that are lacking in any cooked diet. Periodontal disease-causing bacteria are scraped away at each feeding, whereas a cooked food-fed dog has that bacteria remaining, which are then coated over by a sticky plaque resulting from the cooked grains, vegetables, and meat proteins.
Cooking denatures protein. According to Encyclopedia Britannica, denaturation is a modification of the molecular structure of protein by heat or by an acid, an alkali, or ultraviolet radiation that destroys or diminishes its original properties and biological activity.
Denaturation alters protein and makes it unusable or less usable. According to Britannica, protein molecules are readily altered by heat:. Unlike simple organic molecules, the physical and chemical properties of protein are markedly altered when the substance is just boiled in water. Further: All of the agents able to cause denaturat-ion are able to break the secondary bonds that hold the chains in place. Once these weak bonds are broken, the molecule falls into a disorganized tangle devoid of biological function.
Again, according to Britannica the most significant effect of protein denaturation is the loss of the its biological function. For example, enzymes lose their catalytic powers and hemoglobin loses its capacity to carry oxygen. The changes that accompany denaturation have been shown to result from destruction of the specific pattern in which the amino acid chains are folded in the native protein. In Britannica is the acknowledgement that "cooking destroys protein to make it practically useless"
There are two ways to denature the proteins: chemically using digestive enzymes, or through the use of heat. Via heat, the body does not have the recombinant ability to utilize damaged denatured protein components (amino acids) and rebuild them once again into viable protein molecules.
Some Physiologists claim that cooking and digestion are virtually the same: that cooking is a form of predigestion where heat is used to hydrolyze nutrients that would otherwise be hydrolyzed at body temperature through digestion. This due to the enormous heat exposure during cooking, that denatures the protein molecule past a point of being bioactive, however, body heat is too low to effect the protein molecule so adversely.
When proteins are subjected to high heat during cooking, enzyme resistant linkages are formed between the amino acid chains. The body cannot separate these amino acids. What the body cannot use, it must eliminate. Cooked proteins become a source of toxicity: dead organic waste material acted upon and elaborated by bacterial flora.
When wholesome protein foods are eaten raw, the body makes maximum use of all amino acids without the accompanying toxins of cooked food.
According to the textbook Nutritional Value of Food Processing, 3rd Edition, (by Karmas, Harris, published by Van Nostrand Reinhold) which is written for food chemists in the industrial processed food industry: changes that occur during processing either result in nutrient loss or destruction. Heat processing has a detrimental effect on nutrients since thermal degradation of nutrients can and does occur. Reduction in nutrient content depends on the severity of the thermal processing.
Protein molecules under ideal eating and digestive conditions are broken down into amino acids by gastric enzymes. Every protein molecule in the body is synthesized from these amino acids. Protein you consume IS NOT used as protein: it is first recycled or broken down into its constituent amino acids AND THEN used to build protein molecules the body needs.
There are 23 different amino acids. These link together in different combinations in extremely long chains to create protein molecules, like individual rail cars form a train. The amino group gives each amino acid its specific identifying characteristic that differentiates it from the others. Excessive heat sloughs off or decapitates the amino group. Without this amino group, the amino acid is rendered useless and is toxic.
I am often berated for recommending a raw diet as being best for our carnivorous pets but after all my research and feeding my own pets this way for years now, I can not help but believe that our pet dogs and cats would be much healthier in the long run if fed live whole foods.
For more information on cooked food versus raw food, please check out the famous Pottenger cat study:
http://www.nutritionreallyworks.com/Pottengers-cats.html
http://www.price-pottenger.org/Articles/PottsCats.html
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http://www.rawmeatybones.com/diet/exp-diet-guide.pdf (http://www.rawmeatybones.com/diet/exp-diet-guide.pdf)
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some of this stuff is going to take days to read.
Is there cliff notes available?
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some of this stuff is going to take days to read.
Is there cliff notes available?
No, there is no time limit on learning. :)
Feeding is simple, but sorry, no cliff notes on educating yourself. :)
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some really good info here and on the Vaccine Thread too. Thanks for the time and effort at presenting the information everyone it is very appreciated :)
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No, there is no time limit on learning. :)
Feeding is simple, but sorry, no cliff notes on educating yourself. :)
Flower, you've made a couple of very good posts in this thread....especially the one about dogs being carnivores. I will admit, I was trying to lead you with that question and you shot me down...in a ball of flames. Very good. ;)
I will say I don't disagree with an owner who is willing to take the time to formulate a "homemade" (I'm changing my terminology here for Knny's benefit) diet that is nutritionally complete for their pets. The one problem I've encountered with it is the same one I mentioned before, owners, when using these types of diets MUST take the time to formulate a diet that is nutritionally compete for their pets. Nutrition will not be the be all or end all for preventing disease, but it will help, and considering the recent pet food recall, is something that needs to be looked at very closely by both veterinarians and pet owners. A well formulated homemade diet is great. The problem comes with owners who do not take the time to do that and who cut corners or they stubbornly cling to unfounded beleifs that result in nutritional disease in our pets. Nutritional diseases encountered amoung our pets in the 1930's and 40's have been virtually eliminated with commercial dog foods (I'm refering to ricketts, metabolic bone diseases, and other gross nutritional imbalances). Unfortunately it appears as if we have come full circle with commercial diets where the manufacturer, or worse yet the manufacturer's suppliers, have managed to cut costs (and enhance profit) in a way that has resulted in the deaths of many family pets. Its a sad case of the dollar governing things once again with little regard for who or what is hurt.
The other big problem is human laziness. Lets be honest, people are lazy. Thats why ready made meals are such big sellers. If a person won't cook for themselves, how can you demand that they cook for their pet? It just doesn't happen that often.
One study I'd like to see involving homemade diets is the incidence of obesity in relationship to the dog eating only a homemade diet and a dog fed a commerical food with "table scraps". I'd also like to see the incidence of obesity in domestic cats allowed to hunt (or conversely a diet composed of whole rodents, other mammals and birds---a comparative small cat "wild" diet) as their sole source of food vs domestic cats fed commercial cats. I'm not aware of such a controlled study existing, but I'll also admit I haven't taken the time to do a full literature search on it.
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The other big problem is human laziness. Lets be honest, people are lazy. Thats why ready made meals are such big sellers. If a person won't cook for themselves, how can you demand that they cook for their pet? It just doesn't happen that often.
I agree
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Vet, I agree with a lot you said. Though I think that it is much easier to feed a raw diet than is thought. A home cooked diet is another story. That type of diet can easily lead to deficiencies. I would probably steer someone to a better quality kibble over home cooking.
I have come across a few people (no one on here!) that have mentioned raw feeding but I could tell they weren't going to do any research and thought throwing some hamburger down every day would be sufficient. That makes me cringe.
When you say home made, I think cooked, btw. Raw fed dogs fed raw meaty bones, muscle meat, and some offals, usually are not obese. I think home cooking which usually includes some grains or something may lead to obesity.
The whole point IMO, is to get away from the grains. Unfortunately kibble needs some kind of grain or something to give it it's shape. Some of the freeze dried raw products (Wysong) are not that bad, but are costly. Same with buying preground (Bravo, Oma's, aplaceforpaws). I bet I can feed my 4 dogs for the same cost or cheaper than if I was feeding them a high quality kibble. You just have to have a freezer so you can buy in bulk!
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I would like to reiterate that....
Raw diets with bones do NOT mean the bones are cooked.
For the longest time, I was one of those people that was afraid of giving a dog a bone because of the horror stories that I would hear (or personally experienced). We've all heard of a dog swallowing chicken bones, splintering, & then dying....very painfully.
I did NOT know for the longest time...
COOKED bones splinter
RAW bones do not.
I know there's some people on here that already know this....but for those that don't...this is FYI
When making up a raw diet or even as VET suggests "Whole Food" diets...DO NOT cook bones & give them to your dogs.
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Vet, I agree with a lot you said. Though I think that it is much easier to feed a raw diet than is thought. A home cooked diet is another story. That type of diet can easily lead to deficiencies. I would probably steer someone to a better quality kibble over home cooking.
I have come across a few people (no one on here!) that have mentioned raw feeding but I could tell they weren't going to do any research and thought throwing some hamburger down every day would be sufficient. That makes me cringe.
When you say home made, I think cooked, btw. Raw fed dogs fed raw meaty bones, muscle meat, and some offals, usually are not obese. I think home cooking which usually includes some grains or something may lead to obesity.
The whole point IMO, is to get away from the grains. Unfortunately kibble needs some kind of grain or something to give it it's shape. Some of the freeze dried raw products (Wysong) are not that bad, but are costly. Same with buying preground (Bravo, Oma's, aplaceforpaws). I bet I can feed my 4 dogs for the same cost or cheaper than if I was feeding them a high quality kibble. You just have to have a freezer so you can buy in bulk!
I apologize for the confusion with terminology. Unfortunately, I do think what I use may be something that is confusing for the people who post on this board....
If one of you wants to take the time to set up some definitions, I'll do what I can to try to keep things consitant with my posts.
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I would like to reiterate that....
Raw diets with bones do NOT mean the bones are cooked.
For the longest time, I was one of those people that was afraid of giving a dog a bone because of the horror stories that I would hear (or personally experienced). We've all heard of a dog swallowing chicken bones, splintering, & then dying....very painfully.
I did NOT know for the longest time...
COOKED bones splinter
RAW bones do not.
I know there's some people on here that already know this....but for those that don't...this is FYI
When making up a raw diet or even as VET suggests "Whole Food" diets...DO NOT cook bones & give them to your dogs.
The biggest problem with bones isnt' that they splinter but that they can break the dogs teeth or become wedged between the teeth. I've only removed one "bone intestinal foreign object"---a porkchop bone that wasn't lodged, but did perforate the small intestine-- but I've fixed many a broken tooth and many a dog with an oral abcess from bones wedged in their teeth.
I used to give knuckle bones to my pits.... until my male slab fractured his carnasial tooth and I ended up having to pull the tooth. Hard, large bones, like cow leg bones (even raw bones) can play hell with some dogs teeth--especially those that are really aggressive chewers. You need to think about that before giving one to your dog.
And just so you know, I think cow hooves are much, much worse, especially the boiled ones available in pet stores. They will destroy a dogs teeth.
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The biggest problem with bones isnt' that they splinter but that they can break the dogs teeth or become wedged between the teeth. I've only removed one "bone intestinal foreign object"---a porkchop bone that wasn't lodged, but did perforate the small intestine-- but I've fixed many a broken tooth and many a dog with an oral abcess from bones wedged in their teeth.
I used to give knuckle bones to my pits.... until my male slab fractured his carnasial tooth and I ended up having to pull the tooth. Hard, large bones, like cow leg bones (even raw bones) can play hell with some dogs teeth--especially those that are really aggressive chewers. You need to think about that before giving one to your dog.
And just so you know, I think cow hooves are much, much worse, especially the boiled ones available in pet stores. They will destroy a dogs teeth.
True...
I do have to stop & think that one dog I had growing up was an aggressive chewer. When he was an "old guy" he basically wore his teeth down to the gums.
Never had an oral abcess....but maybe he was lucky.
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Hard, large bones, like cow leg bones (even raw bones) can play hell with some dogs teeth--especially those that are really aggressive chewers. You need to think about that before giving one to your dog.
I was wondering about that. Scout has many of these, and he loves them ( I believe they're sterilized shin bones). He is an aggressive chewer when he gets going on them. They haven't splintered, but he has managed to make groves in them. Should I take them away? What would be a good alternative?
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I give them marrow or soup bones. Mine are mostly concerned with getting the flesh off the bones and the marrow out. They don't usually try and "eat" them. After about a week (or when I get sick of kicking them) I throw them out. By then they have started to dry out and they have gnawed down the edges. I don't like the long femur bones because then they can't get to the marrow as easily and may try and crack them. Sometimes a femur cut in half is fine though.
If your dog trys to actually chew them up, they might not be a good idea except under supervision, but I have had no problems.
I think Tad makes the bigger dogs jealous because he can get his head in some bones and if not he will stick his paw in, get some marrow, lick it off and repeat. The others rely on their tongues.
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Tad! lol!
The biggest problem with bones isnt' that they splinter but that they can break the dogs teeth or become wedged between the teeth. I've only removed one "bone intestinal foreign object"---a porkchop bone that wasn't lodged, but did perforate the small intestine-- but I've fixed many a broken tooth and many a dog with an oral abcess from bones wedged in their teeth.
I used to give knuckle bones to my pits.... until my male slab fractured his carnasial tooth and I ended up having to pull the tooth. Hard, large bones, like cow leg bones (even raw bones) can play hell with some dogs teeth--especially those that are really aggressive chewers. You need to think about that before giving one to your dog.
And just so you know, I think cow hooves are much, much worse, especially the boiled ones available in pet stores. They will destroy a dogs teeth.
My vet once told me that teeth problems in dogs are not nearly as painful as the same type of problem in a human. Is this true?
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http://www.rawmeatybones.com/diet/exp-diet-guide.pdf (http://www.rawmeatybones.com/diet/exp-diet-guide.pdf)
This link says you can feed rat carcasses. RAT CARCASSES? RAT CARCASSES?
RAT CARCASSES?
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This link says you can feed rat carcasses. RAT CARCASSES? RAT CARCASSES?
RAT CARCASSES?
I believe cat and ferret raw feeders feed rats, mice, etc. :D
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Tad! lol!
My vet once told me that teeth problems in dogs are not nearly as painful as the same type of problem in a human. Is this true?
I think thats pure bullshit. I get seriously pissed at veterinarians that make those type of stupid assed statements because it shows an old-school close minded mentality.
The problem with assessing pain in an animal is that we often attempt to assign "human" emotions to that animal with little concern for the animal itself in question. Teeth in dogs and humnas both contain nerve rich pulp. The gums contain nerve rich mucosa. If there is sufficient dental disease that causes exposure of the pulp or that causes significant alteration of the gingival mucosa, then those nerves will be stimulated. Is it the same pain as a human has? Its irrelevant, the bottom line is pain nerves will be stimulated. That warrants pain medication and treatment of the originating cause irrelevant of the species.
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I believe cat and ferret raw feeders feed rats, mice, etc. :D
Mice and rats are commonly fed to European ferrets.
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I think thats pure bullshit. I get seriously pissed at veterinarians that make those type of stupid assed statements because it shows an old-school close minded mentality.
The problem with assessing pain in an animal is that we often attempt to assign "human" emotions to that animal with little concern for the animal itself in question. Teeth in dogs and humnas both contain nerve rich pulp. The gums contain nerve rich mucosa. If there is sufficient dental disease that causes exposure of the pulp or that causes significant alteration of the gingival mucosa, then those nerves will be stimulated. Is it the same pain as a human has? Its irrelevant, the bottom line is pain nerves will be stimulated. That warrants pain medication and treatment of the originating cause irrelevant of the species.
I think dogs & cats hide pain better than humans.
Whenever a dog or cat (IMO) expressed pain....they were really...really hurt.
really....really
;D
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I think dogs & cats hide pain better than humans.
Whenever a dog or cat (IMO) expressed pain....they were really...really hurt.
really....really
;D
This is true, but you also need to consider that humans are by and large, very,very poor at assessing pain in any species.... including other humans.
I'd rather error on the side of caution with my patients and keep them as comfortable as I can.
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EVERYONE HAS A DOCTOR IN HIM OR HER; WE JUST HAVE TO HELP IN ITS
WORK. THE NATURAL HEALING FORCE WITHIN EACH ONE OF US IS THE GREATEST
FORCE IN GETTING WELL. OUR FOOD SHOULD BE OUR MEDICINE. OUR MEDICINE
SHOULD BE OUR FOOD. (Hippocrates, a Greek physician, and the Father
of Medicine, 460-377 B.C.)
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I think Tad makes the bigger dogs jealous because he can get his head in some bones and if not he will stick his paw in, get some marrow, lick it off and repeat. The others rely on their tongues.
What makes you think dogs are capable of being jealous?
-Hedge
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I give them marrow or soup bones.
On the carpet ??? :o :o :o
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On the carpet ??? :o :o :o
Yes. :) I find them in the couch and chairs sometimes. The downstairs is the dog's area. They (except for Tad if I sleep with him) stay downstairs and are not allowed upstairs. I have a baby gate that blocks the kitchen off and they are not allowed in there either. The other 2 downstairs rooms are theirs, the dining and living room.
I finally got a new dining room table, a metal one with a glass top that they couldn't chew the legs up!
I've got to find that sign that says something like 'Dogs Live here, if you don't like it tough" or something like that, because that is the way it is in our house.
;D
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Trying out a new supplier Saturday. Getting some Tripe, heart, liver, and beef chunks.
Picking up 135 pounds, the doggies are gonna love me even more! ;D
It's harder to find beef products that won't break the bank so I am hoping this turns out good.
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I just picked up 135# of beef products! :o I have some yummy tripe defrosting now. yum yum good stuff!
And yesterday I just went to the butcher and picked up 140 pounds of stuff there!!
My freezer is so full and I still have 40# of chicken that needs to dethaw a bit more so I can break it down!!
Good thing I have a lock on my freezer, the door won't stay shut!! (I definitely recommend a freezer with a lock if you have a freezer, you don't close the door completely and you ruin everything in it!)
I will have to put some stuff in the upstairs freezer on the fridge, no way is there room for 40# more pounds in there.
I will take a picture later and show everyone what real dog food looks like.
;D
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How much did all that cost?
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How much did all that cost?
$178.50 total. The beef is an every other month pickup so I stocked up since I can't get it again until the 2nd Saturday in Sept. It was a flat .70/# for beef chunks, tripe, heart and liver (everything is in 5# rolls) which is waaaaaaaaaay cheaper than I can get it at the store or the butchers. I still had some pork and chicken in the freezer but my butcher is going on vacation the next 2 weeks so I went a got an order there too. So we are really really stocked now!
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STella, did you get my "donation" email? I forgot to collect before I went and picked this all up! lollz ;D
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STella, did you get my "donation" email? I forgot to collect before I went and picked this all up! lollz ;D
Yes but did you get mine? To make things easy you owe me 357.00 - 178.50 = 178.50
;D
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Yes but did you get mine? To make things easy you owe me 357.00 - 178.50 = 178.50
;D
Damn!!!! I've been STell0wnd!! ;D
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Here's the freezer!! The tubs on the door are Tino's chicken I make him.
I love a full freezer!!! :D
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A great site with more than just raw feeding articles, please take a look and browse through some of the links:
http://mypetcarnivore.com/ (http://mypetcarnivore.com/)
I realize I may be one of the few people here that find this interesting, but I do hope some of you check these links out. there are health related articles too.
:)
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Food Source, rabbits, goat, tripe,more..... dehydrated items, whole and ground:
http://www.hare-today.com/ (http://www.hare-today.com/)
"We euthanize all our rabbits with C02. CO2 is an approved method of euthanizing small animals approved by the American Veterinary association. The rabbits are placed in a large Rubbermaid tub with fresh hay on the bottom. The lid is closed and the co2 gas is turned on slowly. The rabbits will fall asleep. They just don't wake back up. I believe this is the most human method and this is important to me. Also C02 does not leave any residual build up in the blood stream so it does not affect the nutritional quality of the meat."
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Links:
http://www.rawdogranch.com/rawdiet.htm (http://www.rawdogranch.com/rawdiet.htm)
http://www.rawlearning.com/rawfaq.html (http://www.rawlearning.com/rawfaq.html)
http://rawfed.com/myths/ (http://rawfed.com/myths/)
http://www.raingoddess.com/vetmed/rawfood.html (http://www.raingoddess.com/vetmed/rawfood.html)
http://rawfed.com/myths/rebuttal.html (http://rawfed.com/myths/rebuttal.html)
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I just did some calculations to see if it costs me more, about the same, or less, to feed raw.
I was told kibble* weighs about 4.5oz for a cup. I would go through approximately 17 cups of kibble a day to feed my 4. A 35# bag is 560oz. And a 35#bag is approximately $30.
560oz / 4.5oz = 124cups per 45#bag
124 / 17 = 7.29 days per 35# bag (7 days)
$30 / 7 = $4.29/day
My last raw purchases was for 275# @ $178.50 total. I feed about 7.5# a day in raw food.
275# / 7.5# = 36 days
$178.50 / 36 = $4.96/day
So using those numbers it costs about the same. BUT.... The beef items I purchased for that total cost $0.70/# and there was more purchased than for a month. Chicken costs me $0.20-0.30 cents less a pound than the beef items. So over the course of a month it could actually cost me LESS to feed a raw diet than kibble.
This does not include the health & teeth benefits this diet may be bring in the form of less vet bills and chronic disease that would need to be treated, and the overall enjoyment consuming real food brings to my dogs, which is priceless. :)
*the kibble used for this comparison was Chicken Soup for the Pet Lover's Soul, the kibble that I recommend to kibble feeders
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Very interesting info. Thanks Flower.
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I have been giving Scout raw marrow beef bones. He loves them and only seems to want one about once a week. If I give him one any more often, he immediately finds a place to bury it. He then goes back to get it a few days later. I've also been adding a small amount of beef BARF to his kibble. I have a bag of BARF tripe in the freezer too. Is all this okay or am I doing him a disservice by not committing to one or the other ??? (Raw vs kibble) I want to make sure I've done all my due diligence if and when I decide to go 100% raw. I'm not there yet.
So... now that I have some of this stuff
(http://www.barfworld.com/System/images/Tripe.gif)
what do I do with it? Is it just for an ocassional treat or a meal? How much at a time?
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Flower has helped me switch Oscar over to raw for about the past 2 weeks. I still mix about a quarter cup of kibble in with his raw beef and bones(I havent got the nerve to thaw the tripe yet). So far so good- he no longer leaves half a cup of food for latter and the day and he comes and tells me when hes hungry!
Flower - his poop is picture perfect! :D
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I have been giving Scout raw marrow beef bones. He loves them and only seems to want one about once a week. If I give him one any more often, he immediately finds a place to bury it. He then goes back to get it a few days later. I've also been adding a small amount of beef BARF to his kibble. I have a bag of BARF tripe in the freezer too. Is all this okay or am I doing him a disservice by not committing to one or the other ??? (Raw vs kibble) I want to make sure I've done all my due diligence if and when I decide to go 100% raw. I'm not there yet.
So... now that I have some of this stuff
(http://www.barfworld.com/System/images/Tripe.gif)
what do I do with it? Is it just for an ocassional treat or a meal? How much at a time?
Tripe is fed as a meal. You can mix it with the beef if you want or by itself. He should LOVE it. :D
Some people do feed raw and kibble with no apparent problems to the dog. They usually do them separate, one meal kibble, one meal raw, because kibble and raw digest at different rates and may cause tummy problems. That is how I would suggest feeding them if you continue to feed both, but if he is having no problems with them mixed, then you can continue to do it that way too.
As far as doing him a disservice by feeding both..... By feeding the kibble you are still giving him grains, so he cannot get the full benefit of a raw, grain free diet. Nor will you get the smaller poop benefit. :-X If you don't want to go 100% raw for whatever reason, I would say to keep feeding him some raw if you can because then he is getting unprocessed real food that way. By feeding only preground raw he is missing out on the teeth cleaning benefits of having whole bones to crunch and chew. While the marrow bones do help, because they are really eaten and crunched/chewed they don't compare to feeding raw meaty bones (RMB's).
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Flower has helped me switch Oscar over to raw for about the past 2 weeks. I still mix about a quarter cup of kibble in with his raw beef and bones(I havent got the nerve to thaw the tripe yet). So far so good- he no longer leaves half a cup of food for latter and the day and he comes and tells me when hes hungry!
Flower - his poop is picture perfect! :D
Glad to hear this!! I'm telling you, that tripe you have is less stinky than the kind I am currently feeding. :-X
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8)
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The FDA is working for the kibble manufacture agenda, this it TOTAL bullshit!
Quote:
Almost a week after Bravo! a raw pet food diet producer, announces a
product recall, Melinda Miller, one of the principals of Bravo and a
co-founder of the North American Raw Petfood Association (NARPA)
writes a memo and sends the following email:
*******
A Message From Bravo:
*ALL* raw meat carries pathogens. Whether you buy from the grocery
store, from wholesale meat suppliers, or from prepared raw diet
manufacturers.
It is impossible to avoid. The USDA allows poultry producers to have
up to 23% Salmonella contamination on poultry. A good portion of
chickens are actually *born* with Salmonella. So the poultry products
that manufacturers must use are contaminated long before it ever gets
to us. Since these are *RAW* diets and we don't cook them, the
bacteria is left intact. This is true for *every* raw diet
manufacturer and for every person who feeds raw regardless of their
source. Raw meat has bacteria - that's why people are told to wash
their hands after handling raw meat. ANYONE who has fed raw has fed
pathogens such as Salmonella and Listeria.
Do Salmonella and Listeria pose a threat to our dogs and cats? Not
really. If you go to our website you'll find a recall FAQ that gives
citations about how Salmonella is a normal part of the intestinal
flora and how dogs apparently neutralize the bacteria. There's even a
quote from the FDA Consumer magazine that acknowledges that healthy
dogs and cats rarely become ill from Salmonella.
So why is the FDA involved and why did we do the recall? You can find
more information on that on our website also. But briefly you should
know some of this:
The FDA agents told us that we are just the first of the raw diet
companies to be visited, and that they hope to be able to shut down
the raw diet industry and stop raw feeding. So this is an industry
problem, not a Bravo problem.
The FDA has a very black eye due to the melamine recalls. So, they
want an easy win so they can prove they are safeguarding America's
pets. Raw diets are an easy target for them.
The FDA is holding raw diets to a *cooked* diet standard and has no
desire to be reasonable and acknowledge that you can't hold *RAW* meat
to the same regulation that governs *cooked* meat.
The FDA and USDA are currently in a bitter battle. The FDA is trying
to take control of USDA operations. We believe one of the reasons
Bravo was chosen was that we are a USDA facility. By bashing Bravo
they are able to bash the USDA.
This recall is the result of politics and unreasonable bureaucrats.
Bravo raw products carry the same risk - and BENEFITS - as any raw
product - whether home-prepared or manufactured.
We have been a company dedicated to high quality. That's why we use
antibiotic-free poultry, and grass-fed, hormone-free red meats. It's
why we manufacture in our own USDA plant under USDA human processing
standards. Other than the reality that all raw meat has some pathogen
presence, nothing has changed. You can still count on us to make a
high quality and beneficial products.
To those who have been sending notes of support, thank you very much.
We're caught in the midst of a political struggle and it helps to know
there are people who understand and appreciate the passion
and care we put into Bravo products.
FMI: www.bravorawdiet.com
Melinda
Melinda Miller
Bravo Raw Diet
Unquote
http://www.bravorawdiet.com/recallinfo.html (http://www.bravorawdiet.com/recallinfo.html)
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http://www.bravorawdiet.com/recallinfo.html
Have any pets or humans become ill from Bravo! Raw Diet?
No. None that we know of
Why is Bravo! recalling their products?
There are existing FDA regulations which do not allow Salmonella presence in cooked pet foods – i.e., canned foods and kibble. While raw diet manufacturers do not make cooked foods, we fall under the same FDA standards as those who do. Despite the difference in products – cooked vs. raw – Bravo! wants to fully cooperate with the FDA and is voluntarily complying with their regulations.
How did your Bravo! products become contaminated?
Raw meat, especially poultry, harbors pathogens (bacteria). That is why it is essential for you to wash your hands after handling raw meat and to clean surfaces and utensils that have been in contact with raw meat. Approximately 15 percent to 23 percent of all poultry is estimated to be contaminated with Salmonella by the time it reaches the age of slaughter.1 Therefore, contamination takes place long before the poultry parts ever make it to raw diet manufacturers for processing. The USDA recognizes Salmonella as a fact of life and has even set “tolerance levels” for Salmonella – so poultry producers are allowed to have a certain amount of Salmonella present in their birds. The reality for raw feeders is that low levels of pathogens are present in most raw meats, most of the time, whether they feed raw meat from the supermarket or whether they buy prepared raw diets from manufacturers. If you have been feeding raw food to your pet for more than a day or two, your pet has consumed pathogens such as Salmonella.
Does this mean my pet is going to get Salmonella poisoning?
There is no definitive answer for this; however, we want you to consider the following:
Most dogs and cats can eat high quality raw meat without a problem, even if the same raw meat would make humans very sick. They are resistant - NOT immune - from the disease potential of these pathogens, and healthy dogs often harbor them without symptoms. Think about your dog - this is an animal that can lick itself, lick other dogs, eat a variety of disgusting rotting things, and ingest its own feces or those of other animals with no ill effects. Dogs, and cats as well, simply can handle greater bacterial loads than humans can because their physiology is different.
Here’s what the Merck Veterinary Manual says about Salmonella in pets:
“Many dogs and cats are asymptomatic carriers of Salmonellae. Clinical disease is uncommon, but when it is seen, it is often associated with hospitalization, another infection or debilitating condition in adults, or exposure to large numbers of the bacteria in puppies and kittens.” 2
To translate: Many dogs and cats carry Salmonella in their systems (as evidenced by the presence of Salmonella in their feces), but they rarely become ill. It is just a natural part of what lives in their GI systems. When illness does occur it is usually associated with an already ill animal who is already immune-compromised. Illness may also occur when young animals are exposed to very high numbers of the bacteria. This might happen if a puppy finds and licks the inside of an outdoor garbage can that has never been washed and is teeming with bacteria.
Research indicates that approximately 36 percent of healthy dogs and 17 percent of healthy cats carry Salmonella in their digestive tract.3 The American Veterinary Medical Association (AVMA) agrees with these numbers.4 It is interesting to note that these numbers are based on kibble-fed dogs – which means that Salmonella is a natural part of life for our pets regardless of what they are eating.
The resistance to illness in dogs from Salmonella is apparent in a study of raw-fed dogs in Canada. In that study 16 dogs were deliberately fed commercial raw diets contaminated with Salmonella. None of those 16 dogs became ill. Additionally, only 7 of those 16 dogs shed Salmonella in their feces.5 While it was not further studied, one might speculate that the 9 dogs who ate Salmonella-contaminated food but did not shed it in their feces effectively neutralized the bacteria.
Even the FDA, in the FDA Consumer magazine, acknowledges that healthy pets rarely become ill from Salmonella contamination.6
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What does all of this mean to me and my pet?
All types of pet food carry some risk. That is also true for raw diets. These risks can be reduced by feeding the highest quality products you can buy and by following all the recommendations about temperature, storage and hygiene. Only you can decide if the risks outweigh the benefits. Most people feeding raw diets were not completely happy with the health of their pets when they were being fed kibble. If they were, the entire raw diet movement would have never taken root. There’s nothing more convenient than pouring kibble into a dish. So, some people must be seeing benefits from feeding raw.
What is Bravo! doing to reduce the risk of bacterial contamination?
Bravo! products are manufactured in a USDA-inspected human meat processing facility which we own. Our full line of products are made with only high-quality, USDA-inspected and approved meats and poultry. All processing is done by our own local employees to insure high-quality production, and all of our Bravo! production adheres to the same USDA standards required for processing human meat products.
Our meat processing rooms are kept between 35 to 40 degrees during production. Processed products are then immediately placed in a blast freezer where they are subjected to a temperature of -20 degrees for a minimum of 24 hours. The blast-frozen products are then transferred to our commercial freezers where temperatures between 0 and 10 degrees are constantly monitored and maintained.
Bravo! follows all of the FDA guidelines for manufacturing raw diets (except irradiation). You can find those guidelines at: http://www.fda.gov/cvm/Guidance/Guide122.doc
Additionally, Melinda Miller, one of Bravo!’s principals, is one of the founders of the North American Raw Petfood Association (NARPA) and is currently its President. NARPA has been investigating manufacturing options to further reduce pathogen presence in raw diet products and will hopefully be establishing industry standards as viable processing procedures are found. Bravo! will be introducing some of these production steps into its manufacturing process.
How will I know if my pet has Salmonella sickness?
As noted above, it is highly unlikely your pet will contract Salmonella. However, as with humans, younger, older or sickly pets would most likely be affected. The symptoms of Salmonella sickness in pets is also similar to those in humans and includes: vomiting, diarrhea, poor appetite, dehydration, sluggishness, weakness and high fever. If your pet exhibits any of these symptoms, please contact your veterinarian.
How can I avoid Salmonella infection?
In short, hygiene, hygiene, hygiene. When dealing with any raw protein, such as meat, poultry or fish, or when handling pet foods and/or coming into contact with pets or surfaces exposed to these foods it is essential to thoroughly wash your hands with hot water and soap. It is also advised you wash counters, utensils, storage containers and pet food bowls that are exposed to raw meats. You should also avoid contact with your pet’s stool as Salmonella and other pathogens may be present in the stool. If you do have contact with pet feces, always remember to thoroughly wash your hands afterwards. You should also avoid letting your pets lick you immediately after they’ve eaten.
There has been a lot of talk about Salmonella contamination, but what about the Listeria contamination?
Listeria is not seen in cats and is extremely uncommon in dogs. When it is seen in dogs the symptoms are typically diarrhea, fever, neurological signs and vomiting. The symptoms are the same in people. Listeria infection in pregnant women has been associated with miscarriages and stillbirths. Again, when handling raw meat products, practice good hygiene. For information on Listeria: www.cdc.gov/ncidod/dbmd/diseaseinfo/listeriosis_g.htm
What should I feed my pet in place of the recalled product?
You should continue with your pet’s raw diet. Only the specific products from the specific batch ID codes are affected by the recall. Other Bravo! products, which have other batch ID codes, are not part of the recall.
How can I tell if the product I have in my freezer is part of the recall?
Please check the product batch ID code located on the plastic hang tag attached to the bottom of each tube. Only the specific products from the specific batch ID codes are affected by the recall. Other Bravo! products, which have other batch ID codes, are not part of the rec
What should I do if I have recalled product in my home?
If unopened, you may return it to the store where purchased for a full refund.
If opened, you may dispose of the contents in a safe manner (example, a securely covered trash receptacle) and return the washed plastic batch ID tag to the store where purchased for a full refund.
Footnotes
1. www.consumerreports.org/cro/food/food-safety/chicken-safety/chicken-safety-1-07/overview/0107_chick_ov.htm
2. http://www.merckvetmanual.com/mvm/index.jsp?cfle=htm/bc/20900.htm
3. Hand, M.S., Thatcher, C.D., Remillard, R.L., and Roudebush, P. (2000) Small Animal Clinical Nutrition. Mark Morris Institute. Pg. 36-42,188.
4. http://www.avma.org/reference/zoonosis/znsalmonellosis.asp
5. Finley, R., et al. (2007) The Risk of Salmonellae Shedding by Dogs Fed Salmonella-contaminated Commercial Raw Food Diets. Can Vet J. Vol 48 #1. Pg. 69-75.
6. http://www.fda.gov/FDAC/departs/2000/500_upd.html#pigs
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The FDA is working for the kibble manufacture agenda, this it TOTAL bullshit!
Quote:
Almost a week after Bravo! a raw pet food diet producer, announces a
product recall, Melinda Miller, one of the principals of Bravo and a
co-founder of the North American Raw Petfood Association (NARPA)
writes a memo and sends the following email:
*******
A Message From Bravo:
*ALL* raw meat carries pathogens. Whether you buy from the grocery
store, from wholesale meat suppliers, or from prepared raw diet
manufacturers.
It is impossible to avoid. The USDA allows poultry producers to have
up to 23% Salmonella contamination on poultry. A good portion of
chickens are actually *born* with Salmonella. So the poultry products
that manufacturers must use are contaminated long before it ever gets
to us. Since these are *RAW* diets and we don't cook them, the
bacteria is left intact. This is true for *every* raw diet
manufacturer and for every person who feeds raw regardless of their
source. Raw meat has bacteria - that's why people are told to wash
their hands after handling raw meat. ANYONE who has fed raw has fed
pathogens such as Salmonella and Listeria.
Do Salmonella and Listeria pose a threat to our dogs and cats? Not
really. If you go to our website you'll find a recall FAQ that gives
citations about how Salmonella is a normal part of the intestinal
flora and how dogs apparently neutralize the bacteria. There's even a
quote from the FDA Consumer magazine that acknowledges that healthy
dogs and cats rarely become ill from Salmonella.
So why is the FDA involved and why did we do the recall? You can find
more information on that on our website also. But briefly you should
know some of this:
The FDA agents told us that we are just the first of the raw diet
companies to be visited, and that they hope to be able to shut down
the raw diet industry and stop raw feeding. So this is an industry
problem, not a Bravo problem.
The FDA has a very black eye due to the melamine recalls. So, they
want an easy win so they can prove they are safeguarding America's
pets. Raw diets are an easy target for them.
The FDA is holding raw diets to a *cooked* diet standard and has no
desire to be reasonable and acknowledge that you can't hold *RAW* meat
to the same regulation that governs *cooked* meat.
The FDA and USDA are currently in a bitter battle. The FDA is trying
to take control of USDA operations. We believe one of the reasons
Bravo was chosen was that we are a USDA facility. By bashing Bravo
they are able to bash the USDA.
This recall is the result of politics and unreasonable bureaucrats.
Bravo raw products carry the same risk - and BENEFITS - as any raw
product - whether home-prepared or manufactured.
We have been a company dedicated to high quality. That's why we use
antibiotic-free poultry, and grass-fed, hormone-free red meats. It's
why we manufacture in our own USDA plant under USDA human processing
standards. Other than the reality that all raw meat has some pathogen
presence, nothing has changed. You can still count on us to make a
high quality and beneficial products.
To those who have been sending notes of support, thank you very much.
We're caught in the midst of a political struggle and it helps to know
there are people who understand and appreciate the passion
and care we put into Bravo products.
FMI: www.bravorawdiet.com
Melinda
Melinda Miller
Bravo Raw Diet
Unquote
http://www.bravorawdiet.com/recallinfo.html (http://www.bravorawdiet.com/recallinfo.html)
Flower, the statistics cited for bacteria contamination are correct. Thats why humans are advised to thoroughly cook their foods. I've treated cases of salmonella in dogs---its not pretty and I've seen dogs die from it. That said, I've never seen or heard of acase of listeria in a dog.
Anyway, I don't want to get into an argument with you, I just want to put in my two cents about the FDA. After the entire proheart 6 scandal and the actions they've had with a couple of other drugs, I've pretty much lost faith in that organizations ability to "protect" us. They are politically and financially motivated in my opinion and as a result should be closely watched by the average consumer. I work closely with the USDA and have for several years with exotic species. I have faith in that organization because of those interactions. I don't with the FDA.
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The FDA should keep it's nose out of this, it is the USDA's business. It is a move to get rid of raw food sellers especially after the kibble fiasco and people losing some faith in that industry.
"Research indicates that approximately 36 percent of healthy dogs and 17 percent of healthy cats carry Salmonella in their digestive tract.3 The American Veterinary Medical Association (AVMA) agrees with these numbers.4 It is interesting to note that these numbers are based on kibble-fed dogs – which means that Salmonella is a natural part of life for our pets regardless of what they are eating."
Raw food or not, a good number of dogs have salmonella in their digestive tracts.
I personally have never heard of a raw fed dog dieing from salmonella, but I have heard of a number of kibble fed dogs that did or got really sick. Maybe when you feed crap the body is less able to deal with things it normally could? The digestive system is forced to deal with food that it was not meant too. ::) In addition to that I would hazard to guess that the same people that raw feed are also conservative when it comes to vaccines and topical or oral poisons used on their pets. Something else that may allow a dog or cat to deal with what is natural to them.
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The FDA should keep it's nose out of this, it is the USDA's business. It is a move to get rid of raw food sellers especially after the kibble fiasco and people losing some faith in that industry.
"Research indicates that approximately 36 percent of healthy dogs and 17 percent of healthy cats carry Salmonella in their digestive tract.3 The American Veterinary Medical Association (AVMA) agrees with these numbers.4 It is interesting to note that these numbers are based on kibble-fed dogs – which means that Salmonella is a natural part of life for our pets regardless of what they are eating."
Raw food or not, a good number of dogs have salmonella in their digestive tracts.
I personally have never heard of a raw fed dog dieing from salmonella, but I have heard of a number of kibble fed dogs that did or got really sick. Maybe when you feed crap the body is less able to deal with things it normally could? The digestive system is forced to deal with food that it was not meant too. ::) In addition to that I would hazard to guess that the same people that raw feed are also conservative when it comes to vaccines and topical or oral poisons used on their pets. Something else that may allow a dog or cat to deal with what is natural to them.
The question I ask with those statistics are where did the salmonella come from in the first place? Salmonella is not a naturally occuring bacteria in most omnivores or carnivore digestive tracts. I'd be interested in seeing a study that investigates incidence of salmonella from human food (either raw scraps, bones, or raiding garbage) consumption.
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The question I ask with those statistics are where did the salmonella come from in the first place? Salmonella is not a naturally occuring bacteria in most omnivores or carnivore digestive tracts. I'd be interested in seeing a study that investigates incidence of salmonella from human food (either raw scraps, bones, or raiding garbage) consumption.
from the link provided of the AVMA:
http://www.avma.org/reference/zoonosis/znsalmonellosis.asp (http://www.avma.org/reference/zoonosis/znsalmonellosis.asp)
Nontyphoidal salmonellosis is one of the leading causes of acute bacterial gastroenteritis in the United States, responsible for an estimated 1.4 million cases of illness annually.1 Many animals, both domestic and wild, are colonized by Salmonella spp, usually harboring the bacteria in their gastrointestinal tracts with no apparent signs of illness. Hence, salmonellae are often present in feces excreted by healthy animals and frequently contaminate raw foods of animal origin through fecal contact during production and slaughter.
that makes it sound like it is very common :-\
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from the link provided of the AVMA:
http://www.avma.org/reference/zoonosis/znsalmonellosis.asp (http://www.avma.org/reference/zoonosis/znsalmonellosis.asp)
Nontyphoidal salmonellosis is one of the leading causes of acute bacterial gastroenteritis in the United States, responsible for an estimated 1.4 million cases of illness annually.1 Many animals, both domestic and wild, are colonized by Salmonella spp, usually harboring the bacteria in their gastrointestinal tracts with no apparent signs of illness. Hence, salmonellae are often present in feces excreted by healthy animals and frequently contaminate raw foods of animal origin through fecal contact during production and slaughter.
that makes it sound like it is very common :-\
It is very, very common--that study is over 5 years old. Thats why the guidelines are to completely cook your food---that will kill salmonella and e-coli. I am of the firm opinion that meat and meat products purchased from a grocery store or a even a local butchershop are much more likely to be contaminated with potentially disease causing bacteria than meat that is home butchered. The thing is most people don't have a way to do that. So they are lulled into a sense of feeling "safe" by purchasing bullshit like "organic" or "range fed" or some other marketing shit.
The study I'm not aware of is incidence of those food borne diseases that are contracted by domestic animals via ingestion of human food or waste food. I don't know of any study like that that has been done.
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But if it is very common to be in the digestion, then why be worried about them consuming it on food unless they are unhealthy or compromised?
To me the salmonella angle as a deterrent to feeding raw food is misrepresented and the risk inflated. Now if they want to say that a PERSON has a higher chance of getting salmonella if they feed raw, I would agree with that, BUT if a person can handle meat for their family, they should be able to with their pets. And kibble fed dogs test positive for salmonella in their stools just like raw fed dogs can, again, if you aren't touching kibble poop and putting your hands in your mouth, then why would people with raw feeding? :-X
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But if it is very common to be in the digestion, then why be worried about them consuming it on food unless they are unhealthy or compromised?
To me the salmonella angle as a deterrent to feeding raw food is misrepresented and the risk inflated. Now if they want to say that a PERSON has a higher chance of getting salmonella if they feed raw, I would agree with that, BUT if a person can handle meat for their family, they should be able to with their pets. And kibble fed dogs test positive for salmonella in their stools just like raw fed dogs can, again, if you aren't touching kibble poop and putting your hands in your mouth, then why would people with raw feeding? :-X
You get salmonella by eating the food that is contaminated, not by handling it. Handling raw meat is less risky than eating it. And how many humans do you know eat absolutely raw meat? Even a rare steak has been exposed to heat on the surface sufficient to kill surface contamination (that surface contamination is why ground meats are so dangerous).
Again, the fact that kibble fed dogs test positive doesn't answer my question about a study to determine where the contamination comes from---think about it. Dogs eat grass, some eat shit, they eat road kill, dogs raid the garbage, dogs will eat raw food intentionally fed to them by their human owners. Even a 'kibble fed" dog doesn't eat just kibble. Thats why I'd like to see the study I've been talking about. The thing is it would be a long one---because I'm willing to bet you would have to start culturing feces at the time of birth and it has to take into consideration different species of salmonella and living conditions of the dog.
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If most dogs (and other animals) go through life with salmonella in their digestive tract but no problems, does it really matter where it came from? What is trying to be proved? ??? What would be the point of the study? What if the study showed a dog remains salmonella free until someone feeds him some raw meat, or he sticks his head in a garbage can? Most dogs unless compromised have no problem (because that is how nature made them ;D ), so what would we learn from that study that would apply to anything?
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My doctor found 4lbs of low grade beef and a womans partially digested femur bone in my gut once :)
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If most dogs (and other animals) go through life with salmonella in their digestive tract but no problems, does it really matter where it came from? What is trying to be proved? ??? What would be the point of the study? What if the study showed a dog remains salmonella free until someone feeds him some raw meat, or he sticks his head in a garbage can? Most dogs unless compromised have no problem (because that is how nature made them ;D ), so what would we learn from that study that would apply to anything?
Well, first off salmonella is not considered "normal" flora of the GI tract of any mammal even though studies have shown percentages suggesting a fair number of dogs may harbor this bacteria. That means an animal that is actively shedding salmonella is in a state of constant flux as a result fo that bacterial infection. You need to remember that withbacteria capable of developing a chronic shedding state, one of three things happens when an animals immune system encounters them. First (and ideally) the immune system/animals defenses against infection killes the invading bacteria. 2) the invading bacteria overwhelms the immune system/animals defenses and the animal dies or 3) the salmonella bacteria persist in teh animal despite an appropriate immune response. These are bad because that bacteria will then take advantage of a good situation when the immune system is compromised, rapidly growing and causing severe disease. You often speak of "building up" dogs by feeding them a raw diet, but if you think about it, if you are repeatedly innoculating them with salmonella, you are doing the exact opposite. Not only that, but when you consider normal intestinal flora, salmonella compromises a very, very small number even in severely ill animals. Despite this low number it is capable of causing severe GI disease, including persistant ulcerative colitis. This won't kill the dog until their colon perforates, but they will chronically loose blood into their feces from the bleeding intestinal lining.
So what are you going to learn from that study that I suggested? Well, definitive proof salmonellosis comes from feeding a raw diet is kind of a no brainer. Its asanine to recommend feeding a diet that is proven to potentially result in a deadly bacterial infection or a chronic carrier state shedding that bacterium. Its also borderline asanine to feed a diet that may contribute to dogs developing a chronic carrier state, where they are chronically shedding bacteria in their feces, thus potentially jeopardizing the health of anyone who comes in contact with that feces. Be honest, we all know kids who've handled dog shit in earnest and we all know dogs who've unloaded diarrhea in our living room. Now think of that pile of dogshit containing a bacteria that potentially will cause severe disease. Resolve is not a disinfectant and will do virtually nothing to kill bacteria. Remember that. ;)
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Don't twist my words- I never said "building them up" by feeding them a raw diet. I said by feeding a raw diet you allow their digestive system to work the way it is supposed to, which also includes being able to deal with salmonella, I never said keep giving them salmonella so they will get used to it. ::)
What I think is asinine is to feed a diet a digestive system is NOT designed to process, that the animal doesn't get the bioavailable nutrients from, and that causes stress on the animals body because of that.
As for the feces comment and handling, and of course a dog crapping in the house, well if that is your reasoning then reptiles and turtles should NOT be allowed as pets because aren't they always contaminated with salmonella which a person comes in contact with by touching the animal? Most people would wash their hands after picking up dog shit, or a mess the animal made in the house, but how often do you think it is that someone is handling a reptile or turtle (and snakes, not sure about them) and puts a hand in their mouth or eats something, or just doesn't wash afterwards?
I think it is pretty asinine to feed an inappropriate diet which can cause CHRONIC HEALTH PROBLEMS for the animal because of a small chance of something that might happen, a very small chance. Your whole argument is full of overblown scare tactics. I have heard you mention about man meddling with nature/animals and fucking them up for our (mans) own purpose, yet you have no problem using scare tactics and over blowing/skewing truths to do the same? :-\
I have never heard of a dog getting sick from salmonella on a raw diet, I have heard of dogs getting sick from salmonella from KIBBLE. Could it be that the inappropriate diet of kibble messes with the natural workings of the digestive system so when it comes in contact with an abundance of salmonella it can't handle it?
Your arguments sound good, they have the affect that people that use them are going for, fear, but when you actually look at the facts, that fear tactic is pretty lame and weak.
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I wonder if in kibble fed dogs the level of hydrochloric acid is less so when they get kibble contaminated with salmonella their natural defense has been weakened from eating the inappropriate food, combined with the stress it takes on their system already digesting the inappropriate food, added to a digestive system that is designed for raw food and would usually have a short transit time, the transit time is lengthened because their bodies are trying to digest the inappropriate food so the salmonella gets to sit there for much much longer and has that much more of a chance to make them sick.
:D yeah for long run on sentences!!
Maybe man should stop trying to "fix" what is not broken which in turn causes more problems (that man then tries to fix, and so on...)
If 36% of dogs at any time are actively shedding salmonella (and that number was obtained from KIBBLE fed dogs) I would think we would be hearing about a lot of cases of people getting it from dogs because that is a pretty high number. The salmonella argument is used by anti-raw people because it can put fear in people. But when you break it down and look at salmonella and raw feeding animals factually, it's laughable. :D
on the other hand, look at what the CDC has to say about salmonella:
Diseases from Reptiles
An estimated 3% of households in the United States own at least one reptile. Reptiles, including turtles, lizards, and snakes, can carry germs that make people sick. Of greatest importance is salmonellosis. An estimated 70,000 people get salmonellosis from contact with reptiles in the United States each year.
:o
Now Vet, you said that you said reptile restriction laws were stupid, but it seems to me that they are a public health hazard and asinine to allow just anyone to have them as a pet. 8)
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Don't twist my words- I never said "building them up" by feeding them a raw diet. I said by feeding a raw diet you allow their digestive system to work the way it is supposed to, which also includes being able to deal with salmonella, I never said keep giving them salmonella so they will get used to it. ::)
What I think is asinine is to feed a diet a digestive system is NOT designed to process, that the animal doesn't get the bioavailable nutrients from, and that causes stress on the animals body because of that.
As for the feces comment and handling, and of course a dog crapping in the house, well if that is your reasoning then reptiles and turtles should NOT be allowed as pets because aren't they always contaminated with salmonella which a person comes in contact with by touching the animal? Most people would wash their hands after picking up dog shit, or a mess the animal made in the house, but how often do you think it is that someone is handling a reptile or turtle (and snakes, not sure about them) and puts a hand in their mouth or eats something, or just doesn't wash afterwards?
I think it is pretty asinine to feed an inappropriate diet which can cause CHRONIC HEALTH PROBLEMS for the animal because of a small chance of something that might happen, a very small chance. Your whole argument is full of overblown scare tactics. I have heard you mention about man meddling with nature/animals and fucking them up for our (mans) own purpose, yet you have no problem using scare tactics and over blowing/skewing truths to do the same? :-\
I have never heard of a dog getting sick from salmonella on a raw diet, I have heard of dogs getting sick from salmonella from KIBBLE. Could it be that the inappropriate diet of kibble messes with the natural workings of the digestive system so when it comes in contact with an abundance of salmonella it can't handle it?
Your arguments sound good, they have the affect that people that use them are going for, fear, but when you actually look at the facts, that fear tactic is pretty lame and weak.
You know, I dont' give a shit if you are scared or arent and the last thing I'm trying to do is twist your words. I'm just trying to present what I know as facts considering infectious disease and I'm trying to get you to take your blinders off considering your opinions and think about them for a second. You can feed your dogs whatever you want as far as I'm concerned. The thing I find troubling is you insisting that there are correlations with disease based on anecdotal claims at best. You have absolutely no proof to back up many of the claims you make, but you sure do spout them off when you get a chance. And you know what, even that is fine because I've come to expect you to spout off. I don't want to argue with you. Its just not worth it. All I want you to do is think about what you are posting because we are guaranteed there is some other dumbass who will log in here and consider your words gospel....and then go kill their dog because they dont' have the brains to feed a raw diet that is appropriately balanced for the animal. Does that make sense?
The salmonella cases I've treated have all involved dogs that ate raw foods. Thats right, food that was contaminated with salmonella that was not appropriately prepared or food that was taken from the garbage or the worst case was food offered in the form of scraps left from butchering. You aren't going to 'build them up" by repeatedly exposing them to infectious diseases. You yourself use that as the basis of your arguments why vaccinations are bad. Its not about exposure to an abundance of salmonella. its about salmonella growing under conditions that are favorable to the organism causing chronic disease or a chronic intermittant shedding effect.
I do agree with you about digestability, but I've said it before and I'll say it again, you are severely mistaken with your assumptions that Canids are strict carnivores. I don't have a position as to a homemade diet being better or worse for domestic dogs. That said, I think there are variations with commercially available dog foods and feeding the cheapest isn't ideal.
Using the dog and reptile example.... most people I know who own don't let their pet snakes access the same areas that they do their dogs. Dog shit is right there on the carpet where a kid can eat it. Snake shit is a solid pellet in some form of a container (cage, aquarium, snake room) that typically isn't accessable as easily as blowing diarrhea right out on the living room floor (the spot where every puppy I've ever owned has blown out diarrhea).
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I wonder if in kibble fed dogs the level of hydrochloric acid is less so when they get kibble contaminated with salmonella their natural defense has been weakened from eating the inappropriate food, combined with the stress it takes on their system already digesting the inappropriate food, added to a digestive system that is designed for raw food and would usually have a short transit time, the transit time is lengthened because their bodies are trying to digest the inappropriate food so the salmonella gets to sit there for much much longer and has that much more of a chance to make them sick.
:D yeah for long run on sentences!!
Yeah, its a runon, but its a good thought.
Maybe man should stop trying to "fix" what is not broken which in turn causes more problems (that man then tries to fix, and so on...)
If 36% of dogs at any time are actively shedding salmonella (and that number was obtained from KIBBLE fed dogs) I would think we would be hearing about a lot of cases of people getting it from dogs because that is a pretty high number. The salmonella argument is used by anti-raw people because it can put fear in people. But when you break it down and look at salmonella and raw feeding animals factually, it's laughable. :D
I don't know, 36% of them shedding the disease is cause of concern to me.
on the other hand, look at what the CDC has to say about salmonella:[/color]
Diseases from Reptiles
An estimated 3% of households in the United States own at least one reptile. Reptiles, including turtles, lizards, and snakes, can carry germs that make people sick. Of greatest importance is salmonellosis. An estimated 70,000 people get salmonellosis from contact with reptiles in the United States each year.
:o
Now Vet, you said that you said reptile restriction laws were stupid, but it seems to me that they are a public health hazard and asinine to allow just anyone to have them as a pet. 8)
thats right cave into your ridiculous fears and use scare tactics.... ::)
I'll be honest, I've always questioned CDC statistics with exotic pets. The reporting is so haphazard, its hard to tell whats factual and what isn't. for example, a household with a small child that has reptiles in the basement where the child NEVER comes into contact with the animal can be reported as the child getting salmonella from the reptile even though the kid admittantly ate spoiled chicken salad the weekend before. It also varies because some municipalities with their exotic animal control laws require that ALL DISEASES SUSPECTED must be reported, but others don't.
Can you get salmonella from a reptile? yes, I know because I have. Are reptiles dangerous because of that? No, not if you use a bit of common sense and wash your fucking hands.
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You aren't going to 'build them up" by repeatedly exposing them to infectious diseases. You yourself use that as the basis of your arguments why vaccinations are bad. Its not about exposure to an abundance of salmonella. its about salmonella growing under conditions that are favorable to the organism causing chronic disease or a chronic intermittant shedding effect.
Again, I never said they are going to build up by repeatedly exposing them. You missed what I said.
I've known people with Iguanas and snakes (one Iguana was free roam) who let them roam around rooms. So the snake (or reptile) never comes in contact with its feces and gets some transfer on it's body and then the person touches that spot? With 70,000 cases of salmonella a year attributed to reptiles, that is an awful lot of people ingesting reptile shit.
;D
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Can you get salmonella from a reptile? yes, I know because I have. Are reptiles dangerous because of that? No, not if you use a bit of common sense and wash your fucking hands.
You ate reptile shit? You are some crazy people in vet school!! ;D
Wouldn't this apply to dogs also? With a little common sense any threat to people is very small.
I don't think reptiles are dangerous or should be banned, I just used that as an example to refute not raw feeding because of salmonella. I think when people use that angle it is using a scare tactic and inflating it.
For some reason the CDC only had the reptile salmonella cases number, no dog one?
Some people give their dogs apple cider vinegar with raises the acid in the stomach to combat salmonella. I did in the beginning (because it has other benefits) but haven't in years.
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All I want you to do is think about what you are posting because we are guaranteed there is some other dumbass who will log in here and consider your words gospel.
that wasn't very nice :-[
;D
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Again, I never said they are going to build up by repeatedly exposing them. You missed what I said.
I've known people with Iguanas and snakes (one Iguana was free roam) who let them roam around rooms. So the snake (or reptile) never comes in contact with its feces and gets some transfer on it's body and then the person touches that spot? With 70,000 cases of salmonella a year attributed to reptiles, that is an awful lot of people ingesting reptile shit.
;D
Yup, but they aren't going to shed the bacteria through their skin. Its fecal oral transmission. that means shit to mouth. ;D ;)
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You ate reptile shit? You are some crazy people in vet school!! ;D
yeah, i ate reptile shit. When I was in college I worked for the herp lab at the university. Part of my job was basically to go out and do field work catching species native to Missouri. I got salmonella after catching some snakes, that shit all over me as I was trying to get weights and lengths on them. I ate a sandwich after catching those snakes---I didn't wash my hands and apparently a sandwich bag is not a good protective cover from salmonella. I was squirting brown water out my ass two days after that field trip.
Wouldn't this apply to dogs also? With a little common sense any threat to people is very small.
I'm not arguing with you about that at all.
I don't think reptiles are dangerous or should be banned, I just used that as an example to refute not raw feeding because of salmonella. I think when people use that angle it is using a scare tactic and inflating it.
I understand where you were coming from.
For some reason the CDC only had the reptile salmonella cases number, no dog one?
Some people give their dogs apple cider vinegar with raises the acid in the stomach to combat salmonella. I did in the beginning (because it has other benefits) but haven't in years.[/color]
The reptile cases go back to the baby turtle ban in the 1970's. That redflagged reptiles as being "dangerous" and led to the tracking of salmonella.
I honestly dont' know about apple cider vinegar. I will say i've questioned it because the body does have buffering mechanisms (such as bicarbonate in saliva). Not only that but stomach pH is lower (between 1.5-2.5 depending on your reference) than the pH of apple cider vinager (pH 3-4). if anything i'd think it might actually temporarily raise stomach pH until the body responded by secreting H+(Cl) ions, lowering it back to where it belongs, but thats a whole lot of chemistry I'm not in the mood of thinking about right now.
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Flower. Can you recommend a good kibble in your eyes.
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Flower. Can you recommend a good kibble in your eyes.
The one that I recommend to people is the Chicken Soup line. There was a recent thread and I thought you and JMT had some suggestions? Canidae? Eagle Pack?
My ferrets (one 9 year old left now who eats the ground chicken "gravy" stuff I make for him) used to eat premium ferret food and I switched them to the Chicken Soup for Kittens and I noticed a difference so that is the only line I personally have any experience with. I believe Princess L was (is?) feeding it, and STella too? I haven't heard anything bad about it at least. They weren't involved in the recall and have their own plants, they don't outsource it so they have better control over producing it.
This is a raw food thread you sneak!! >:( .,..................... ;D
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The one that I recommend to people is the Chicken Soup line. There was a recent thread and I thought you and JMT had some suggestions? Canidae? Eagle Pack?
My ferrets (one 9 year old left now who eats the ground chicken "gravy" stuff I make for him) used to eat premium ferret food and I switched them to the Chicken Soup for Kittens and I noticed a difference so that is the only line I personally have any experience with. I believe Princess L was (is?) feeding it, and STella too? I haven't heard anything bad about it at least. They weren't involved in the recall and have their own plants, they don't outsource it so they have better control over producing it.
This is a raw food thread you sneak!! >:( .,..................... ;D
I was being serious. I may try it.
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What about Timberwolf Organics? Have you ever heard of them?
http://www.heartypet.com/products.php?cat=34
this food "TimberWolf Organics Southwest Chicken and Herbs Canid Formula" actually looks decent. First three are meat.
http://www.heartypet.com/proddetail.php?prod=tw_dry5&cat=34
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one issue with the timberwolf, evo, solid gold and a few other high grade kibbles is the price. you can get a 40lb bag of the canidae all life stages in the $35-$40 range while the 33lb bag of the timberwolf is in the $55-$60 range. its definetly one of the top kibbles but i dont see how it really justifies the big difference in price. canidae also gets rated as one of the best yet it is still priced more in line with some of the regular store brands. i think the chicken soup is also priced with the canidae.
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bump for good eatin! !
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good thread
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double ;) ;)
I think I need to reorganize the dog's freezers again, I keep forgetting I have stuff!
Anybody who raw feeds check yahoogroups for a co-op or buying group in your area. You can get much better deals buying as a group and get more variety. I buy stuff that is processed and sold strictly as pet food (organ grinds and tripe I buy mainly that way, I prefer to feed RMB's whole and not ground), and I also have access to bulk human grade items.