People tend to think that commercial dog food, especially if it has been recommended by their veterinarian is of good quality and is giving your dog the best chance in life. Right?
Wrong!
While vets should be the best people to advise about dog food, sadly they’re not. Why? Because the top commercial pet food manufacturers now financially contribute to many veterinary schools. They have a foot in the door. They can, and do, influence the students.
After all you generally don’t bite the hand that feeds you.
In most countries of the world, there are, at least some basic laws governing the quality of human food, whether it’s fresh produce, meat or fast food.
In no country are there laws (which are enforced) that insist commercial pet food manufacturers use quality ingredients. That means anything can, and does, go.
After all, if meat is of good quality, wouldn’t you sell it to the highest market - the human market? So, it’s only the poorest quality meat, more often meat by-products (such as hair, intestines and contents, chicken feet, brain, skin, grizzle, fat, etc) that goes for dog food.
This means that the overall nutrient quality is as poor as it gets, as different proteins have different nutritional absorbability.
Pet food is always bulked out with inert (or not as the melamine scam from China testifies) filler. Typically, this filler will be the current cheapest carbohydrate. There’s often a world glut of something, driving down the price. It may be sugar one year, wheat the next.
Do you think the addition of sugar into your dog’s diet will serve to improve his health?
Why do you think that diabetes in dogs is on the increase?
Dogs may bulk out their food in the wild, but it would be on fresh plant matter that’s available, such as fruit or leaves.
Cooking destroys many vitamins and enzymes which are critical to the overall health of your dog.
As most dog food is dried pellets, which keep indefinitely at room temperature, preservatives must be used. Some manufacturers claim they have not added preservatives. Look carefully at the wording. They did not add it. This may be true. But preservatives will always have been added to the meat before it was delivered to the manufacturers.
It’s impossible to keep meat products at room temperature indefinitely without the use of strong preservatives. Preservatives that would never be allowed in human food, because of their poisonous effect.
So your dog may be well fed as far as volume is concerned, but will be starving for quality food. How can your dog remain healthy if he’s fed garbage?
Most people would be appalled at the process that goes into the making of commercial pet food. That would be a really good incentive not to feed it. I’m attempting to give you a glimpse behind the scenes, so you can give your dog the best dog food available within your budget and within your time available.
Showing posts with label dog food. Show all posts
Showing posts with label dog food. Show all posts
Monday, January 25, 2010
Monday, July 13, 2009
Dog Food for Diabetes Has the Potential to Cure
It’s a heart rendering time if your dog has been diagnosed with diabetes. Quite apart from the added burden of the extra veterinary costs, which you may be able to ill afford, what about the cost to your dog?
Is the quality of his life going to deteriorate? How is he going to cope with regular injections of insulin, if he needs them? Most dogs hate drugs and medication and will often fight you when you try to dose them.
Are you going to have trouble with this? Are you going to get hurt, as well as your dog and your wallet?
You might be asking yourself if you could have prevented this from happening, although the vet probably told you that its a common occurrence these days.
Yes, it is common these days.
And yes, you probably could have prevented it.
While doctors and veterinarians have been trained to match particular medication with a disease, homeopaths have been trained to look for causes.
So while the medication may help to stabilise your dog’s diabetes, it’s unlikely to cure it. But if you can get to the cause, and address that, you may well be able to cure your dog’s diabetes.
Your journey to success has already started with your search for dog food for diabetes.
One of the main causes of diabetes in dogs is the food you feed him. Most commercial dog food (included that promoted by most vets) is made up of about 30% low grade meat by-products (from rendering plants which take in slaughter house waste, euthanised animals, road kill, etc), about 65% filler (which can vary from a high fat content, to melamine from China, to a cheap food because of a world glut), and the balance being synthetic nutrients (which are difficult if not impossible to digest), toxic preservatives (mostly not considered fit for human consumption), appetite stimulants and artificial colour.
Some commercial dog food has better quality of meat, beyond by-products. But it still contains cheap filler and toxic preservatives, despite the claim on the packet.
As there has been a world glut of sugar, this is often used as a filler. Do you think sugar is a suitable dog food for diabetes?
Do you think any of the above constitutes suitable dog food for diabetes or any other health condition? Does it sound like suitable dog food, period?
Dogs evolved over many millions of year, as an omnivore, but at the carnivore end. This means dogs can survive on a vegetarian diet, but it isn’t normal. They are natural hunters. And while they do scavenge, so can eat carrion, their main diet is fresh, raw meat.
Holistic veterinarians have discovered that chronic disease normally melts away when dogs are fed on a diet of fresh, raw meat and bones.
By providing quality dog food for diabetes, based on the dogs evolution, the potential is there for a complete cure.
Not only is this more beneficial for your dog’s health, it is a great deal lighter on your wallet. Quite apart from the high veterinary costs, feeding raw food is cheaper than feeding commercial dog food.
And you’re a lot safer too, not running the risk of getting bitten.
Dog food for diabetes, or any other condition, needs to be based on what dogs eat in the wild.
Is the quality of his life going to deteriorate? How is he going to cope with regular injections of insulin, if he needs them? Most dogs hate drugs and medication and will often fight you when you try to dose them.
Are you going to have trouble with this? Are you going to get hurt, as well as your dog and your wallet?
You might be asking yourself if you could have prevented this from happening, although the vet probably told you that its a common occurrence these days.
Yes, it is common these days.
And yes, you probably could have prevented it.
While doctors and veterinarians have been trained to match particular medication with a disease, homeopaths have been trained to look for causes.
So while the medication may help to stabilise your dog’s diabetes, it’s unlikely to cure it. But if you can get to the cause, and address that, you may well be able to cure your dog’s diabetes.
Your journey to success has already started with your search for dog food for diabetes.
One of the main causes of diabetes in dogs is the food you feed him. Most commercial dog food (included that promoted by most vets) is made up of about 30% low grade meat by-products (from rendering plants which take in slaughter house waste, euthanised animals, road kill, etc), about 65% filler (which can vary from a high fat content, to melamine from China, to a cheap food because of a world glut), and the balance being synthetic nutrients (which are difficult if not impossible to digest), toxic preservatives (mostly not considered fit for human consumption), appetite stimulants and artificial colour.
Some commercial dog food has better quality of meat, beyond by-products. But it still contains cheap filler and toxic preservatives, despite the claim on the packet.
As there has been a world glut of sugar, this is often used as a filler. Do you think sugar is a suitable dog food for diabetes?
Do you think any of the above constitutes suitable dog food for diabetes or any other health condition? Does it sound like suitable dog food, period?
Dogs evolved over many millions of year, as an omnivore, but at the carnivore end. This means dogs can survive on a vegetarian diet, but it isn’t normal. They are natural hunters. And while they do scavenge, so can eat carrion, their main diet is fresh, raw meat.
Holistic veterinarians have discovered that chronic disease normally melts away when dogs are fed on a diet of fresh, raw meat and bones.
By providing quality dog food for diabetes, based on the dogs evolution, the potential is there for a complete cure.
Not only is this more beneficial for your dog’s health, it is a great deal lighter on your wallet. Quite apart from the high veterinary costs, feeding raw food is cheaper than feeding commercial dog food.
And you’re a lot safer too, not running the risk of getting bitten.
Dog food for diabetes, or any other condition, needs to be based on what dogs eat in the wild.
Monday, June 8, 2009
How to Use Nutritious Homemade Dog Food Recipes in a Busy Life
Commercial dog food has questionable quality and nutrition, depending on the brand and their ethics at the time.
By taking control of what you feed your dog, you are taking the enormous step into assuring his maximum potential for a long and healthy life.
If your dog is healthy, you’ll have fewer trips to the vet, saving you probably many thousands of dollars.
But trying to work out how to make nutritious homemade dog food recipes to keep your dog interested, at the same time juggling work, family and home life, can be daunting.
But it needn’t be.
It’s only a question of you getting your head around a few basic concepts about healthy dog food.
For example, seven different homemade dog food recipes gives your dog a different meal every day of the week.
It also gives you a routine which is easy to work and plan for. Shopping just becomes too easy, with the same things to buy every week.
Arming yourself with the knowledge that nature knows best, after all the dog evolved very well without any help from us for aeons, you can come close to a wild dog’s diet.
Enzymes are an all important part of everyone’s diet, including dogs. So you need to ensure these are kept alive and well in the dog food you prepare.
Some nutrients are only found in organ meats, but these can be easily overfed. What is the optimum amount of organ meat in your dog’s diet and which ones should you feed?
There is one essential part of a dog’s daily diet which, if left out, will cause tooth decay, unhealthy gums and most likely an unhappy dog.
Many ‘experts’ disagree on its inclusion in a dog’s diet. By bypassing the inconsistencies of ‘experts’ and going back to the only real expert - nature - you are not left wondering who may be right and who may be wrong.
Your homemade dog food recipes needs to ensure all micro and all macro minerals are included.
Your dog manufactures some vitamins himself, but others must be included in his diet.
This means you need to know the nutrients in each type of food.
Although your homemade dog food recipes will naturally keep your dog slim and in good overall health, some dogs are naturally fat and some are naturally slim. You need to know how to vary each ingredient to suit your individual dog.
There are many, no doubt well intentioned, people who write that certain foods are dangerous to dogs. However, if your dog is receiving a well balanced diet, based on a wild dogs diet, he won’t be ravenous and will become very aware of the difference between what is good for him and what is not. You won’t need to worry that he may ingest something poisonous to him.
A constantly ravenous dog is normally one who is not receiving a balanced diet, rather one which is devoid of essential nutrients.
For your dog’s sake, learn some homemade dog food recipes. It really isn’t difficult. And your dog will love you all the more for it.
By taking control of what you feed your dog, you are taking the enormous step into assuring his maximum potential for a long and healthy life.
If your dog is healthy, you’ll have fewer trips to the vet, saving you probably many thousands of dollars.
But trying to work out how to make nutritious homemade dog food recipes to keep your dog interested, at the same time juggling work, family and home life, can be daunting.
But it needn’t be.
It’s only a question of you getting your head around a few basic concepts about healthy dog food.
For example, seven different homemade dog food recipes gives your dog a different meal every day of the week.
It also gives you a routine which is easy to work and plan for. Shopping just becomes too easy, with the same things to buy every week.
Arming yourself with the knowledge that nature knows best, after all the dog evolved very well without any help from us for aeons, you can come close to a wild dog’s diet.
Enzymes are an all important part of everyone’s diet, including dogs. So you need to ensure these are kept alive and well in the dog food you prepare.
Some nutrients are only found in organ meats, but these can be easily overfed. What is the optimum amount of organ meat in your dog’s diet and which ones should you feed?
There is one essential part of a dog’s daily diet which, if left out, will cause tooth decay, unhealthy gums and most likely an unhappy dog.
Many ‘experts’ disagree on its inclusion in a dog’s diet. By bypassing the inconsistencies of ‘experts’ and going back to the only real expert - nature - you are not left wondering who may be right and who may be wrong.
Your homemade dog food recipes needs to ensure all micro and all macro minerals are included.
Your dog manufactures some vitamins himself, but others must be included in his diet.
This means you need to know the nutrients in each type of food.
Although your homemade dog food recipes will naturally keep your dog slim and in good overall health, some dogs are naturally fat and some are naturally slim. You need to know how to vary each ingredient to suit your individual dog.
There are many, no doubt well intentioned, people who write that certain foods are dangerous to dogs. However, if your dog is receiving a well balanced diet, based on a wild dogs diet, he won’t be ravenous and will become very aware of the difference between what is good for him and what is not. You won’t need to worry that he may ingest something poisonous to him.
A constantly ravenous dog is normally one who is not receiving a balanced diet, rather one which is devoid of essential nutrients.
For your dog’s sake, learn some homemade dog food recipes. It really isn’t difficult. And your dog will love you all the more for it.
Monday, May 25, 2009
Is Organic Dog Food Healthier?
Most people are aware of the benefits of organic food, which is food grown without chemical fertilisers or pesticides. Nutrient content is much richer. Although supermarket food looks good, generally, its nutrient content is very poor.
If organic food is good for people, is it also good for dogs?
A resounding YES, is the answer to that...
But!
There’s always a but isn’t there?
You need to look at the whole picture.
If you are buying the commercial organic dog food, then you really aren’t getting what you’re paying for.
Why not?
If you look at what goes into commercial dog food, the benefits that the organic origins give to the food are swamped by all the other chemicals.
Let’s look at the meat content of dog food first. The source for the bulk of commercial pet food comes from rendering plants. These take the waste from slaughter houses (heads, hooves, intestines, etc), road kill, euthanised pets from vets and zoos and dead animals from farms. If the slaughter house rejects come from some organic farms, that’s helpful. But the overall mix is far from organic.
Even if the protein comes from organic waste meat, is that meat certified organic, or has the supplier just put an organic label on the packet to lure in unsuspecting buyers?
So the end product should be certified organic dog food. Not just one ingredient.
Now lets look at the dried food. Meat (or more likely meat by-products, the end product from rendering plants) is kept indefinitely at room temperature. The only way you can do this is by adding a strong preservative.
As there are no laws governing the quality of dog food in most countries, any preservative can be used. Even those considered unfit for consumption. Such as ethoxyquin. And formaldehyde.
Both these preservatives cause huge health problems simply by being in contact with them. Imagine what it does to your dog’s health if he consumes them, and on a regular basis.
That alone makes the idea of organic dog food of little importance.
Even when the label on the packet proudly proclaims that no preservatives have been added, they are simply stating that they haven’t added preservatives. The rendering plant may have done it for them.
Logic tells you that meat cannot be kept indefinitely at room temperature any other way.
Because the rendering plants boil the ‘food’ for long periods at high pressures, there is little nutrient content left.
To address this shortfall, isolated and synthetic nutrients are added. Neither humans nor dogs can utilise isolated and synthetic nutrients. These should come from the food, in a complex and balanced form.
I suggest that organic dog food is no different from any other commercial pet food.
If organic food is good for people, is it also good for dogs?
A resounding YES, is the answer to that...
But!
There’s always a but isn’t there?
You need to look at the whole picture.
If you are buying the commercial organic dog food, then you really aren’t getting what you’re paying for.
Why not?
If you look at what goes into commercial dog food, the benefits that the organic origins give to the food are swamped by all the other chemicals.
Let’s look at the meat content of dog food first. The source for the bulk of commercial pet food comes from rendering plants. These take the waste from slaughter houses (heads, hooves, intestines, etc), road kill, euthanised pets from vets and zoos and dead animals from farms. If the slaughter house rejects come from some organic farms, that’s helpful. But the overall mix is far from organic.
Even if the protein comes from organic waste meat, is that meat certified organic, or has the supplier just put an organic label on the packet to lure in unsuspecting buyers?
So the end product should be certified organic dog food. Not just one ingredient.
Now lets look at the dried food. Meat (or more likely meat by-products, the end product from rendering plants) is kept indefinitely at room temperature. The only way you can do this is by adding a strong preservative.
As there are no laws governing the quality of dog food in most countries, any preservative can be used. Even those considered unfit for consumption. Such as ethoxyquin. And formaldehyde.
Both these preservatives cause huge health problems simply by being in contact with them. Imagine what it does to your dog’s health if he consumes them, and on a regular basis.
That alone makes the idea of organic dog food of little importance.
Even when the label on the packet proudly proclaims that no preservatives have been added, they are simply stating that they haven’t added preservatives. The rendering plant may have done it for them.
Logic tells you that meat cannot be kept indefinitely at room temperature any other way.
Because the rendering plants boil the ‘food’ for long periods at high pressures, there is little nutrient content left.
To address this shortfall, isolated and synthetic nutrients are added. Neither humans nor dogs can utilise isolated and synthetic nutrients. These should come from the food, in a complex and balanced form.
I suggest that organic dog food is no different from any other commercial pet food.
Monday, May 18, 2009
Dog Food - Unhealthy By Default
Have you ever idly wondered what goes into the packet or tin of dog food, you lovingly feed your dog? Perhaps you fear the worst and don’t want to know. Putting your head in the sand may make you feel a bit better in the short term, but it is likely to cost you dearly in the long term.
Why?
Food, by virtue of its daily consumption, is one of the most important parts of your health. And obviously the same applies to your dog.
If you don’t feed your dog quality dog food, he is likely to suffer ongoing ill health. This translates into hundreds, if not thousands, in veterinarian bills.
So let’s have a look at how dog food is produced in most countries, especially by the big commercial pet food companies.
A rendering plant is sort of an adjunct to a slaughterhouse. It’s where unusable parts of slaughtered animals or dead animals on a massive scale are disposed. It also includes retail food outlet waste.
Typical unusable waste from slaughterhouses includes heads, hooves, beaks, intestines, bones, blood, etc.
Dead animals can be road kill, euthanised pets from veterinarians or animal shelters, zoo animals or horses.
Retail food waste includes food past its use by date.
On the surface, none of this sounds too bad. Perhaps you can consider most of it as acceptable ingredients for your dog food. But let’s have a closer look.
Bones, in particular spines, and brains from the heads of cattle can be the source of bovine spongiform encephalogathy (mad-cow disease, BSE), Although these parts are not permitted now, to be included in human food, policing this is almost impossible in a rendering plant.
Animals are euthanised with sodium pentobarbital. This cannot be broken down in the processing.
Euthanised dogs and cats frequently still ware collars, including pet identification discs and flea collars. Flea collars normally contain organophosphate insecticides.
Pets, zoo and farm animals can contain heavy metals from their identi chip, or ID tags and from surgical pins.
Farm animals may contain insecticide patches.
Farm animals who have died can contain toxic levels of veterinary medications, including high levels of antibiotics, hormones or pesticides, to name just a few. Animals who have died naturally, may have done so from cancer, an organ failure, TB or a host of other hazardous diseases.
Retail food waste is often still wrapped meat, past it’s use by date. Wrapping is normally styrofoam trays covered with cling film.
Euthanised pets from veterinarians and animal shelters often come in plastic bags.
Generally there is not the strict hygiene afforded to rendering plants, that there is to slaughter houses. So carcasses can be piled up waiting in summer heat. This means that maggots are a very real part of the end product, as least for that processed in summer. Rat infestations at rendering plants may not be common in many of them, but it is not rare either.
With the ever increasing cost of labour, removing collars and plastic wrapping is just out of the question. Removing implanted identichips or surgical pins would be nearly impossible.
It is unavoidable that toxic waste is a part of the end products of a rendering plant.
So that’s the raw material of a rendering plant. What about the processing? This involves grinding the raw material and then cooking for long periods under pressure and high temperature. Some may be further dried.
Depending on the particular rendering plant, the end products are called recycled meat, meat meal, poultry meal, bone meal, blood meal, animal meal, fish meal, poultry by-products, meat by-products, tallow, beef fat, chicken fat, animal fat, yellow grease, food enhancer, protein, calcium, phosphorus. Many are sold as a source of protein, energy, mineral or enhancer for farm animals, horses and pets. In fact any livestock.
About a third of rendering plant end products are used as the basis of commercial cat and dog food.
The quality bit.
The meat source,
The protein.
Thereafter, the ingredients deteriorate, with filler (perhaps sugar or melamine from China or any other cheap ‘food’), isolated and synthetic nutrients and toxic preservatives, making up the balance. Then it may be irradiated.
You may find it hard to believe that any part of the entire produce could possibly translate as nourishing dog food, that a vet would recommend for a healthy life.
The end result means that commercialisation has forced your dog to become a cannibal.
Why?
Food, by virtue of its daily consumption, is one of the most important parts of your health. And obviously the same applies to your dog.
If you don’t feed your dog quality dog food, he is likely to suffer ongoing ill health. This translates into hundreds, if not thousands, in veterinarian bills.
So let’s have a look at how dog food is produced in most countries, especially by the big commercial pet food companies.
A rendering plant is sort of an adjunct to a slaughterhouse. It’s where unusable parts of slaughtered animals or dead animals on a massive scale are disposed. It also includes retail food outlet waste.
Typical unusable waste from slaughterhouses includes heads, hooves, beaks, intestines, bones, blood, etc.
Dead animals can be road kill, euthanised pets from veterinarians or animal shelters, zoo animals or horses.
Retail food waste includes food past its use by date.
On the surface, none of this sounds too bad. Perhaps you can consider most of it as acceptable ingredients for your dog food. But let’s have a closer look.
Bones, in particular spines, and brains from the heads of cattle can be the source of bovine spongiform encephalogathy (mad-cow disease, BSE), Although these parts are not permitted now, to be included in human food, policing this is almost impossible in a rendering plant.
Animals are euthanised with sodium pentobarbital. This cannot be broken down in the processing.
Euthanised dogs and cats frequently still ware collars, including pet identification discs and flea collars. Flea collars normally contain organophosphate insecticides.
Pets, zoo and farm animals can contain heavy metals from their identi chip, or ID tags and from surgical pins.
Farm animals may contain insecticide patches.
Farm animals who have died can contain toxic levels of veterinary medications, including high levels of antibiotics, hormones or pesticides, to name just a few. Animals who have died naturally, may have done so from cancer, an organ failure, TB or a host of other hazardous diseases.
Retail food waste is often still wrapped meat, past it’s use by date. Wrapping is normally styrofoam trays covered with cling film.
Euthanised pets from veterinarians and animal shelters often come in plastic bags.
Generally there is not the strict hygiene afforded to rendering plants, that there is to slaughter houses. So carcasses can be piled up waiting in summer heat. This means that maggots are a very real part of the end product, as least for that processed in summer. Rat infestations at rendering plants may not be common in many of them, but it is not rare either.
With the ever increasing cost of labour, removing collars and plastic wrapping is just out of the question. Removing implanted identichips or surgical pins would be nearly impossible.
It is unavoidable that toxic waste is a part of the end products of a rendering plant.
So that’s the raw material of a rendering plant. What about the processing? This involves grinding the raw material and then cooking for long periods under pressure and high temperature. Some may be further dried.
Depending on the particular rendering plant, the end products are called recycled meat, meat meal, poultry meal, bone meal, blood meal, animal meal, fish meal, poultry by-products, meat by-products, tallow, beef fat, chicken fat, animal fat, yellow grease, food enhancer, protein, calcium, phosphorus. Many are sold as a source of protein, energy, mineral or enhancer for farm animals, horses and pets. In fact any livestock.
About a third of rendering plant end products are used as the basis of commercial cat and dog food.
The quality bit.
The meat source,
The protein.
Thereafter, the ingredients deteriorate, with filler (perhaps sugar or melamine from China or any other cheap ‘food’), isolated and synthetic nutrients and toxic preservatives, making up the balance. Then it may be irradiated.
You may find it hard to believe that any part of the entire produce could possibly translate as nourishing dog food, that a vet would recommend for a healthy life.
The end result means that commercialisation has forced your dog to become a cannibal.
Monday, April 20, 2009
Dog Vomiting and the Role Commercial Pet Food Plays
Someone says ‘dog food’ and the image of dry kibble pops into your head. As a society, for over fifty years, commercially manufactured bagged kibble and canned ‘wet’ food has been synonymous with those simple words.
Although the first processed dog ‘biscuit’ was first invented by James Spratt of Cincinnati, Ohio in 1860, it was World War II that spurred commercial manufacturers to first start pushing the ease of kibble and canned food onto the already stretched family unit. It was convenient, affordable and no one considered the quality of the food or the ingredients that went into this new time saver because it had to be better then the table scraps that domestic animals enjoyed at the time, right?
Wrong!
In fact, early commercial dog food manufacturers agreed that feeding dogs meat, vegetables and some grains was better for the dogs than the processed kibble they were making from meat scraps, meat- by-products, and factory waste, such as saw dust and grain husk. Convenient? Absolutely! Cheap - not in the long run. Healthy? You can excuse the early adopters but, generations later, dog diseases are near epidemic levels. In spite of the evidence that something is wrong, millions of people continue to give their dogs manufactured dog food.
For everyone involved, the commercial pet food industry was a win-win operation! Farmers sold off both grain and vegetable crops that were unfit for human consumption and slaughterhouses had a market for body parts they would normally have to pay to have taken to the dump. The manufacturers quickly worked out how best to market their products to unwary pet owners and Purina even developed a way to expand or ‘fluff up’ the kibble before drying called extrusion so consumers felt they were getting more for their money.
In 1964, without scientific basis, the Pet Food Institute began their massive media campaign against table scraps. Veterinarians throughout the world jumped on the bandwagon and by the early 1960’s, few people were feeding their four-legged family members anything but this wondrous, convenient and readily available food.
Commercial Dog Food: Buyer Beware
Forty years after the campaign to remove table scraps from your pet’s diet, pet stores, some breeders, and most veterinarians (who peddle the AVMA approved brand- as supposedly being “better”), continue to extol the virtues of manufactured dog foods in spite of the evidence. People who think outside the box are often demonized for feeding their dogs a more natural diet.
Nothing is ever that black or white.
In a society that lives on fast food and prepackaged meals, it’s no wonder their cats and dogs are being fed the equivalent. Everything must be fast, convenient and palatable, even if what makes the food ‘easy’ and ‘tasty’ is also slowly killing us. If this wasn’t bad enough, starting in the late1990s recycled restaurant grease (reused for days at carcinogenic temperatures) is sprayed on kibble! Why? Just to give this otherwise tasteless “dog food” some flavor!
The incidence of cancer, heart conditions and strokes are all steadily rising. Diet related illnesses, such as diabetes, inflammatory bowel disease, colitis, Crohn’s disease and obesity are at the minimum common place, and some are epidemic.
Why should our animals be any different? If we cannot feed ourselves properly, what makes you think their pets are being fed responsibly?
Processed foods are slowly killing North Americans and their pets. Proof of this fact is the preponderance of people (and their pets) under medical care and medication. Some people might argue that humans and animals are living longer, but what about quality of life? People and their dogs are not only on more meds than ever, millions are on multiple meds!
Meds are akin to magic; they do not heal, they simply make the symptoms disappear from view by overriding your pets’ immune defense systems. Taken long enough, your pets’ immune defense systems eventually shut down, relegating the user to a lifetime of meds, and a lower quality of life.
Pet food manufacturers wrote the book on how to manipulate nutritional content; lists of ingredients and marketing to best highlight the ‘good’ while entirely avoiding the ‘bad’. Do you really expect a forty-pound bag of dog food that costs $12.98 to have any nutritional value? Consider this: Forty-pounds of human-grade corn meal (commonly used empty calorie filler linked to diabetes) used in commercial pet foods, costs nearly $120!
Can you imagine what is in your dog’s food if the human-grade ‘filler’ costs nearly ten times that of the entire bag of food? You do not want to know.
Commercial Dog Food and Vomiting in Dogs
Commercial dog food is the equivalent of McDonalds, Burger King, Wendy’s Popeye’s, Churches… but for dogs. Eye catching packaging, combined with multi-billion dollar Madison Avenue advertising specifically designed to appeal to the masses, does not change the fact that manufactured dog food should only be used during emergencies.
Have you ever seen Lemmings following each other off a cliff? None ask “Why?” they just follow the others! And the “others” have been bombarded with slick advertising campaigns for over 50 years! Just because your mother and her mother and her mother before her bought manufactured pet food doesn’t mean it was ever the right choice.
The cost to your dog’s overall health and well-being is not just expensive, it is heart wrenching. Today, it is all too common to find “older dogs” (dogs over 10 years of age) in poor health and on multiple meds, shells of their former selves.
The documentary ‘Super Size Me’ is based on what happens to the human body when eating nothing but McDonalds 24/7 for thirty days. Independent filmmaker, Morgan Spurlock, was curious to know whether or not a diet based solely on fast- food is bad for you. He put himself on the McDonalds 24/7 diet. Doctors specializing in internal medicine carefully monitored him. He gained over 24 pounds in the thirty-day span – nearly an extra pound a day! He also suffered from mood swings, depression, lethargy, sexual dysfunction and potentially irreversible liver damage. He vomited on only the second day of this experiment and by the third week, was suffering from heart palpitations! The decline in his health was so rapid, that his doctors urged him to end the experiment after just two weeks.
How can this be? If you believe that the fast-food industry cares about your health, you are sadly mistaken! They are in the business of making money for their stockholders. It is your responsibility to learn what is healthy and what is not. Fast foods should only be eaten occasionally, if at all.
A steady diet of poorly balanced and over processed diets leads to an unhealthy digestive system, and is the leading cause of chronic illnesses and disease. ‘Super Size Me’ is proof of it in the human world; a day at the vet hospital proves it in the animal world. If you have wondered why obesity, diabetes and cancer are on the rise in dogs, you only need to look so far as the bag of dog food in the pantry.
The Royal Society of Medicine Great Britain states “Fully 90% of all chronic disease is caused by an unhealthy digestive system”. This is proof positive that we are what we eat. Your dog is at your mercy as to what choices you make for them.
You can read more of Robert Hart's pet health articles at www.vitalityscience.com
Although the first processed dog ‘biscuit’ was first invented by James Spratt of Cincinnati, Ohio in 1860, it was World War II that spurred commercial manufacturers to first start pushing the ease of kibble and canned food onto the already stretched family unit. It was convenient, affordable and no one considered the quality of the food or the ingredients that went into this new time saver because it had to be better then the table scraps that domestic animals enjoyed at the time, right?
Wrong!
In fact, early commercial dog food manufacturers agreed that feeding dogs meat, vegetables and some grains was better for the dogs than the processed kibble they were making from meat scraps, meat- by-products, and factory waste, such as saw dust and grain husk. Convenient? Absolutely! Cheap - not in the long run. Healthy? You can excuse the early adopters but, generations later, dog diseases are near epidemic levels. In spite of the evidence that something is wrong, millions of people continue to give their dogs manufactured dog food.
For everyone involved, the commercial pet food industry was a win-win operation! Farmers sold off both grain and vegetable crops that were unfit for human consumption and slaughterhouses had a market for body parts they would normally have to pay to have taken to the dump. The manufacturers quickly worked out how best to market their products to unwary pet owners and Purina even developed a way to expand or ‘fluff up’ the kibble before drying called extrusion so consumers felt they were getting more for their money.
In 1964, without scientific basis, the Pet Food Institute began their massive media campaign against table scraps. Veterinarians throughout the world jumped on the bandwagon and by the early 1960’s, few people were feeding their four-legged family members anything but this wondrous, convenient and readily available food.
Commercial Dog Food: Buyer Beware
Forty years after the campaign to remove table scraps from your pet’s diet, pet stores, some breeders, and most veterinarians (who peddle the AVMA approved brand- as supposedly being “better”), continue to extol the virtues of manufactured dog foods in spite of the evidence. People who think outside the box are often demonized for feeding their dogs a more natural diet.
Nothing is ever that black or white.
In a society that lives on fast food and prepackaged meals, it’s no wonder their cats and dogs are being fed the equivalent. Everything must be fast, convenient and palatable, even if what makes the food ‘easy’ and ‘tasty’ is also slowly killing us. If this wasn’t bad enough, starting in the late1990s recycled restaurant grease (reused for days at carcinogenic temperatures) is sprayed on kibble! Why? Just to give this otherwise tasteless “dog food” some flavor!
The incidence of cancer, heart conditions and strokes are all steadily rising. Diet related illnesses, such as diabetes, inflammatory bowel disease, colitis, Crohn’s disease and obesity are at the minimum common place, and some are epidemic.
Why should our animals be any different? If we cannot feed ourselves properly, what makes you think their pets are being fed responsibly?
Processed foods are slowly killing North Americans and their pets. Proof of this fact is the preponderance of people (and their pets) under medical care and medication. Some people might argue that humans and animals are living longer, but what about quality of life? People and their dogs are not only on more meds than ever, millions are on multiple meds!
Meds are akin to magic; they do not heal, they simply make the symptoms disappear from view by overriding your pets’ immune defense systems. Taken long enough, your pets’ immune defense systems eventually shut down, relegating the user to a lifetime of meds, and a lower quality of life.
Pet food manufacturers wrote the book on how to manipulate nutritional content; lists of ingredients and marketing to best highlight the ‘good’ while entirely avoiding the ‘bad’. Do you really expect a forty-pound bag of dog food that costs $12.98 to have any nutritional value? Consider this: Forty-pounds of human-grade corn meal (commonly used empty calorie filler linked to diabetes) used in commercial pet foods, costs nearly $120!
Can you imagine what is in your dog’s food if the human-grade ‘filler’ costs nearly ten times that of the entire bag of food? You do not want to know.
Commercial Dog Food and Vomiting in Dogs
Commercial dog food is the equivalent of McDonalds, Burger King, Wendy’s Popeye’s, Churches… but for dogs. Eye catching packaging, combined with multi-billion dollar Madison Avenue advertising specifically designed to appeal to the masses, does not change the fact that manufactured dog food should only be used during emergencies.
Have you ever seen Lemmings following each other off a cliff? None ask “Why?” they just follow the others! And the “others” have been bombarded with slick advertising campaigns for over 50 years! Just because your mother and her mother and her mother before her bought manufactured pet food doesn’t mean it was ever the right choice.
The cost to your dog’s overall health and well-being is not just expensive, it is heart wrenching. Today, it is all too common to find “older dogs” (dogs over 10 years of age) in poor health and on multiple meds, shells of their former selves.
The documentary ‘Super Size Me’ is based on what happens to the human body when eating nothing but McDonalds 24/7 for thirty days. Independent filmmaker, Morgan Spurlock, was curious to know whether or not a diet based solely on fast- food is bad for you. He put himself on the McDonalds 24/7 diet. Doctors specializing in internal medicine carefully monitored him. He gained over 24 pounds in the thirty-day span – nearly an extra pound a day! He also suffered from mood swings, depression, lethargy, sexual dysfunction and potentially irreversible liver damage. He vomited on only the second day of this experiment and by the third week, was suffering from heart palpitations! The decline in his health was so rapid, that his doctors urged him to end the experiment after just two weeks.
How can this be? If you believe that the fast-food industry cares about your health, you are sadly mistaken! They are in the business of making money for their stockholders. It is your responsibility to learn what is healthy and what is not. Fast foods should only be eaten occasionally, if at all.
A steady diet of poorly balanced and over processed diets leads to an unhealthy digestive system, and is the leading cause of chronic illnesses and disease. ‘Super Size Me’ is proof of it in the human world; a day at the vet hospital proves it in the animal world. If you have wondered why obesity, diabetes and cancer are on the rise in dogs, you only need to look so far as the bag of dog food in the pantry.
The Royal Society of Medicine Great Britain states “Fully 90% of all chronic disease is caused by an unhealthy digestive system”. This is proof positive that we are what we eat. Your dog is at your mercy as to what choices you make for them.
You can read more of Robert Hart's pet health articles at www.vitalityscience.com
Monday, April 13, 2009
What is An All Natural Dog Food?
What’s on your mind when you consider an all natural dog food? Could it be a commercial dog food which has the word ‘natural’ on the packet? Could it be you think of cooking your own dog food from scratch? Do you consider table scraps to be the ideal diet?
Wrong! None of the above will address your dog’s health, Why not?
Well, the commercial dog food starts off with very low grade meat, mostly meat by-products (the better quality going for the higher priced human food), high fat and sometimes euthanased animals, which contain the chemical sodium pentobarbital. Then, to bulk out the already cheap ‘meat’, a non-nutritional filler is added. That can be sugar, as there’s a world glut of it at the moment, or melamine if you live in China.
Then, to keep the product indefinitely at room temperature a preservative is added.
When you see a packet of dried dog food in the shop, with the slogan ‘preservative free’ ask yourself this question - how can dried ‘meat’ be kept indefinitely at room temperature without preservatives? Do you think you wouldn’t have heard of a new way to do this, if there was?
So either there is no ‘meat’ or there is preservative present. Trouble is, the preservatives used are very strong, cause huge health problems and aren’t allowed in human food.
So commercial dog food can be crossed off as an all natural dog food!.
I see quite a lot of ‘dog experts’ on the internet advocating you cook your own dog food. Whilst that is hugely better than commercial pet food, it’s still missing the nutrients that are lost in cooking. Typically these are vitamins and enzymes, both essential for a healthy dog. But other nutrients are altered by cooking. Fat changes during the cooking process from a beneficial food to a harmful one.
So you can cross though this one too, as an all natural dog food.
What about table scraps? That depends so much on the table scraps. If the human food is a good, natural one of lots of raw fruit and veg, with lightly cooked meat, then these table scraps have the potential of being the best dog food out of all three options, as long as there is enough left over to satisfy your dog’s nutritional needs.
If, however, your diet is typically fast food with a lot of processed food, then these table scraps will be little better than the commercial dog food.
Yet another cross through.
There is only one all natural dog food and that’s the one dogs evolved on. Nothing that mankind has done has improved one iota on that. And considerable decline has occurred.
Dogs have evolved over millions of years on an all natural dog food and it keeps them happy and healthy.
Once you get to grips with the idea of how dogs evolved, duplicating that diet within the constraints of what is available and the limits on your time, is not that difficult. However, there are a few important things you need to know such as:
When you change the diet of your dog from a commercial pet food to an all natural dog food, there may initially be a de-toxing period. This is normal and natural, but can seem a bit scary to you if you don’t understand why it’s happening and the symptoms. It should be of short duration, depending on your dog’s age and level of health.
Dogs digestion is robust. They have evolved on eating raw meat and carrion. They can’t cope with preservatives, fillers, high fat or low grade protein, none of which occurs (at least in high proportions) in nature.
Once you have your dog on an all natural dog food, you’ll find fewer and fewer health problems. I’m sure you’d be as happy as anyone, to cut your dog’s professional health fees.
Wrong! None of the above will address your dog’s health, Why not?
Well, the commercial dog food starts off with very low grade meat, mostly meat by-products (the better quality going for the higher priced human food), high fat and sometimes euthanased animals, which contain the chemical sodium pentobarbital. Then, to bulk out the already cheap ‘meat’, a non-nutritional filler is added. That can be sugar, as there’s a world glut of it at the moment, or melamine if you live in China.
Then, to keep the product indefinitely at room temperature a preservative is added.
When you see a packet of dried dog food in the shop, with the slogan ‘preservative free’ ask yourself this question - how can dried ‘meat’ be kept indefinitely at room temperature without preservatives? Do you think you wouldn’t have heard of a new way to do this, if there was?
So either there is no ‘meat’ or there is preservative present. Trouble is, the preservatives used are very strong, cause huge health problems and aren’t allowed in human food.
So commercial dog food can be crossed off as an all natural dog food!.
I see quite a lot of ‘dog experts’ on the internet advocating you cook your own dog food. Whilst that is hugely better than commercial pet food, it’s still missing the nutrients that are lost in cooking. Typically these are vitamins and enzymes, both essential for a healthy dog. But other nutrients are altered by cooking. Fat changes during the cooking process from a beneficial food to a harmful one.
So you can cross though this one too, as an all natural dog food.
What about table scraps? That depends so much on the table scraps. If the human food is a good, natural one of lots of raw fruit and veg, with lightly cooked meat, then these table scraps have the potential of being the best dog food out of all three options, as long as there is enough left over to satisfy your dog’s nutritional needs.
If, however, your diet is typically fast food with a lot of processed food, then these table scraps will be little better than the commercial dog food.
Yet another cross through.
There is only one all natural dog food and that’s the one dogs evolved on. Nothing that mankind has done has improved one iota on that. And considerable decline has occurred.
Dogs have evolved over millions of years on an all natural dog food and it keeps them happy and healthy.
Once you get to grips with the idea of how dogs evolved, duplicating that diet within the constraints of what is available and the limits on your time, is not that difficult. However, there are a few important things you need to know such as:
- what food should not be given more than once a week
- should bones be given
- what carbohydrates are the best ones and how much
- are there any fruit or vegetables that shouldn’t be given
- what amino acid is essential to a dog’s healthy skin
- should you supplement the diet
- how do you convert the diet of an elderly or sick dog safely
When you change the diet of your dog from a commercial pet food to an all natural dog food, there may initially be a de-toxing period. This is normal and natural, but can seem a bit scary to you if you don’t understand why it’s happening and the symptoms. It should be of short duration, depending on your dog’s age and level of health.
Dogs digestion is robust. They have evolved on eating raw meat and carrion. They can’t cope with preservatives, fillers, high fat or low grade protein, none of which occurs (at least in high proportions) in nature.
Once you have your dog on an all natural dog food, you’ll find fewer and fewer health problems. I’m sure you’d be as happy as anyone, to cut your dog’s professional health fees.
Monday, March 23, 2009
Feeding This Diabetic Dog Food Could Cure Your Dog’s Diabetes
Diabetes is no fun for humans or animals, with the desire for sweet things, the copious urine output and the huge thirst, to mention just a few of the common symptoms.
And it’s on the increase in humans as well as dogs and cats. Why should this be happening now?
Leaving the human cause aside for the purposes of this article, lets look at a typical diet for dogs in the western world, those who are not fed a quality diabetic dog food, that is.
Most people feed their dog a commercial brand of pet food. You’re lured by the manufacturers claims, which are mostly untrue, and by smiling vets and dog breeders on the colourful packets.
Health depends hugely on diet. Arguably, it could be considered the major cause of ill health in all animals, you included.
I want you to imagine, for a moment, that you are the owner of a dog food manufacturing business. You have to pay
All this costs money. And you haven’t even bought in the raw ingredients, the food, yet.
Would you be a bit tempted to buy in low quality, low cost raw ingredients? After all, with the price of meat going up all the time, you have to consider whether your potential customers would pay the higher price your product would be? There’s plenty of competition about and customers are generally lured by low prices.
And they probably say - it’s only for dogs.
(I don’t know about you, but my dogs aren’t ‘only’.)
Don’t get me wrong. I don’t want you to sympathise with the commercial pet food manufacturers. But if you can understand where they’re coming from, you’ll understand why it would be a good idea to make your own diabetic dog food.
I’m not suggesting all commercial pet food manufacturers are the same. But they do all face the same problems.
So not only is the meat low quality, it’s also bulked out with a filler.
Fillers can be anything from sawdust, to melamine (remember Chinese pet food?), to a market glut of any carbohydrate.
For the past few decades, the production of sugar has soared with its huge demand. This has resulted in a world glut.
Now, whenever there’s a world glut, the price drops. So buying sugar for bulking out commercial pet food is cheap.
I’m sure you’ve now made the connection between your dog getting diabetes and feeding him a commercial pet food. After all, no dog evolved eating processed sugar even in small amounts, let alone the huge amounts that go into pet food.
So the best diabetic dog food is to make it yourself. Then you know what goes into it.
I am offering you the chance to make a huge impact on the health of your beloved dog, simply by switching to the diabetic dog food I recommend.
It’s easy, it’s quick, you probably have most of the ingredients already. And it won’t cost you any more.
Are you ready to make a commitment, to feed your dog my diabetic dog food, to see his health change almost overnight?
And it’s on the increase in humans as well as dogs and cats. Why should this be happening now?
Leaving the human cause aside for the purposes of this article, lets look at a typical diet for dogs in the western world, those who are not fed a quality diabetic dog food, that is.
Most people feed their dog a commercial brand of pet food. You’re lured by the manufacturers claims, which are mostly untrue, and by smiling vets and dog breeders on the colourful packets.
Health depends hugely on diet. Arguably, it could be considered the major cause of ill health in all animals, you included.
I want you to imagine, for a moment, that you are the owner of a dog food manufacturing business. You have to pay
- rent on the premises
- services to the premises - electricity, telephone
- equipment purchase and upkeep
- wages for your workers, including tax, health, sick and holiday pay
- packaging for the end product
- storage for the end product
- advertising and marketing the end product
All this costs money. And you haven’t even bought in the raw ingredients, the food, yet.
Would you be a bit tempted to buy in low quality, low cost raw ingredients? After all, with the price of meat going up all the time, you have to consider whether your potential customers would pay the higher price your product would be? There’s plenty of competition about and customers are generally lured by low prices.
And they probably say - it’s only for dogs.
(I don’t know about you, but my dogs aren’t ‘only’.)
Don’t get me wrong. I don’t want you to sympathise with the commercial pet food manufacturers. But if you can understand where they’re coming from, you’ll understand why it would be a good idea to make your own diabetic dog food.
I’m not suggesting all commercial pet food manufacturers are the same. But they do all face the same problems.
So not only is the meat low quality, it’s also bulked out with a filler.
Fillers can be anything from sawdust, to melamine (remember Chinese pet food?), to a market glut of any carbohydrate.
For the past few decades, the production of sugar has soared with its huge demand. This has resulted in a world glut.
Now, whenever there’s a world glut, the price drops. So buying sugar for bulking out commercial pet food is cheap.
I’m sure you’ve now made the connection between your dog getting diabetes and feeding him a commercial pet food. After all, no dog evolved eating processed sugar even in small amounts, let alone the huge amounts that go into pet food.
So the best diabetic dog food is to make it yourself. Then you know what goes into it.
I am offering you the chance to make a huge impact on the health of your beloved dog, simply by switching to the diabetic dog food I recommend.
It’s easy, it’s quick, you probably have most of the ingredients already. And it won’t cost you any more.
Are you ready to make a commitment, to feed your dog my diabetic dog food, to see his health change almost overnight?
Monday, March 2, 2009
What Can Hypoallergenic Dog Food Really Do?
Allergies abound in today’s health arena, for dogs as well as humans. There are a various causes for this, but in my opinion, there is only one maintaining cause, ie the reason it keeps going.
As a rule, allergies are showing that the sufferer has a very weak immune system. When you are considering feeding your dog a hypoallergenic dog food, you know that his immune system is at rock bottom.
I’m not going to address the possible causes here, but I am going to look at bringing your dog’s immune system up, so that he is no longer so sensitive.
Food is consumed every day. So food has the biggest impact on your dog’s health. Whatever the label may say, if you’re feeding your dog a commercial hypoallergenic dog food, then you’re contributing to his discomfort and ill health.
All commercial pet foods are basically the same:
Each one of these aspects of commercial dog food will undermine your dog’s immune system. Bringing them all together ensures he can’t fight off any health issue that comes his way.
The best way to help bring up your dog’s immune system is to feed him as his ancestors fed - with raw meat and bones.
I’m not saying that by feeding your dog as nature intended he will necessarily completely recover from his allergies. But he’ll do a whole lot better than he will by feeding him a commercial hypoallergenic dog food.
There is no true holistic vet or animal therapist who doesn’t adhere to this policy.
Once you have his diet addressed and he’s been on it for enough time to see what it alone can cure, then it’s time to consider treatment.
Being a natural therapist myself (a homeopath), of course I’m biased! But I get a lot of animals come to me who vets haven’t been able to help. Once I get the dog on the natural diet, then the homoeopathic remedy of choice finishes the problem off. Without the diet, the remedy can only palliate.
What I’m really saying is that there is no such thing as hypoallergenic dog food. There is only good, healthy dog food and unhealthy dog food. You will never address a problem if you don’t look at the cause (which homeopathy does so well) and you don’t contribute to it.
Suppose you have a riot in the city (allergies). You can send in the police and the riot will die down (allergies seem to clear up). But underneath the unrest continues (the cause of the allergies hasn’t been cured), and the real reasons are left untouched, only to fester into a much worse state (now hypoallergenic). Homeopathy is akin to finding the cause of the riots and disturbances and dealing with those in a peaceful and constructive way. That is the true nature of cure. (See afternote.)
So don’t be taken in by the pretty words and smiling actors on a packet of commercial hypoallergenic dog food. It will do nothing to bring your dog’s immune system back up, which is the only way to help cure his sensitivities.
I consider there is only one type of healthy dog food, only one type which help restore even the sickest dog’s immune system. And that’s the one based on the natural diet of wild dogs.
Footnote
The above example was written by Jeremy Sherr, a leading UK homeopath.
As a rule, allergies are showing that the sufferer has a very weak immune system. When you are considering feeding your dog a hypoallergenic dog food, you know that his immune system is at rock bottom.
I’m not going to address the possible causes here, but I am going to look at bringing your dog’s immune system up, so that he is no longer so sensitive.
Food is consumed every day. So food has the biggest impact on your dog’s health. Whatever the label may say, if you’re feeding your dog a commercial hypoallergenic dog food, then you’re contributing to his discomfort and ill health.
All commercial pet foods are basically the same:
- over cooked, destroying vital nutrients
- use of very low quality food, such as dead animals and high fat
- use of any cheap filler to bulk it out
- use of highly toxic preservatives - how else do you keep ‘meat’ products indefinitely, at room temperature
Each one of these aspects of commercial dog food will undermine your dog’s immune system. Bringing them all together ensures he can’t fight off any health issue that comes his way.
The best way to help bring up your dog’s immune system is to feed him as his ancestors fed - with raw meat and bones.
I’m not saying that by feeding your dog as nature intended he will necessarily completely recover from his allergies. But he’ll do a whole lot better than he will by feeding him a commercial hypoallergenic dog food.
There is no true holistic vet or animal therapist who doesn’t adhere to this policy.
Once you have his diet addressed and he’s been on it for enough time to see what it alone can cure, then it’s time to consider treatment.
Being a natural therapist myself (a homeopath), of course I’m biased! But I get a lot of animals come to me who vets haven’t been able to help. Once I get the dog on the natural diet, then the homoeopathic remedy of choice finishes the problem off. Without the diet, the remedy can only palliate.
What I’m really saying is that there is no such thing as hypoallergenic dog food. There is only good, healthy dog food and unhealthy dog food. You will never address a problem if you don’t look at the cause (which homeopathy does so well) and you don’t contribute to it.
Suppose you have a riot in the city (allergies). You can send in the police and the riot will die down (allergies seem to clear up). But underneath the unrest continues (the cause of the allergies hasn’t been cured), and the real reasons are left untouched, only to fester into a much worse state (now hypoallergenic). Homeopathy is akin to finding the cause of the riots and disturbances and dealing with those in a peaceful and constructive way. That is the true nature of cure. (See afternote.)
So don’t be taken in by the pretty words and smiling actors on a packet of commercial hypoallergenic dog food. It will do nothing to bring your dog’s immune system back up, which is the only way to help cure his sensitivities.
I consider there is only one type of healthy dog food, only one type which help restore even the sickest dog’s immune system. And that’s the one based on the natural diet of wild dogs.
Footnote
The above example was written by Jeremy Sherr, a leading UK homeopath.
Monday, February 16, 2009
Homemade Dog Food for The Busy Human
Busy people generally tend to shy away from home prepared food for themselves as well as their dogs. But relying on others for your and your dog’s nutritional needs is likely to ensure your dog’s health will suffer, if not your own.
What it really boils down to, is time. You think preparing homemade dog food is not time efficient, perhaps messy, and how can you be sure it’s healthy? Don’t commercial pet food manufacturers know more than you do?
No. Commercial pet food manufacturers are chasing the mighty dollar, just as most people are. Generally, they have very little interest in good quality. By the time you have finished reading this article, you’ll know more than they do.
Is homemade dog food preparation going to be messy?
No, not once you have the hang of what you’re doing, which is where I come in. I’m here to help you every step of the way.
Does it take a long time to prepare homemade dog food?
No, once you’ve got the hang of what you’re doing, it incredibly quick and easy.
Just as it can be in preparing your own homemade food.
So I’ve knocked away some of the most common excuses for not preparing your homemade dog food. But, as you still hesitate, there may be one hurdle in the way, which we haven’t covered.
You have been accustomed to believe commercial dog food is better than anything else. Your vet may have told you. Your parents may have told you. You see people feeding commercial pet food all the time. Can they all be wrong?
Yes!
Because none of them are looking to their dog’s origins. Dog evolved in the wild over many thousands of years, hunting in packs in times of plenty and eating carrion or plant matter in times of famine.
In contrast, commercial dog food typically pellets, is not raw or of the quality a hunted animal is. Dogs digestive systems and nutritional requirements have not changed or adapted, just because they are now domestic.
The best way to ensure your dog maintains not just good, but excellent health is to make homemade dog food, based on a wild dog’s diet. Sure, it isn’t possible to exactly duplicate a wild dog’s diet, but we can come so close that it won’t affect your dog’s health.
When you’re shopping in the supermarket, it’s just as easy to buy raw meat and bones as it is to purchase a packet. You can buy enough to keep your dog going until the next time you shop. Freezing food is an acceptable way to keep it, as it is not so destructive as cooking. Three or four days of fresh food and the rest thawed frozen food will be absolutely adequate to maintain good health.
Once you’ve measured out the food the first time, it’s just a matter of routine.
Keeping all the ingredients together means it’s convenient.
By making your own homemade dog food, you have control over the quality and the ingredients. This is critical to your dog’s good health as many ingredients in commercial pet food is toxic, not natural, not nutritious and certainly isn’t raw.
Try your dog on raw meat and bones for a month and you’ll see a big smile on his face!
Couple that with his drastically reduced health bills, and you’ll be the next one grinning.
Warning: in older dogs there can be an initial clearing period. This is natural and normal, but can look alarming if you don’t know what’s happening.
What it really boils down to, is time. You think preparing homemade dog food is not time efficient, perhaps messy, and how can you be sure it’s healthy? Don’t commercial pet food manufacturers know more than you do?
No. Commercial pet food manufacturers are chasing the mighty dollar, just as most people are. Generally, they have very little interest in good quality. By the time you have finished reading this article, you’ll know more than they do.
Is homemade dog food preparation going to be messy?
No, not once you have the hang of what you’re doing, which is where I come in. I’m here to help you every step of the way.
Does it take a long time to prepare homemade dog food?
No, once you’ve got the hang of what you’re doing, it incredibly quick and easy.
Just as it can be in preparing your own homemade food.
So I’ve knocked away some of the most common excuses for not preparing your homemade dog food. But, as you still hesitate, there may be one hurdle in the way, which we haven’t covered.
You have been accustomed to believe commercial dog food is better than anything else. Your vet may have told you. Your parents may have told you. You see people feeding commercial pet food all the time. Can they all be wrong?
Yes!
Because none of them are looking to their dog’s origins. Dog evolved in the wild over many thousands of years, hunting in packs in times of plenty and eating carrion or plant matter in times of famine.
In contrast, commercial dog food typically pellets, is not raw or of the quality a hunted animal is. Dogs digestive systems and nutritional requirements have not changed or adapted, just because they are now domestic.
The best way to ensure your dog maintains not just good, but excellent health is to make homemade dog food, based on a wild dog’s diet. Sure, it isn’t possible to exactly duplicate a wild dog’s diet, but we can come so close that it won’t affect your dog’s health.
When you’re shopping in the supermarket, it’s just as easy to buy raw meat and bones as it is to purchase a packet. You can buy enough to keep your dog going until the next time you shop. Freezing food is an acceptable way to keep it, as it is not so destructive as cooking. Three or four days of fresh food and the rest thawed frozen food will be absolutely adequate to maintain good health.
Once you’ve measured out the food the first time, it’s just a matter of routine.
Keeping all the ingredients together means it’s convenient.
By making your own homemade dog food, you have control over the quality and the ingredients. This is critical to your dog’s good health as many ingredients in commercial pet food is toxic, not natural, not nutritious and certainly isn’t raw.
Try your dog on raw meat and bones for a month and you’ll see a big smile on his face!
Couple that with his drastically reduced health bills, and you’ll be the next one grinning.
Warning: in older dogs there can be an initial clearing period. This is natural and normal, but can look alarming if you don’t know what’s happening.
Monday, February 9, 2009
Natural Choice Dog Food, Chosen by Your Dog
The most natural choice dog food currently is commercial dog food. That’s as far as a dog ‘owner’ is concerned. If it was up to your dog, that wouldn’t be the case. How would your dog choose?
I believe dogs are inherently intelligent and know, on a deep level, what is good and healthy for them. This natural ability is often upset, just as in humans, by the daily consumption of junk food, year in, year out. Your dog can become addicted.
But if your dog had the freedom to a natural choice dog food from a puppy, what would you see?
I had just that experience, when a dog came into my home, for the first time since becoming an adult.
I was by then, feeding my cats raw meat and bones, having made the conversion a couple of years before.
I hadn’t expected to get a dog, she catapulted into my life, so I was unprepared. I didn’t know what to feed her. Here was this abandoned, energetic puppy, about eight weeks old, who had made it very clear to me that I was the chosen one. She intended to live with me, so I’d better just get used to the idea.
Still racking my brains for a clue as to her diet, I decided to purchase a couple of tins, while I tried to work it out. After all, they were supposed to be ‘balanced’, ‘nutritionally complete’, ‘recommended by top vets’ weren’t they?
My dog knew better.
Even though I was feeding her separately from the cats, she knew what I was feeding them.
And she didn’t like what I was offering her.
Abandoned dogs have often suffered a lack in regular or sufficient food. Even so, she left her food and raced to where the cats were, whining and leaping about as only puppies can, desperately trying to tell me that THIS was her natural choice dog food.
I ended up throwing away a tin and a half of dog food. I capitulated and fed her the same as the cats, just more of it, until I could be sure of the correct amount and type.
She remained fit, energetic and healthy up to about eleven years of age, with absolutely no veterinary intervention of any sort except sterilisation at about six months. She kept her figure, was always interested in everything going on, had a lovely glossy coat.
Her natural choice dog food was raw meat and bones. She chose it. She never had any other type of dog food.
It was me who was the barrier to try initially. I had to sort out my prejudices, my beliefs, my ingrained ideas of healthy dog food that I had gained over the years, from childhood, through advertisements. That was my biggest hurdle to allowing my dog her right for her natural choice dog food.
I believe dogs are inherently intelligent and know, on a deep level, what is good and healthy for them. This natural ability is often upset, just as in humans, by the daily consumption of junk food, year in, year out. Your dog can become addicted.
But if your dog had the freedom to a natural choice dog food from a puppy, what would you see?
I had just that experience, when a dog came into my home, for the first time since becoming an adult.
I was by then, feeding my cats raw meat and bones, having made the conversion a couple of years before.
I hadn’t expected to get a dog, she catapulted into my life, so I was unprepared. I didn’t know what to feed her. Here was this abandoned, energetic puppy, about eight weeks old, who had made it very clear to me that I was the chosen one. She intended to live with me, so I’d better just get used to the idea.
Still racking my brains for a clue as to her diet, I decided to purchase a couple of tins, while I tried to work it out. After all, they were supposed to be ‘balanced’, ‘nutritionally complete’, ‘recommended by top vets’ weren’t they?
My dog knew better.
Even though I was feeding her separately from the cats, she knew what I was feeding them.
And she didn’t like what I was offering her.
Abandoned dogs have often suffered a lack in regular or sufficient food. Even so, she left her food and raced to where the cats were, whining and leaping about as only puppies can, desperately trying to tell me that THIS was her natural choice dog food.
I ended up throwing away a tin and a half of dog food. I capitulated and fed her the same as the cats, just more of it, until I could be sure of the correct amount and type.
She remained fit, energetic and healthy up to about eleven years of age, with absolutely no veterinary intervention of any sort except sterilisation at about six months. She kept her figure, was always interested in everything going on, had a lovely glossy coat.
Her natural choice dog food was raw meat and bones. She chose it. She never had any other type of dog food.
It was me who was the barrier to try initially. I had to sort out my prejudices, my beliefs, my ingrained ideas of healthy dog food that I had gained over the years, from childhood, through advertisements. That was my biggest hurdle to allowing my dog her right for her natural choice dog food.
Sunday, February 1, 2009
What You Need to Know About Commercial Dog Food Before Buying Any More
People tend to think that commercial dog food, especially if it has been recommended by their veterinarian is of good quality and is giving your dog the best chance in life. Right?
Wrong!
While vets should be the best people to advise about dog food, sadly they’re not. Why? Because the top commercial pet food manufacturers now financially contribute to many veterinary schools. They have a foot in the door. They can, and do, influence the students.
After all you generally don’t bite the hand that feeds you.
In most countries of the world, there are, at least some basic laws governing the quality of human food, whether it’s fresh produce, meat or fast food.
In no country are there laws (which are enforced) that insist commercial pet food manufacturers use quality ingredients. That means anything can, and does, go.
After all, if meat is of good quality, wouldn’t you sell it to the highest market - the human market? So, it’s only the poorest quality meat, more often meat by-products (such as hair, intestines and contents, chicken feet, brain, skin, grizzle, fat, etc) that goes for dog food.
This means that the overall nutrient quality is as poor as it gets, as different proteins have different nutritional absorbability.
Pet food is always bulked out with inert (or not as the melamine scam from China testifies) filler. Typically, this filler will be the current cheapest carbohydrate. There’s often a world glut of something, driving down the price. It may be sugar one year, wheat the next.
Do you think the addition of sugar into your dog’s diet will serve to improve his health?
Why do you think that diabetes in dogs is on the increase?
Dogs may bulk out their food in the wild, but it would be on fresh plant matter that’s available, such as fruit or leaves.
Cooking destroys many vitamins and enzymes which are critical to the overall health of your dog.
As most dog food is dried pellets, which keep indefinitely at room temperature, preservatives must be used. Some manufacturers claim they have not added preservatives. Look carefully at the wording. They did not add it. This may be true. But preservatives will always have been added to the meat before it was delivered to the manufacturers.
It’s impossible to keep meat products at room temperature indefinitely without the use of strong preservatives. Preservatives that would never be allowed in human food, because of their poisonous effect.
So your dog may be well fed as far as volume is concerned, but will be starving for quality food. How can your dog remain healthy if he’s fed garbage?
Most people would be appalled at the process that goes into the making of commercial pet food. That would be a really good incentive not to feed it. I’m attempting to give you a glimpse behind the scenes, so you can give your dog the best dog food available within your budget and within your time available.
Wrong!
While vets should be the best people to advise about dog food, sadly they’re not. Why? Because the top commercial pet food manufacturers now financially contribute to many veterinary schools. They have a foot in the door. They can, and do, influence the students.
After all you generally don’t bite the hand that feeds you.
In most countries of the world, there are, at least some basic laws governing the quality of human food, whether it’s fresh produce, meat or fast food.
In no country are there laws (which are enforced) that insist commercial pet food manufacturers use quality ingredients. That means anything can, and does, go.
After all, if meat is of good quality, wouldn’t you sell it to the highest market - the human market? So, it’s only the poorest quality meat, more often meat by-products (such as hair, intestines and contents, chicken feet, brain, skin, grizzle, fat, etc) that goes for dog food.
This means that the overall nutrient quality is as poor as it gets, as different proteins have different nutritional absorbability.
Pet food is always bulked out with inert (or not as the melamine scam from China testifies) filler. Typically, this filler will be the current cheapest carbohydrate. There’s often a world glut of something, driving down the price. It may be sugar one year, wheat the next.
Do you think the addition of sugar into your dog’s diet will serve to improve his health?
Why do you think that diabetes in dogs is on the increase?
Dogs may bulk out their food in the wild, but it would be on fresh plant matter that’s available, such as fruit or leaves.
Cooking destroys many vitamins and enzymes which are critical to the overall health of your dog.
As most dog food is dried pellets, which keep indefinitely at room temperature, preservatives must be used. Some manufacturers claim they have not added preservatives. Look carefully at the wording. They did not add it. This may be true. But preservatives will always have been added to the meat before it was delivered to the manufacturers.
It’s impossible to keep meat products at room temperature indefinitely without the use of strong preservatives. Preservatives that would never be allowed in human food, because of their poisonous effect.
So your dog may be well fed as far as volume is concerned, but will be starving for quality food. How can your dog remain healthy if he’s fed garbage?
Most people would be appalled at the process that goes into the making of commercial pet food. That would be a really good incentive not to feed it. I’m attempting to give you a glimpse behind the scenes, so you can give your dog the best dog food available within your budget and within your time available.
Tuesday, January 27, 2009
Healthy Dog Food - How do You Find One
Most people don’t stop to think about the food they are giving their dog. The colourful packs on the laden supermarket shelves are normally as far as people give dog food a thought. You may be one of them, but are now branching out and looking for something a bit healthier.
Believe me, the packs can look tempting and with smiling veterinarians and dog breeders on the cover, you’re not that hard to convince.
But stop for a moment and consider a wild dog’s diet. Dogs are naturally pack animals and so they hunt in packs. They can bring down a large animal, as large as a cow, with their combined efforts. Then they all gather round, with much growling and snarling and consume most of the carcass, bones and all. Probably the only parts left is the hide and hooves.
Whether or not you can accept this idea, that’s how dogs evolved. And the wild dogs still manage very well. This is the most healthy dog food. There is nothing that can beat it.
Man, with his puny pseudo scientific ideas of improving on the natural diet of dogs is going down a dead end. You can’t.
Period.
There is only one type of healthy dog food. And that is the one which so closely resembles a wild dog’s diet, as to be virtually the same as far as health benefits are concerned.
Lets look at some of the differences between a wild dog’s diet and commercial dog food, a diet most dogs exist on (I won’t say live, as it’’s hardly a life).
A wild diet, a healthy dog food, consists of:
A typical commercial dog food consists of:
So in your search for a healthy dog food, keep firmly in mind the diet of a wild dog. It’s OK to take your time to get used to the idea. If you find the idea repulsive, just go slowly. Try to replace one thing at a time. Just keep in mind that dogs have evolved over millions of years, on this diet. Humans have only been producing (poor quality) commercial dog food for a few decades.
If you don’t like the idea of raw meat for your dog, that’s your issue, not his.
I also suggest that you keep in mind the concept that most people are lured by price. With the best will in the world, if a commercial pet food manufacturer suddenly started to produce quality pet food, because it would be more expensive, do you think it would be a sell-out?
That would only be possible if people had already started to reject the current commercial dog food and were now looking for a healthy dog food, so were prepared to pay a little more.
However, if you make your own dog food, you won’t need to find the extra cash. Not only is a homemade, healthy dog food economical to produce, it has an enormous impact on the health of your dog, often beyond your wildest dreams.
Believe me, the packs can look tempting and with smiling veterinarians and dog breeders on the cover, you’re not that hard to convince.
But stop for a moment and consider a wild dog’s diet. Dogs are naturally pack animals and so they hunt in packs. They can bring down a large animal, as large as a cow, with their combined efforts. Then they all gather round, with much growling and snarling and consume most of the carcass, bones and all. Probably the only parts left is the hide and hooves.
Whether or not you can accept this idea, that’s how dogs evolved. And the wild dogs still manage very well. This is the most healthy dog food. There is nothing that can beat it.
Man, with his puny pseudo scientific ideas of improving on the natural diet of dogs is going down a dead end. You can’t.
Period.
There is only one type of healthy dog food. And that is the one which so closely resembles a wild dog’s diet, as to be virtually the same as far as health benefits are concerned.
Lets look at some of the differences between a wild dog’s diet and commercial dog food, a diet most dogs exist on (I won’t say live, as it’’s hardly a life).
A wild diet, a healthy dog food, consists of:
- raw food
- lots of raw bones
- internal organs are consumed, but these are scarce compared with the muscle meat
- carbohydrates which are limited to the stomach contents, so is small in the overall content
A typical commercial dog food consists of:
- cooked food (many vitamins, enzymes and other nutrients are destroyed by cooking)
- the meat is of poor (often extremely poor) quality (humans get the good stuff)
- carbohydrates, in particular sugar, are a major part of the food - it’s cheap and bulks out the ‘meat’
- the food is fortified with strong preservatives (not allowed in human food for their dangerous impact on health) - DESPITE WHAT THE LABEL SAYS
- to try to redress the nutritional imbalance, isolated and synthetic nutrients are added - nutrients which can’t be properly absorbed and utilised when they are in isolation, or if they are synthetic
So in your search for a healthy dog food, keep firmly in mind the diet of a wild dog. It’s OK to take your time to get used to the idea. If you find the idea repulsive, just go slowly. Try to replace one thing at a time. Just keep in mind that dogs have evolved over millions of years, on this diet. Humans have only been producing (poor quality) commercial dog food for a few decades.
If you don’t like the idea of raw meat for your dog, that’s your issue, not his.
I also suggest that you keep in mind the concept that most people are lured by price. With the best will in the world, if a commercial pet food manufacturer suddenly started to produce quality pet food, because it would be more expensive, do you think it would be a sell-out?
That would only be possible if people had already started to reject the current commercial dog food and were now looking for a healthy dog food, so were prepared to pay a little more.
However, if you make your own dog food, you won’t need to find the extra cash. Not only is a homemade, healthy dog food economical to produce, it has an enormous impact on the health of your dog, often beyond your wildest dreams.
Monday, January 19, 2009
Raw Dog Food - How Can You Be Sure It’s Healthy?
Most people feel reassured by the pictures of smiling veterinarians and dog breeders paying tribute to the commercial pet food they feed their dog. Or perhaps, you’ve been convinced by your own vet that the food they sell is sure to be nutritionally balanced.
For your dog’s sake, be a bit suspicious. Don’t be convinced by anyone (including me) that what they are trying to sell you is necessarily in your dog’s best interest.
Instead, it may be in their own best interest if they gain a sale from convincing you.
If you’re having a problem getting your head around the idea of raw dog food, then I suggest it’s your problem, not your dog’s.
Dogs evolved on a diet of raw food over millennia. Humans have only recently taken an interest in making dog food.
Do you really imagine, for one moment, that humans have been able to change the domestic dog’s digestive and immune system in fifty odd years?
You may well say that humans have had an impact on the way dogs look, with all the different breeds. Yes, that’s true. But have you also noticed that pedigree dogs are also the most unhealthy? What I call a Heinz 57 dog, is normally much healthier.
So in breeding a selective type of dog, humans have gone against nature, by isolating one or more traits, until the breed becomes what the breeder wants.
And so it is with food. Humans tinker about with food, under the guise of ‘science’. I call it junk science, because there’s nothing scientific about commercial dog food. The word ‘science’ has come to be revered by the majority. Just as the word ‘natural’ is currently enjoying popularity.
So a clever commercial dog food manufacturer will incorporate the word ‘science’ and/or ‘natural’ in the advertising, to lure you in.
That doesn’t mean there’s anything of quality within the packet or can It could be anything. You have no way of knowing how the food was prepared or what is in each pack.
Raw dog food, on the other hand, contains all the nutrients essential to a healthy dog.
I appreciate that it may take you time to get your head around the idea, because you’ve probably been brought up on the idea that commercial pet food is the healthiest way to go.
If that was true, how cum that dogs health invariably improves when a switch from commercial to raw dog food is made? The only way you’re really going to find out for sure is to try it out yourself.
You may be worried about parasites and bacteria in raw dog food.
Neither of these are an issue for dogs, whose digestive system is very robust, with powerful digestive juices. Dogs aren’t carnivores, they’re omnivores, which means they can eat anything (as long as it’s raw), including vegetation and rotting carcasses.
In fact, you will notice that when you feed a raw dog food, fleas and worms decrease and almost disappear.
Dogs have problems with unnatural foods - those that are cooked, those that contain preservatives. Neither of these are natural. Cooking destroys many vitamins and denatures other nutrients.
I can genuinely assure you, that your dogs health will improve considerably when you start feeding a raw dog food. There may be a ‘de-toxing’ period initially, but this is normal, natural and only takes a short time to go through.
Why not try it for a month and see for yourself? What have you got to lose?
For your dog’s sake, be a bit suspicious. Don’t be convinced by anyone (including me) that what they are trying to sell you is necessarily in your dog’s best interest.
Instead, it may be in their own best interest if they gain a sale from convincing you.
If you’re having a problem getting your head around the idea of raw dog food, then I suggest it’s your problem, not your dog’s.
Dogs evolved on a diet of raw food over millennia. Humans have only recently taken an interest in making dog food.
Do you really imagine, for one moment, that humans have been able to change the domestic dog’s digestive and immune system in fifty odd years?
You may well say that humans have had an impact on the way dogs look, with all the different breeds. Yes, that’s true. But have you also noticed that pedigree dogs are also the most unhealthy? What I call a Heinz 57 dog, is normally much healthier.
So in breeding a selective type of dog, humans have gone against nature, by isolating one or more traits, until the breed becomes what the breeder wants.
And so it is with food. Humans tinker about with food, under the guise of ‘science’. I call it junk science, because there’s nothing scientific about commercial dog food. The word ‘science’ has come to be revered by the majority. Just as the word ‘natural’ is currently enjoying popularity.
So a clever commercial dog food manufacturer will incorporate the word ‘science’ and/or ‘natural’ in the advertising, to lure you in.
That doesn’t mean there’s anything of quality within the packet or can It could be anything. You have no way of knowing how the food was prepared or what is in each pack.
Raw dog food, on the other hand, contains all the nutrients essential to a healthy dog.
I appreciate that it may take you time to get your head around the idea, because you’ve probably been brought up on the idea that commercial pet food is the healthiest way to go.
If that was true, how cum that dogs health invariably improves when a switch from commercial to raw dog food is made? The only way you’re really going to find out for sure is to try it out yourself.
You may be worried about parasites and bacteria in raw dog food.
Neither of these are an issue for dogs, whose digestive system is very robust, with powerful digestive juices. Dogs aren’t carnivores, they’re omnivores, which means they can eat anything (as long as it’s raw), including vegetation and rotting carcasses.
In fact, you will notice that when you feed a raw dog food, fleas and worms decrease and almost disappear.
Dogs have problems with unnatural foods - those that are cooked, those that contain preservatives. Neither of these are natural. Cooking destroys many vitamins and denatures other nutrients.
I can genuinely assure you, that your dogs health will improve considerably when you start feeding a raw dog food. There may be a ‘de-toxing’ period initially, but this is normal, natural and only takes a short time to go through.
Why not try it for a month and see for yourself? What have you got to lose?
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