[pyrnet] Fw: 10 Secrets Pet Food Companies Don't Want You to Know

["Barb Bowes" <bamb@monmouth.com>]

This was posted on another list. I'm forwarding it to you so that
you will do some research and perhaps have a healthier pet in the
long run. See below my signature line. and yes, I do hope this
will spark CIVILISED debate!

Barb Bowes
Bo & Chelsea (Pyrs), Flopsy (Pyr Shep) & Machin (Doxie)
The more people I meet, the more I like my dog!
bamb@monmouth.com
<<10 Secrets Pet Food Companies Don't Want You to Know

1. Pet food is NEVER mostly meat. Many ads
suggest that it is. In order to list a meat source first on the
bag label pet food companies resort to a variety of gimmicks.

Here are a few to get you thinking:

1st, listing a "wet" ingredient in what ends up being an
essentially dry finished product. Wet meat gets a lot lighter
when the moisture is cooked out. This labeling loophole is
blatantly deceptive to the general public. All ingredients should
be weighed and listed in dry weight equivalents for you to know
truly how much of each makes up the ration. If the label lists,
"chicken" it means chicken weighed when wet. Drop 75% of the
value. If, on the other hand, it says, "chicken meal" they play
fairly. If it says, "meat (any type) by-product meal" or "meat
(any type) by-products" it was never meat to begin with. Find
another food.

Another gimmick is to "split carbohydrates" (grains) into
multiple parts to get the "meat" to list first. Label ingredients
are listed in descending order by weight. So, If you have 10 lbs.
of chicken meal and 25 lbs. of rice, which should appear first on
the label? Chicken of course! (if you want people to buy the
stuff).

Here's how it's done:

1st- CHICKEN MEAL
2nd- GROUND RICE
3rd- RICE BRAN
4th- RICE GLUTEN

Pretty sneaky and obviously deceptive unless you know the trick.
Rice Flour, Brewer's Rice and Rice ala Ronny could also have been
listed if they really wanted to be fancy. A related tactic is to
use a variety of grains with different names to get meat listed
first. This is slightly more valid since they have
different amino acid profiles and are truly different
ingredients. Grains cost a lot less than meat. Meat "by-products"
cost a lot less than meat. Both also have considerably less food
value.

The last gimmick for now is the campaign to
convince the public that meat by-products and
meat are just about the same thing. Hmm... "Honey, I'm having a
ribeye steak tonight and you're having a nice pile of
by-products, ok?" "Would you like the chicken breast or the
intestine-cartilage-beak medley with your rice, Bob?" "Well gee
Dear, doesn't really make any difference to me, they all sound
equally delicious, nutritious and healthy!"

By definition, by-products may contain anything
from the specified animal except, (in the case of chicken),
feathers and feces and, (in the case of beef), hoof, hide and
feces. Meat and fat are separated out first because they are
costlier and are therefore not present in any appreciable
quantity. What's left is the bones, tendons, cartilage, beaks,
feet and innards. Proudly displayed and masqueraded as meat.

A pet food bag is not a place for dumping stuff of unknown
nutritional value. Some foods even use the term , "SELECT
by-products". All these contortions serve one purpose; To make
you think that you're getting more meat than you really are in
your bag of pet food. After all, who'd pay $35 for a bushel of
corn?!

Well, keep reading!

2. The cooking process used in pet foods KILLS
off a vital component: enzymes. In order to eliminate bacteria
and make cutesy shapes that pets care nothing about, processing
temperatures in excess of 160 degress F are used to extrude or
bake your pet's food.

So what? Well, glad you asked. This places the entire burden for
digestion on your pet's pancreas to supply the enzymes necessary
for breaking down nutrients for absorption. In nature, this is
far from the case. Animals naturally follow the path of "least
digestive resistance" in the wild.

Consider the fox who catches a rabbit. First item on the menu is
the contents of the gut. Let the rabbit do the digesting and
enjoy! The rabbit spent hours nibbling grasses and grains
readying them for the fox's easy absorption of carbohydrates.
Quick and cheap fuel.

Next the fox buries or hides the rest to stew a spell. What we
call, "turning rancid" the fox calls, "just getting better". In a
couple days, the live enzymes in the rabbit meat have broken it
down into easily digested protein. Notice how no fire was used in
this process? For dessert, a little bone gnawing for the marrow,
the calcium, and the teeth cleaning, and it's naptime. Left for
the lower animals in the hierarchy are most of the by-products
and the hide.

Let's get back to your pet.

In puppies and kittens, the pancreas is usually
robust and up to the task of supplying sufficient
digestive enzymes to make dead food somewhat
useable and fulfill it's other vital functions. With age,
however, pancreatic function is weakened and often can't keep up
with this undue burden. If the pet food fed day in and day out is
of low nutritional value to begin with, the taxing effect on the
system will be all the greater and the pancreas will most likely
give up that much sooner. The consequences to your pet's health
are too broad in scope to cover here.

3. Giving "real food" aka "table scraps" is the RIGHT thing to
do! Stepping on a lot of toes here
to smash the myth that you should only feed the
stuff from the bag and nothing else ever, PERIOD.
What is it they are afraid of anyway? That your pet will learn to
beg? Unlearn that. That your pet won't eat the chaff they call
"food" after tasting the real deal? Probably. Or that it will
throw the delicate balance of their finely tuned "nutrition" out
of whack somehow? He He Hoo, hardly.

Here's the scoop...

Providing real food (not potato chips or other junk food) in its
raw form counteracts some of the deficit that can be caused by
only feeding commercially prepared pet food. It can provide the
living enzymes to make digestion an easy rather than burdensome
process.

But, don't just go wild and throw everything in the feeding
trough. Good bets for pets are raw carrots, broccoli, yogurt,
cheese, garlic and meats. Cooked oatmeal, rice, corn, squash and
the like are fine too. Don't feed raw grains, legumes, potatoes,
onions, celery or chocolate which are either unusable or
unhealthy. If you aren't comfortable with raw meat and fish,
don't do it. Keep in mind, they aren't people and have an
entirely different gastro-intestinal system than we do.

Introduce new foods a little at a time about three times a week
to start and give your pet's pancreas a much needed break.

4. Most "vet recommended" foods pay mightily for the "honor".
Does it matter that the majority of vets know very little about
pet nutrition? The public is told to, "Ask your vet". The vet is
told by the pet food companies, "we'll send you to Hawaii for a
week of golf if you sell and endorse XYZ brand pet food". In
school, vets-to-be could ELECT to take an overview course in
animal nutrition. Or not. There have been changes of late to make
this required study. AS IT WELL SHOULD BE!

You are miles ahead if you understand the pet food label yourself
and take the time to learn some basic nutritional concepts. It's
not that complicated! Find out for yourself, trust your own
judgement and ignore what people say who are getting paid to say
it.

5. The #1 vet recommended brand is probably the
#1 worst pet food value. Without mentioning any
names, if it lists corn as the first ingredient on the label and
gets blasted by the competition for it, you know the company.

Read the label! Compare it to the cheapest stuff you can find.
There isn't a dimes worth of difference in most cases. How much
does it cost them to make a 40 lb. bag of this stuff you may
wonder? Right? Sit down. How about less than $3 including the
cost of the bag? How much does the duped public shell out for the
bushel of corn and peanut shells most recommended by vets? About
$35. "Have a nice flight to Maui, Dr. Cutter and thanks again for
your support".

6. Feeding "Soft-Moist" diets will cut your pet's
life expectancy in half. Thankfully, these foods are on the steep
decline but aren't gone yet. Perhaps killing your customers isn't
a good way to develop long term brand loyalty. These toxic
morsels are so loaded with chemicals to stay soft and prevent
molding and so laden with sugar to cover the harsh chemical
taste, they rip a pet's insides out. The sweetness is addictive
and you'll hear owners say, "Fifi just won't eat anything else".
Well, then better buy the small bag because who knows how long
Fifi will be eating at all? Anybody feeding this garbage should
stop at once and the manufacturers of it should be faced with a
class action.

7. Many companies have "slithered" away from using ETHOXYQUIN.
The once popular, and staunchly defended as safe, preservative
(antioxidant) called "Ethoxyquin" has been mostly abandoned
because of "hushed" litigation and settlements with professional
breeders. It formerly was championed by pet food manufacturers
(and others) as an advanced and healthy inclusion in pet food in
an attempt to hide the fact that it was never
intended to be eaten, much less on a daily basis. It was
originally formulated as a rubber stabilizer and a color
retention agent. Tires stayed pliable and spices stayed red.

Despite efforts to get it approved as a food
stabilizing agent in people food, it is only allowed for
extremely limited application with colored spices. The people who
know the devastating truth about this ingredient when eaten daily
by pets have been paid off and forced to never tell their
stories. There are innumerable instances of stillbirth, sudden
liver
failure, kidney dysfunction, permanent pigment
changes, tumors and death thought to be caused
by the addition of this wonder substance to pet
food starting in about 1987. Much of the talk
about ethoxyquin has quieted since the major pet
food companies jumped off the bandwagon and
switched to safer (and less legally troublesome)
preservatives like forms of vitamins E and C. If they want the
trust of the public, they should own up to their mistakes and
come clean. Fat chance. All you'll get is denial.

8. Nature didn't intend for pets to eat dry food devoid of
enzymes. Convenience is paid for in reduced pet health. Where is
it written that your pet's bowl has to be filled with chalk dry
nuggets of quasi-nutritious ground up brown stuff? We've been
sold on a bad idea. We bought it because it made life easier.
Until the real bill comes, that is.

But doesn't kibbled food make their teeth shiny
and their breath fresh? Won't their teeth fall out if they eat
soft stuff? Yeah, right. Ever watch your dog eat? Does it look
like some kind of teeth cleaning exercise? How about the cat?
Really getting the old gum line clean huh? The truth about teeth
cleaning is this... sticks, rocks, yarn, bones, toys and saliva
primarily accomplish this task, not food. Commercial pet food has
to be flavor enhanced with digest and sprayed-on fat to be even
remotely attractive to your pet. Without these palatability
modifications, the old dry kibble would just sit there and get
dusty.

People get paid big money to invent coatings to
make your pet dive headfirst into the food bowl.
Because then you smile and feel like it must be
healthy and that Fifi loves the food and you too
so you'll buy it again. Right? Remember, the fox
didn't go in search of a crunchy rabbit. It ate the soft one and
it has a dazzling smile and a fully charged pancreas.

9. Some companies sneak sugar into pet food to
hook your pet. Watch out for these guys! They call
it other things of course... (cane molasses, corn
syrup) but it absolutely does not belong in your pet's food bowl.
Processed sugars are foreign to dogs and cats and over the long
term can result in obesity, tooth decay and diabetes (along with
other
maladies). Until 2 years ago, propylene glycol was being used as
a sweet tasting preservative by those who must have cared much
more about shelf life than about pet health. Thankfully, it has
finally been banned.

Pet food companies will tell you that the industry is tightly
regulated and that your pet's health is being fastidiously
protected. Do you buy that one? The FDA can't even keep up with
human food and
didn't lift a finger on behalf of the pet owners during the
ethoxyquin debate.

The regulating body for pet food ingredients is
AAFCO. The American Association of Feed Control Officials. The
rules and definitions they adopt are made by those with vested
interests and are enforced through "voluntary compliance". The
fox guards the rabbit hutch here.

10. Almost all manufacturers use stool hardening
agents in pet food. Convenience again triumphs
over pet health. Stool modifiers make clean up
easier and mask the effects of nutrient malabsorption. Who's
going to buy a pet food if you've got to SCRAPE up after your
dog? It's easier to just stack those little bricks into a pile or
kick them elsewhere. Consider however the strain on your pet's
innards. Would you put concrete mix
in your pancake batter? How about sawdust? If
you were dieting, would you mix ground peanut
shells into your breakfast cereal? Well, they do all that and
more for your beloved pet.

See if any of these made it into your pet food bag: sodium
bentonite, powdered cellulose, tomato
(or any other) pomace, ground peanut shells. The
explanation for including these usually is that they are fiber
sources for your pet's well being. Maybe a little truth there but
not the real reason they are added. Whole grains provide great
fiber content. A bit of bran would do well too. The real goal is
to make you buy the food again because clean up time is so easy
and enjoyable with brand XYZ's designer stools. Before you do
this to your pet, try it yourself for a few days.

One question to ask a company representative is
this, "Aren't there times when my pet needs to
evacuate it's system rapidly such as when a toxin
is ingested or when the kitty or doggy flu comes
around? Is having a cork in there at all times
really a good idea? You'll then likely hear mumbling
about "Our research..." and "regulating intestinal
transit time for optimal nutrient absorption". Do you buy that
one? If the food is good and fed
properly, stools will be fine without forcing your pet to work a
brick through their digestive and excretory systems.

End note: The opinions of this author were formed over a period
of 15 years inside the pet food industry. It was written because
it needed to be said to enlighten and alert the pet loving public
and to
act as a minute counterbalance to the daily barrage
of pet food hype foisted on us.

Your pets depend on you to make the right choice
when it comes to feeding them a nutritious diet.
Their quality of life is at stake. Become a label
reader! Take the time to bone up on nutrition. Call the Company
if you have questions. Most have a toll free number on their bag.
Ask to speak to a Nutritionist or the person who formulated the
food you are using. Dig until you are satisfied or until you know
it's time to switch to another food (or manner of feeding).

For your pet's sake, don't be content with the
miserable status quo. Not all currently available
pet foods are totally rotten and not all companies
engage in the above practices. Some are much
better and more ethical than others. You are the
boss. Now, you're the boss with the inside track
on what to watch out for. Please take your pet's
diet seriously. It's the right thing to do.

Feel free to pass this article along to interested
parties. An informed public will generate changes.>>