Re: [pyrnet] Dog foods

["Linda Weisser" <lmweisser@attbi.com>]

----- Original Message -----
From: "Barb Bowes" <bamb@monmouth.com>


When I fed my dogs Purina Dog Chow, that and their Puppy Chow were (I think)
the only formulas that they offered. Now, that was a LOT of years ago. Dog
food has come a long way since then, but IMO it still has a long way to
go.>>

My cynical view, of course, is that all these multiplying versions and
formulas are just another way for the companies to garner a buck.  If you
can convince buyers that ONLY food x, y or z MUST be fed at some company
determined age, then you can just keep everyone hopping.  This does NOT
apply to the health scrip foods which clearly have a useful purpose.

<<My dogs could have gotten cancer from anything. The water, the pollution,
their genetics, etc. But since they all, yes every single one of them, got
Cancer of one sort or another, I decided to look at different dog foods.>>

Tiz complicated.  I have had only two dogs in 35 years die of cancer.  Yes,
yes, I know, I live in a very environmentally clean area.  However, I have a
friend who lives only 45 miles from me who has lost 9 dogs to bone cancer in
15 years.  Go figure.  She feeds her dogs better than I feed mine too.
Assuming that your problems are environmental, how do you presume that this
or that food is going to hold off the problem?  BTW, Bo's sire's brother
died of bone cancer at around 11.  He also lived in an environmentally clean
place.  Since you changed food, I am presuming you have had no cancer?  How
long has that been and are your current dogs older than the prior cancer
death dogs lived to be?  I'm just not sure that we can always place "blame"
here.

Another thought.  It might be possible that some "one" thing in the food is
causing a problem for dogs who get cancer.  And that one thing might be more
present in up scale dog food than it is in the more pedestrian stuff that I
feed.  I don't think that we can always assume that fancier or more
expensive is better.

Linda