Which food type, canned or dry, do you prefer? What sector? There are so many different pet food brands, types, and packaging options, and pet owners are given so little information on which to base their decisions, which may make it quite confusing (apart from advertising). So buckle up if you have any past experience of the pet food market because this might be a bumpy ride! Seven well hidden secrets regarding pet food are going to be revealed to you. As you settle in and prepare to read, do so.
As “Premium Dog Food, Highest Quality,” other pet foods that cost $30 or more for a 20-pound bag also market their products. Cat owners can also assert the same thing. Choose Whiskas over a pricey cat food that costs three times as much but makes the same claim about a happy, healthy cat: “Everything we do is about making cats happy.”
Pet owners are asking questions like “Is my pet safe?,” “Has this food been recalled?” and “Is this food going to be the next one to be recalled” as a result of the ongoing pet food recall. Wow, this is illogical! terrifying as well! What particularly ought a pet owner to do? Why not learn something? If you are aware of a few insider secrets regarding pet food, it is not nearly as confusing.
One Unique
All meals are labeled as select or premium, even though relatively few pet diets actually include these ingredients. The “secret” is that no pet food is allowed to make any guarantees or assertions about the grade or quality of its ingredients on its label or in its advertising in conformity with industry regulations. You see, the word “premium” DOES NOT suggest that the meal’s ingredients are of the greatest caliber when it is used to describe pet food. The term “premium” does not adequately represent the meal or its quality when used to describe pet foods. It is merely a catchphrase used in marketing. The pet food industry’s standards state that “Ingredient quality or grade are not specified” (regulation PF5 d 3). As a result, words like premium, choice, or quality are basically marketing or sales speak. They shouldn’t be interpreted as a reflection of how good the food is.
But why shouldn’t a pet food label disclose the quality of its ingredients to a prospective buyer? An animal owner has a right to understand the products they are buying, right? This leads me to the next mysterious truth.
Secret
If I may make a quick analogy, we all know that “human” food and pet food are very different in a number of important ways. One choice is White Castle (I’ll admit, I prefer their tiny fellas!). There is also an Outback Steakhouse (another favorite). Both restaurants serve pork and potatoes. At White Castle, a couple of hamburgers and an order of fries cost less than $3. At Outback, a steak and baked potato run approximately $16. You are aware that despite the fact that both a fast food hamburger and a steak contain meat and potatoes, their nutritional profiles differ significantly.
The problem with the pet food business is that most pet owners don’t have the same perspective on pet food. They don’t differentiate between pet foods from nutrient-dense sit-down restaurants and those that are more akin to fast food. A young man once subjected himself to the exact same diet experiment by subsisting solely on fast food for 30 days. He consumed fast food three times every day for a month, gaining a lot of weight and seeing dramatic increases in his blood pressure and cholesterol levels. Think of feeding your pet this kind of food throughout the whole of its life.
I’ll return to discussing our two meals. Chemical analysis might be used to establish how much protein, carbohydrates, and fat are in your White Castle lunch and your Outback dinner. Regardless of whether you believe the steak at Outback is a higher-quality protein than the burger, both would still be classified as proteins. The quality of the protein is not evaluated by the analysis.
Therefore, it’s Imperative to Note:
A Guaranteed Analysis that details the amounts of protein, fat, fiber, and moisture in each serving is included with every pet food product. The REAL secret is in the quality of the protein, fat, and other percentages.
Even though chicken feet only contain a small amount of food, they would appear as protein in a diet for pets even though they include little food. A cow that was put to sleep due to an ailment that made it unsafe for people to consume would also test positive for protein even though it may be fatal to consume. Pet food frequently includes ingredients made from both legal foods and cows that have been put to sleep. As you can see, the producers’ WIDE OPEN ACCESS to the sources of the ingredients they use is the key to the pet food industry’s success. Food for adult dogs and cats must have 18% protein and 26% protein, respectively. For example, “human grade” meat, chicken feet, euthanized animals, grains, even artificial proteins created by humans, and a wide range of other options can all be used to make these precise percentages.
It is neither needed nor allowed for pet food labels to disclose the sources used to provide the required 18% or 26% of protein. Even worse, companies that only use ingredients of human-grade quality are forbidden from telling customers or potential customers that their products are made with premium ingredients
Safety
How can a pet owner know what is in their pet’s food when some pet food options include chicken feet and euthanized animals and labels like premium and choice don’t indicate the food’s quality?
This crucial information is made obvious by ingredient definitions. “Human” food typically has a visual appeal that tells you how excellent it is. With pet food, this is not the case. Specific Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and United States Department of Agriculture requirements must be followed by all “people” food. The sole exception to this rule is pet food. Put-to-death cows and chicken feet are not allowed in human meals for obvious reasons—they have no nutritional value and may be detrimental to consume.
A common ingredient in pet meals, meat and bone meal is simply a blend of several byproducts from the human food industry. Veterinary offices, animal shelters, and farms may use the heads, stomachs, and intestines of euthanized cows, horses, dogs, and cats to produce “meat and bone meal” (horrifying but true). Along with the deceased animals, the pet chow also contains the anesthetic pentabarbitol that was used to put the creatures to sleep. In addition to unused restaurant grease, “flesh and bone meal” may also comprise faulty (or even cancerous) meat components retrieved from deceased animals. Or, to put it another way, this common ingredient is a mixture of dreadfully inferior and potentially hazardous waste materials from the human food industry.
The terms “meat and bone meal,” “meat by-product,” and “meat by-product meal” are also used to describe the ingredients in pet food. It is an unidentified, incredibly poor ingredient in pet food.
Another lement that Mimics the One Previously Mentioned is “Animal Digest.”
The chicken feet I mentioned before may be present in items labeled “Chicken By-Product,” “Poultry By-Product,” or “Chicken By-Product Meal.” These include any byproducts from the chicken or poultry industry, including but not limited to chicken feet, skin with some feathers, heads, and guts. All of these components are still present whether the bird is healthy, unwell, dead, or in the dying process.
What you Gotta do is as Follows:
BEFORE you purchase any pet food, turn the bag over and carefully review the ingredient list. The items on the aforementioned list would be among the first five or ten ingredients. If you find ANY of those things, I strongly advise against purchasing the food. Remember that chicken feet and animal carcasses are also acceptable sources of protein. All that is required in terms of pet food is the right analysis.
In order to boost the protein percentages, several pet food manufacturers in this category add grains and chemical additives to grain-based products. Pet food was voluntarily recalled as a result starting in March 2007. Because no one foresee the probability that the two toxins’ combination could result in kidney and bladder blockage, many pets perished and many others became unwell. Again, their ruse is that the product’s protein level must be evaluated; nobody is required to provide high-quality beef protein.
Why is it crucial that you recognize grains as a source of protein? First off, science has established that a meat protein is beneficial to and necessary for both cats and dogs. The pet won’t get the meat it needs to flourish if its protein source comes from grains. By the way, melamime is one of the substances that were discovered to be the root of the pet food recall in March 2007. Aflatoxin is another another issue associated with cereals. You might not be aware of the new pet food recalls that have taken place because of aflatoxin, a deadly mold found in corn, wheat, and soy. Over 100 pets perished as a result of moldy grains that contained aflatoxin in Diamond Pet Food before the product was recalled in December 2005.