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A Dog's Eye View
"Scared Poopless: The Straight Scoop on Dog Care"
an excerpt by Chiclet T. Dog and Jan Rasmusen
 This is the “before” me on an expensive, super-premium “natural” canned food combined with a top vitamin supplement. See my ugly red tears? I’m mortified to have you seeing me look like this, but I’ve swallowed my pride to help save your dog’s life. You now owe me BIG TIME!
It was bad enough that I looked like a canine Vampira when this photo was taken. My blood and urine tests, and boyfriend Jiggy’s tests, revealed inner scenarios that were even more revolting. I was lacking in Vitamin D, folic acid, phosphorus and chromium. Jiggy and I shared deficiencies in B-6, lecithin, calcium, manganese, selenium, and bioflavinoids, plus we both had poor fat absorption and excess sodium. Jiggy, who was on a top “medical” food for his immune-mediated hepatitis, showed additional deficiencies in Vitamins A, C, D, and E, digestive enzymes, zinc and copper. Both our foods were labeled “complete and balanced.” I’m prompted to ask, as compared to what?
Upon seeing our test results, our new holistic vet, Dr. Tamara Hebbler, convinced Mom to switch us to fresh “people food” and supplements. And guess what happened? Within days of changing our diet, Jiggy’s heart-stopping breath (previously a barrier to our romance) became give-me-a smooch-baby fresh. We practically had to leap out of the way to avoid the tartar tumbling from our teeth. Then one fine day we noticed our red tears were gone. My career as a supermodel was back on track.
How can you tell if your dog’s food is hurting your dog?
Take a good look at her. Does she have fiery red gums, brown teeth, bad breath, smelly ears, ugly red tears or gummy gunk in her eyes? (Hint: she shouldn’t.) Does she climb the walls with hyperactivity or languish about like a lump? How’s her temper? Pissy? Maybe her coat’s dull or sheds in fistfuls? Or she has fleas, allergies, bowel disease, recurring ear infections or parasites, anal gland problems or a musty doggy smell? Does she suffer from arthritis, cancer, diabetes, liver, kidney or heart disease? With so many dogs suffering ill health, something universal has to be at fault.
I can’t promise you that an improved diet will fix everything that’s wrong with your dog, but I can tell you that Jiggy’s blood tests results improved 50% in just one month. Within three months, both of our blood tests were 75% back to normal. Clearly, a good part of the source of our health problems had been lurking in Mom’s pantry.
The way this dog sees it, most of us aren’t on health food diets, we’re on fast food diets. You can almost hear manufacturers say: “Do you want fries and a shake with that, Pup?”
Are things really that bad?
Judge for yourself. After commercial food sickened her two dogs in 1990, Ann Martin, author of Foods Pets Die For, began a decade-long quest to find out what could legally go into her dogs’ food. What she learned was beyond shocking. Believe it or not (I didn’t want to), manufacturers regularly serve up proteins from “downer” animals, what inspectors call “4-D”: the dead, dying, diseased and disabled. (Why so surprised? Feeding downer animals to cattle is what Mad Cow disease is all about, and cattle are part of the Human food chain!)
Pet foods may legally contain roadkill, zoo animals, and even euthanized dogs and cats. Ann’s research uncovered food with traces of the euthanasia agent sodium pentobarbital; sweepings from mill and rendering plant floors; moldy grain; restaurant grease; residual antibiotics and hormones; artificial texture, color and flavor agents; and chemical preservatives banned in Human food in the U.S. and in pet foods in other countries. If you like real-life horror stories, read an excerpt from Ms. Martin’s book at www.newsagepress.com.
Okay, you have your yummy ingredients. (Yeah, right.) Next comes processing, cooking at moderate to high temperatures for hours until bacteria and most of the vitamins and enzymes are gone. (Ever wonder why they add back vitamins?) Unfortunately, endotoxins (produced by the bacteria) aren’t destroyed, nor are mycotoxins (produced by molds and fungi). In fact, mycotoxins, which are potentially present in all dried foods, have caused at least two manufacturers to recall products after dogs fell ill or died.
Bet you don’t know how the dog food industry operates. Well, picture a pack of lions with a carcass. The biggest cats feed first, tearing off the best stuff for themselves. Then the hyenas dig in. After the hyenas come the jackals, and so forth, all the way down to the dung beetles. Then same thing happens in the pet food industry. The parent company takes what it wants for you Humans, selling the leftovers (mostly food earmarked as unfit for Human consumption) as food for pets. Ever hear the expression, “The Devil gets the hindmost?” Well, your little angel is that Devil (or dung beetle). This profit-making from refuse and surplus has built a $16.9 billion a year industry in the U.S. alone. If you want to learn more, go to www.api4animals.org/petfood.htm. I bet you won’t come away hungry.
I have more bad news. You Humans have been sold myths along with the food.
MYTH #1: “People food” is bad for dogs. Our ancestors decided to live with your ancestors because we wanted to share their food rather than hunt for our own; in more recent times, your grandparents fed our great, great…great grandparents their leftovers.
Anyway, if pet food companies think the food Humans eat is bad for dogs, why do their ads promote “real” beef and “real” lamb? Maybe the “people” food that’s bad for us is junk food. And maybe what’s really bad about “people” food is its affect on dog food company profits.
MYTH #2: Dogs shouldn’t eat fruits and vegetables. Our ancestors were either opportunistic carnivores or scavenging omnivores. (Experts disagree.) They ate meat, game, poultry and fish, plus whatever veggies and fruits they could score inside or outside their prey’s tummies. People are always surprised to see Jiggy
and me doing tricks for steamed broccoli or green beans or apples. Humans surprise easily.
MYTH #3: You should overlook all that grain in dog’s food. Ever see a “scaredog” to keep dogs out of cornfields? Our ancestors ate some grain, but for the most part, they stunk as farmers and cooks. What grain they did eat came, for the most part, predigested in their prey. Never was it genetically altered, chemically fertilized or stripped of nutrients during processing. Companies making grain-loaded commercial dog foods know this, and also know that grains (especially corn and soybeans and wheat) can be highly allergenic, but think you prefer cheap over everything else. Grrrrrrrrrrrrrr.
MYTH #4: Dogs should eat the same food every day. Allergy specialists will tell you that the best way to give yourself food allergies and nutritional deficiencies is to eat the same thing meal after meal, day after day. Variety’s not just the spice of life; it’s necessary for a healthy life.
MYTH #5: Variety equals diarrhea. An abrupt change of diet can give us diarrhea, but only temporarily. When you’re initially changing foods, stretch it out over a week or longer, adding a little new, and subtracting a little old, and watching our poop to see how things work out (so to speak). After an initial week or so of runny poop, Jigs and I began eating something different at every meal. And guess what? No diarrhea. Nowadays we eat pretty much like you do with no gastric upset--because we’re mammals just like you.
MYTH #6: Dogs must eat what you put in front of them or they’ll become finicky eaters. If something tastes awful, smells spoiled, or makes us feel achy or queasy, how else can we tell you other than to push it away? If we initially turn up our noses at fresh food, maybe it’s because we’re addicted to fat-laden junk food, just like some of you are. Once we get used to fresh food, we’ll love it.
MYTH #7: Dogs’ nutritional needs are too complicated for Humans to figure out. Our bodies are so similar to yours that they test your products on us (not something Jigs and I favor), so am I missing something here? If you’ve managed to stay healthy yourself, with just a few adjustments, you can keep us healthy, too. (On the other paw, if you live on junk food, tequila shooters and cigarettes, better keep us on a good commercial food.)
MYTH #8: The most nutritious food comes in cans and in bags. Highly-processed food is better than fresh? “Meat flavoring” is better than meat? Mom has some real estate she’d like to sell you.
MYTH #9: Quality food is too expensive. Wholesome dog food doesn’t have to be expensive, and can be a bigger bargain than processed food even before you figure in health benefits. After health benefits, there’s no contest. If you feed your dog junk, sooner or later she’ll probably get sick and require expensive medical care.
MYTH #10: “Complete and balanced” means optimum. Foods can get this designation in two ways: with a chemical analysis (meaning that these foods theoretically meet a certain standard) or by passing feeding trials. Trials are a higher standard, but can ultimately be met by exclusive feeding of the food for six months to six dogs. Even though most of us want to live longer than this, there’s no requirement to follow dogs past the initial period (although some companies do). Here’s another shocker. One food in a brand “family” might pass the trial and allow the rest of the “relatives” to tag along. I don’t know about some of your relatives, but considering mine, that idea’s pretty scary.
Do you know exactly what you’re feeding your dog?
Are you sure? Remember when Dorothy and her friends thought the Wizard of Oz was invincible until little Toto pulled back the curtain to reveal a befuddled imposter? Well, that’s what I want to do. I’m pulling back the curtain on dog food. Grab your cans and bags and let’s take a look at those labels:
· Ingredients are listed by descending weight. If numbers one, two and three are ground corn, beef, and corn meal, the food’s mostly corn. Great news if you’re a crow. If the label reads beef, ground corn, and corn meal, the main ingredient may still be corn because it outweighs the beef. Humans can be tricky.
· Meat means whatever mixture of beef, goat, sheep or swine was available at the rendering plant that day. Poultry is the available birds, anything from turkey to buzzard. Animal could be any dead animal (even a rat or a skunk.) Expect vague words to be vague for a reason. What will Madame have for dinner? Zee chicken breast or zee mystery animal part?
· Meal means processed and dried at a rendering plant. Bone meal may contain heavy metals like lead. Even Stephen King couldn’t make meat and bone meal any scarier than it already is. Dr. Jean Hofve, internationally-known pet food expert and former official liaison to AAFCO (the Association of American Feed Control Officials) told us this is where the worst stuff shows up. Also, proportions of meat to bone are anyone’s guess.
· By-products are basically what’s left of a carcass after Humans have taken whatever they can legally eat. Some of this is just icky sounding stuff Humans don’t like; most of it is illegal to sell for Human consumption. Poultry by-products get you heads, feet and viscera. Meat by-products get you blood, bone, lungs, spleen, and other fun stuff—but no meat.
· Digest is boiled-down or chemically-degraded flavoring sprayed on low-quality food . Animal digest can be made from any animal from any source. Yum.
· Grains vary from whole grain to dust off mill floors. Expect “feed” quality grains—the stuff they feed to cattle to fatten them up. Corn meal supplies calories. Corn gluten meal is a cheap protein source. Ground corn, brown rice, and whole wheat are whole grains, but what is so much of this stuff doing in dog food anyway?
· Dextrose, maltose, sucrose, fructose, lactose and corn syrup are sugars that may contribute to diabetes and weight gain.
· BHA and BHT are chemical preservatives linked to Human health and behavior problems. Ethoxyquin is a chemical preservative banned in Human food, and banned for pets in most other countries. Propyl gallate and propylene glycol are synthetic preservatives, too. And don’t get me started on artificial colors and flavors. See our food safety and food additives... follow the links at http://www.dogs4dogs.com/
· Dinner, as in beef dinner, means beef is at least 25% of the product (excluding water for processing), or 10% of the total weight.
· “With real beef” (as opposed to fake beef?) guarantees that there is at least a whopping 3% of beef by weight, excluding water for processing. Beef flavor guarantees only beef taste.
Jigs and I learned the hard way that dog foods aren’t necessarily what they pretend to be. Jazzy packages, sentimental copywriting and cute dogs no longer fool us. (Did you know those actor dogs get paid?) What would impress me is pet food company executives eating their brand live on national TV. Now there would be a food worth trying.
Ever play the Claim Game? When an ad claims a product “tastes meatier,” does that mean it is meatier? Meatier than what? Does it even contain meat? If a commercial quotes results of a study, find the study on their website; does it match their claim? Is it even there?
A really easy way to check out the exact ingredients in your dog’s food awaits you at a top vendor’s website: www.naturapet.com (that’s natura, no L”). Click on “Tools and Resources” and you can compare up to four brands at once. As an added bonus, you can click on any ingredient and see what’s lurking behind cryptic names.
Warning: Never attempt this on a full stomach!
You’ll find that some commercial foods are better than others, but they’re probably not the ones you expect. And some processed food may be even better than some fresh.
So what should you feed your dog? In the next chapter I’ll give you more good food alternatives for your dog than you ever could have imagined. In the meantime, here’s a treat for reading what I had to say.. Chiclet’s Treat Pet food manufacturers go to a great deal of trouble to make our food look, smell and taste appealing. If we won’t eat it, they can’t sell it. But here’s the thing. Well, things.
Although we’re not exactly colorblind—we see yellows, blues and grays—green is colorless to us and red looks yellow. So why are so many dog foods fresh-meat red? Mom thinks it’s to make Humans feel all warm and fuzzy. I say: you think?
You’re probably wondering why dog food has such a fabulous aroma. If we compare our sense of smell to yours, well, forget about it. Our sniffers are about a hundred times better. Walking noses, like bloodhounds, detect smells a thousand times better. Give us smell over looks and taste any ol’ day.
As for taste, we can detect sweet, sour, bitter and salty tastes, but culinarily speaking, we’re more Ronald McDonald than Wolfgang Puck. And, just for the record, the next time you say, “My dog loves me unconditionally,” please remember: we dogs aren’t known for our taste.
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