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UNTIL 1990 ANN Martin was a typical pet owner who purchased regular pet food for her dogs and cats from the store. When her two dogs became ill after eating a commercial pet food, she became concerned and started asking questions of people in the government and pet food industry, in both Canada, where she lives, and in the United States. The inadequacy of the answers she received motivated a seven-year investigation of pet food. Eventually she put her experience and findings into a book that every pet owner should read: Food Pets Die For—Shocking Facts About Pet Food (New Sage Press, Troutdale, Oregon).
Martin says her investigation revealed that “just about anything and everything is fair game for use in pet food. This includes condemned and contaminated material from slaughterhouse facilities; road-kill, dead, diseased, disabled, and dying animals; and, although the industry vehemently denies it, euthanized companion animals.”
These are just the protein sources, she says. “Grains and fats, dregs from the human food chain, are also included. Labels do not indicate the hidden hazards that lurk in most cans and bags of pet food. Hormones, pesticides, pathogens, heavy metals, and drugs are just a few of the hidden contaminates. Sodium pentobarbital, for instance, is a barbiturate used to euthanize companion animals and, to some extent, livestock. When animals eat pet food that has gone through the rendering process, it is likely they are ingesting a euthanizing drug.”
The vast majority of pet food companies purchase their raw materials from an outside source (rendering companies). Rendered material is dried matter comprising a wide variety of substances, all unfit for human consumption due to disease, high levels of drugs, hormones, and pesticides.
Martin was horrified to learn that euthanized dogs and cats are part of this rendered material used for meat meal in commercial foods. “Despite the denial by the industry that this is happening, none of the companies I have contacted actually test the raw material that they are using to ascertain the sources of the protein,” she says. “Dogs and cats from shelters, pounds, and even veterinary clinics are ending up in pet food. Some people seem to feel that this is not a problem; after all, dogs and cats are a source of protein. What they neglect to consider is that 90 percent of these animals have been treated with high levels of drugs prior to their demise. These drugs, antibiotics, hormones, and so forth all withstand the rendering process and in fact can become more toxic. The companies selling the dyes and flavor enhancers are doing a landslide business, and as long as consumers are not offended by the smell and look of pet food, they assume it is good quality.”
Martin once believed that herself—that she was buying quality. Now her opinion is that “most pet food is garbage—unregulated garbage.” Her animals now are fed only home-prepared food.
In a book entitled Home Prepared Dog & Cat Diets: The Healthful Alternative (Iowa State University Press), Donald R. Strombeck, DVM, professor emeritus at the University of California at Davis’s School of Veterinary Medicine, writes that “pet foods contain ingredients that people will not or cannot eat. Can a quality commercial pet food contain these ingredients and be wholesome? The sources for animal proteins, if known to the consumer, are likely to be objectionable to most.”
The pet food industry is megabusiness—topping $10 billion a year in the United States alone. Competition is fierce among the major manufacturers seeking bigger market shares. Companies try to snare your business with hundreds of millions of dollars in advertising, slick TV commercials, meaningless and misleading nutrition claims, and cute names for products. In this competitive scramble, however, quality and good nutrition are often sacrificed to economics and profit. There are no government standards regulating quality, which changes even within single product lines of a company as cheaper ingredients are constantly sought to replace more expensive ones.
Pet owners have the well-being of their pets at heart, but they also want to feed their animals conveniently and cheaply. So they buy commercial pet food. But feeding conveniently and cheaply may cost you more in the long run—in veterinary bills. Cheap food means cheap ingredients. Poor-quality ingredients, fed over any length of time, leads to an increased incidence of obesity, skin and organ problems, behavioral symptoms, and chronic health disorders.
According to a 1996 report by the Animal Protection Institute of America, more than 95 percent of our companion animals derive their nutritional needs from a single source—highly processed commercial pet food. “Our report clearly shows that what you purchase and what the manufacturers advertise are two entirely different products,” the institute said. “The difference is threatening your animal’s health, cutting short any chance of him enjoying old age, and maybe even killing him now. The ingredients they are using are not wholesome, and the harsh manufacturing practices that make those nifty little shapes, the ones our companion animals surely love to eat, destroy what little nutritional value the food ever had.”
The institute report described pet food manufacturers as “masters at getting dogs or cats to eat something they would normally turn up their noses at.” One way they do this, according to the report, is to spray the kibble with discarded restaurant grease that has been stabilized with powerful chemical antioxidants. “Pet food scientists have discovered that animals love the taste of these sprayed fats,” the report said. In addition, numerous other chemical additives are used that increase the palatability, extend the shelf life, and improve the appearance of the food, so it will look good enough to eat (but, more important, will look good enough for you to buy).
The pet food manufacturing process, in fact, includes a major infusion of some of the biggest names in chemical coloring of our time. Some of these dyes can actually make susceptible animals hyperactive. Sodium nitrite may be present to prevent fading of colors, or red dye #40 may be used to give a fresh, meaty look. Both these agents have long been linked to cancer or birth defects in laboratory animals and are even banned in some countries. Is color important to animals? Not as much as to you. The cosmetic effect is for you—the buyer.
Commercial pet food may be the most highly processed food on the planet—a tribute to the magic of food technology. Chemical additives enlisted to create the finished product include anticaking, antimicrobial, coloring, firming, flavoring, drying, pH control, and surface finishing agents, and emulsifiers, sequestrants, synergists, texturizers, lubricants, and sweeteners. The most common antioxidant preservative is ethoxyquin, which some pet food critics and veterinarians claim is a major cause of disease, skin problems, and infertility in dogs. In 1997 the U.S. Food and Drug Administration requested that manufacturers reduce the maximum level of ethoxyquin by half. The absence of ethoxyquin on the label of a product does not necessarily mean it is not in there. Suppliers to the manufacturers may use it in their processing of meat meal (or meat protein, as some companies are calling it), tallow, and fat. If that’s the case, and it often is, the manufacturers don’t have to list it on their labels. Ethoxyquin is not approved for use as a preservative in human food.
Holistic veterinarians are keenly interested in nutrition and diet. They use both as primary healing tools. These animal doctors tend to be severely critical of the quality of most commercial food. They doubt whether the overcooked, chemicalized, refined, and “scientifically formulated” products you buy in stores can ever create radiant health or maintain a state of harmony in an animal. “The diseases we are treating is the food we are feeding,” says Bill Pollak, DVM, of Fairfield, Iowa.
The critics point out that food has to be more than just the quantity of proteins, fat, carbohydrates, and added vitamins. It’s the freshness, wholesomeness, energy, and digestibility of food that counts also. In these categories the veterinarians give failing grades to most commercial foods.
They say many animals cannot tolerate the ingredients. This rejection is often expressed in the form of violent illness or chronic health problems and often triggers a hypersensitivity and overreaction to flea and insect bites, pollens, soaps, sprays, and environmental contaminants. Dry food is a major offender because it is a concentrated collection of many of the foods that are the most allergenic for animals.
The veterinarians are most concerned about feeding inferior protein to animals ad infinitum. This burdens the kidneys and liver, leaving the system toxic and disease prone.
They are concerned about the level of fat. Contents are often 30 percent animal fat. In the wild, no animal prey carries that much. But fat is a cheap source of energy and it’s also tasty, so manufacturers use a lot of it, as well as chemicals, to enhance the taste. The goal is for animals to eat their brand eagerly and in quantity. This, however, is a primary cause of obesity in companion animals.
If the pet food picture seems bleak, don’t be discouraged. Increasingly, health-conscious consumers are demanding more quality. They are realizing that the food is causing many problems. Fortunately there is an industry response to this growing demand and awareness in the form of higher-quality products and more natural pet foods on the market. These and other dietary options covered in the following chapters will point you in the right direction for improving the health of your animal.