From reading several articles and researching online and reading books, I have come up with information that has been helpful to me during my search for the perfect dog food!
The Bad News First:
"by-products"- what remains of the animal that can't be used for human consumption. (heads, feet, lungs, ligaments, fat, unborn babies etc).
anything other than the pure word "wheat" - other wise you will get bran and mills rather than the real deal.
same deal with "rice"- you want rice, but nothing else.
"natural"-beware of this word! the amount in the bag that is healthy is in such small amounts and the deal with this is that cooking and processing usually destroys anything that was of any benefit.
**Looking at the first five ingredients in the bag will be a helpful indicator of what is in the bag. Ingredients must be listed in descending order of weight. Look for whole foods to be listed.
meat "meal" - just think about this for a second.....take "meat" and bone and try to make meal from it. The definition: "rendered meal from animal tissue". What is rendering you ask? Good question! Webster's Dictionary defines it as " to melt down <render suet>; also : to extract by melting<render lard>".
So ya, boiling fat, yum. Also, it is worth mentioning, that this ingredient "meal"is what is being blamed for causing mad-cow disease. The use of dogs and cats, road kill etc used to be a very common practice, but is no longer as popular, but this is a very real fear!
"BHA or BHT"- they are common preservatives but are highly associated with liver damage, cancer, abnormalities etc.
"ethoxyquin" -also a preservative that has caused outrage among dog owners and was removed from most dog foods years ago but has a tendency to make reoccurrences. It can cause caner, liver, kidney failures among many other things.
"propylene glycol" - another chemical preservative that causes skin problems!
THE GOOD!
"chicken, beef, lamb etc"- look for words that show a whole food has been used rather than a by-product or a meal.
vegetables!!!
fruit!!
--- Ya, the good is pretty simple! Think of everything that is good for your dog and there ya go! I am fixing to start posting every so often about different ingredients and their benefits for your dog, hopefully that will shed more specific light on "the good".
To get WAAAAYY more information on all this and more.....get "Dr. Khalsa's Natural Dog: A Holistic Guide for Healthier Dogs" by Deva Khalsa, VMD. Seriously...you will not regret it!
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