Those who know me, know I have looked long and hard at what I feed the animals in my care – members of the family in every sense of the word. What began as a search for answers to problems that stumped all the veterinarians we saw, ended up leading to a complete rethinking of what we feed our four-footed friends. It was a gradual process that began with moving from commercial processed pet food to home prepared raw food, as guided by Dr. Richard Pitcairn’s Complete Guide to Natural Health for Dogs and Cats. It was a great starting point for us more than a dozen years ago. However, what we feed now bears very little resemblance to those early recipes. As with everything, we each come up with what works for us, and what we feel is the best approach. I look forward to sharing what has worked for our family.
There is a lot of research available detailing what is actually in commercial pet food, be it from the supermarket, health food store, or well respected veterinarian. Unfortunately, the typical veterinary school spends just a fraction of their time teaching about animal nutrition, not unlike the education of a lot of our human doctors…well doctors for humans that is. I think this is in large measure because all too often, medicine’s focus is more on treating illness once it visibly manifests itself, rather than trying to prevent it in the first place.
Nutritional effects, be they good or bad, take time to show up in the body, so it’s easier to dismiss the connections. It’s also pretty scary to think what we put into our bodies, and those of our animal companions. So much easier and happier not to think too much about it then. But as a society we’re more aware of prevention these days, wanting more control over our lives and health. It seems a day doesn’t goes by that we don’t hear something new about the food we eat, what’s in it or what’s not, where it comes from, how it’s prepared, the list goes on and on. It can be rather overwhelming.
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Other stories for other days. I don’t want this to turn into a long rant, but there is just so much about commercial cooked pet food that I wish to share. So much information I wish I’d known sooner – no little animal should have had to suffer because I didn’t know what was really in their food. I trusted the ‘experts’ not knowing they hadn’t been fully taught about it either. It astounds me that some very reputable and caring clinics still sell and promote pet food that in addition to being over-processed, contains animal by-product meal as a first ingredient, and not actual meat.
My most profound experience with feeding choices came a few years ago with a long-standing problem that no vet had been able to fix after more than six months of trying. The solution, it turned out, was almost unbearably simple. I don’t want to annoy like those news shows that offer teasers of upcoming reports, rather than just telling you the gist of the story right away. But this is getting pretty long, and I’m sure you all have other things to do besides reading my ramblings. So at the risk of being annoying and stopping here, I wish you a great day, and look forward to telling you tomorrow about Bailey the cat, and his answer to food.
