THE NEW LAWS OF PET NUTRITION: A feeding plan for the 21st Century

THE NEW LAWS OF

PET NUTRITION A feeding plan for the 21st Century

For over a half-century there has been a social disconnect between pet food companies, community, local growers and species-specific pet nutrition. The consequence of this disconnection is that our pets are suffering from the same nutrition based illness we are suffering from and have much shorter life spans.

Processed pet food companies would like to convince you that supplements, spray on vitamins and formulation using a mixture of grain and vegetables can replace the need for a high quality meat and carefully broken down vegetation diet. Most of the pet parent population knows that thousands of years of eating fresh kill, scavenging for fallen fruit and berries can not be replaced by commercial kibble or canned meals?

What is optimum for your cat and dog is a high quality Mother Nature molded diet. Processed kibble and canned foods are cooked at incredibly high temperatures. The heat needed for pasteurization and to form kibble allows the manufacturer to provide a food product that is safe for humans to handle and has a long shelf life. The problem is that it destroys tons of beneficial bacteria and enzymes during the cooking process. Both dogs and cats have a highly acidic digestive tract to digest raw meats and destroy harmful bacteria. A more natural/ traditional diet of raw meat and a balance mixture bio-available vegetables, fruits and oils; have shown exceptional results, including more muscle mass, better health, less stools and a better coat.

The perils associated with processed pet foods are well documented. Any processed pet food on the market will claim to have sufficient protein levels for proper nutrition. (completely balanced) What is not told to the consumer is the source of the protein. Most dry foods use grains, soy and other plant based protein to achieve an optimum percentage.

These kinds of protein are not design or capable of providing your cat and/or dog with the same nutritional benefits. It has been scientifically proven that our pets thrive on uncooked meat based protein which provide more essential amino acids. Subsidized corn, wheat and processed subhuman grade meat and meat byproducts are much cheaper than free range or organic meat, have a longer shelf life and are more convenient to store and serve. When it comes down to it, convenience is what processed pet food is all about, high profit, lower cost and ease of sale.

Ultimately most of us advocate natural or holistic pet care and we intellectually know the importance of a scientifically formulated “complete” diet plan. If you plan to feed your pet an entirely whole food diet, it’s not as easy as just throwing together different meats, vegetables, fruits, oils and bones. We strongly advise you to consult a veterinary nutritionist or an animal nutritionist who is well versed in food science and animal nutrition.

They will help formulate a diet for your pet’s specific age, lifestyle and any pre-existing conditions.

Preparing your pet’s diet by yourself can be a lot of work. There are premade raw and whole food diets available that are complete meals that do not need any additional supplements. Home-prepared meals can also be a great supplement to some of the better commercially prepared frozen whole pet food on the market.

What does a natural diet look like for your pet? A suburban or rural pet may choose to hunt an animal as large as a deer or as small as a rabbit.

Fresh, uncooked meat & bones contain all sorts of bacteria and vitamins that both a wild and domesticated dog needs. After downing the meal, most people would think that the first thing consumed would be the muscle meat. Actually your dog would most likely first go for the prey’s intestines. The intestines are very nutritious and contain partially digested vegetables, roots, grass, fruits and other green leafy material. This intestinal digestion is not the only time a dog would naturally consume plant matter. Any one who lives on a farm, orchard or has a large garden will tell you that dogs enjoy grazing and scavenging around fruit trees and vegetable gardens.

Ideally your pet should eat organic food free of pesticides, hormones and GMOs. (genetically modified organisms) A problem with feeding organic meals may be the expensive, particularly the meat products that make up the majority of your cat or dog’s diet. Natural is 2nd best and look for manufacturers that use human grade free range meat sources. Make sure you ask where the company gets their ingredients from and if the are human grade, free of hormone meat and pesticides free produce. It’s best to weigh the pros and cons between organic and natural food sources.

Besides being more natural to consume, organic is also more humane to the stock animals. Factory farms treat animals inhumanely, at best, while organic livestock are grass fed and allowed to enjoy their lives before culling. If you’re concerned about the planet, organically farmed meat also has a much lower carbon footprint.

If the price of organics keeps you from buying your pet fresh food consistently, then go with natural or rotate both. You can compromise with meat and eggs by looking for products that are antibiotic and hormone free but not completely organic or free range (note that these products can, and probably will, contain trace amounts of pesticides consumed by factory farm raised livestock.

This program helps you identify the ingredients you want to look for on the labels of the frozen natural and organic frozen pet food s in your grocery market or farmers market. With a good rotation diet plan you will want to have a combination of nutrient rich protein and produce for your pet. FYPR "Feed Your Pet Right." An FYPR score shows the nutrient density of a food on a scale from 1 to 100 based on nutrient content. This scoring system was developed to calculate and score raw food by evaluating an extensive range of micronutrients, including vitamins, minerals, antioxidant, phytochemicals and live enzymes potency.

MEAT Meat 1. Bison, top sirloin 2. Bison, chuck roast 3. Pork Tenderloin 4. Flank Steak 5. Chicken Breast 6. Turkey, light meat 7. Turkey, dark meat 8. Pork Chops 9. Ground Beef, 85% lean 10. Beef, top round

FYPR Score 100 93 86 69 68 64 61 61 56 56

The meat should be raw and unprocessed (only ground) not denatured and broken down by adding water to make tube style meat. If it does look like meat you would eat, do not feed it to your pet.

Denature; Biochemically destroy the characteristic properties by heat, acidity, or other process that disrupts its molecular conformation.

Examples: meat processed for be made into hotdogs, Bologna or chicken nuggets.

FISH Fish 1. Tuna 2. Flounder 3. Sole 4. Salmon 5. Mahi Mahi 6. Swordfish 7. Trout 8. Snapper 9. Haddock

FYPR Score 100 87 87 83 83 81 77 75 75

Fish should be raw or ground raw, not denatured. For those who like to rotate between several protein meat sources we strongly suggest you use ant least one fish meal in that rotation.

VEGETABLES Vegetable 1. Collard/Mustard Greens/Turnip 2. Kale 3. Watercress 4. Bok Choy/Baby Bok Choy 5. Spinach 6. Broccoli 7. Cabbage 8. Arugula

FYPR Score 100 100 100 82 73 72 70 56

COLORED VEGETABLES Vegetable 1. Radish 2. Bean Sprouts 3. Turnip 4. Carrot 5. Cauliflower 6. Tomato 7. Butternut Squash

FYPR Score 55 44 34 34 30 19 16

Ultimately vegetables should be steamed, lightly boiled or broken down by a food processor. This will deliver them at their most bio-available state.

FRUIT Fruit 1. Strawberries 2. Blackberries 3. Raspberries 4. Blueberries 5. Papaya 6. Cantalope 7. Kiwi 8. Apple

FYPR Score 21 18 15 13 12 10 10 7

Fruit should be prepared by crushing or pureed by a food processor.

Never cooked or steamed. Fruit is a great source of anti-oxidants and fiber. Both are very important to your pets diet. Allot of the frozen pet food companies supply under 4% properly prepared fruits and vegetable because of the expense. Quality produce can cost 2 -3 times that of their denatured meat. This is one of the reasons commercial frozen food manufactures suggest that you add vitamin supplements to their meal, to make up for imbalance formulation.

BEANS Vegetable 1. Lentils 2. Red Kidney Beans 3. Great Northern Beans 4. Black Beans 5. Black-Eyed Peas 6. Pinto Beans 7. Edamame 8. Chickpeas

FYPR Score 10 10 9 8 8 6 6 5

Bean should be boiled and finely chopped when being used as a protein source for those pet companions with meat allergies, kidney and liver issues or another illness requiring the use of non-meat protein. Beans and grain are not converted into protein in your pets body as they are in ours. Consult a veterinary nutritionist with regards to replacing meat as a main protein source with beans.

WHOLE GRAINS Whole Grains 1. Oats, old-fashioned 2. Barley, whole grain 3. Wild Brown Rice 4. Brown Rice 5. Barley, pearled 6. Wheat berries 7. Cornmeal, whole grain 8. Quinoa 9. Millet

FYPR Score 5 4 4 4 3 3 2 2 2

For our canine and feline friends properly prepared whole grains are and excellent source of fiber and provide a small amount of vitamins and minerals. Even though their nutrient density scores are very low, their fiber value should not be over looked when selecting a diet or premade meal for your pet.

DAIRY Dairy 1. Tofu 2. Plain Nonfat Yogurt 3. Egg

FYPR Score 37 30 7

Plain yogurt and tofu contains healthy bacteria called probiotics that help maintain the balance of bacteria in your pet’s digestive tract. It also inhibits the growth of the bad bacteria that cause digestive upset such as loose stools and excessive gas.

Summary

When selecting premade whole food meals for your pet, make sure that the ingredients are all human grade, organic or as toxic free as possible, the meat is whole not denatured, it is as bio‐available as possible, you can easily indentify the ingredients in the food, it is truly balanced and it is something that is good enough for you to eat.