Nutrition and Ingredients

Comment

Comment by Zachary Heskett on October 29, 2009 at 3:54pm

What is your single largest challenge when:
A.) Sourcing ingredients for a new project?
...and/or
B.) Diversifying your supply chain for ingredients that you currently purchase?

Comment by Amy Fiumarelli on October 28, 2009 at 12:02pm

Rosemary and Vitman E make great preservatives in baked goods for pets. Flaxseed does not Vitamin C also does not. Been there done that!!

Comment by Jeffrey Michael Bond on October 15, 2009 at 8:30am

Vitamin E is a natural antioxidant and I might think that it would be better than vitamin C as a preservative. Whole flax seed would do little and in fact if you are using ground flax seed it will contribute to rancidity as the oil is highly unsaturated and therefore becomes rancid much quicker. Hadn't heard of vinegar although I guess since it is acidic that it would help to drop the pH and preserve the product but not sure how well it will work after the product has been cooked. All of this said, you might want to specify the problem a little bit more. Do your products have a short shelf life or do you feel the need to put something on the label?

Comment by A.M. Weiting on October 14, 2009 at 4:47pm

Comment by A.M. Weiting 11 minutes ago Delete Comment I started a pet bakery a year and a half ago. I am still changing different recipes for my treats. What I am looking for is a source in or close to Wisconsin for something to use as a natural perservative. I been told to use flax seed, vitamin C, concentrated vinegar, and vitamin E. Help!

Comment by Jeffrey Michael Bond on October 14, 2009 at 4:26pm

Is there not an external auditing system in place with respect to labelling? Sounds like the jurisdiction of the FDA or AAFCO.

Comment by Jana Connell RVT, CVT on October 14, 2009 at 4:22pm

I did a lot of research on it yesterday and it appears that while it is almost always included in foods, it is sometimes not included because the body does make it. It is not tied to taurine, which I first suspected, but it has been implicated (wrongly so according to further research) in creating oxalate crystals in humans and dogs.
It is non-essential because the body makes it. Essential amino acids are ones we have to get from our foods and we cannot make but need to live. Melody explained it all quite nicely down below. Now why it isn't always labeled is another bugaboo just like the Vit K issue Danielle brought up. If we want these things to change, then we need to put these manufacturers to task to do so. I am a loud squeaky wheel when I need to be!!

Comment by Dan Hughes on October 14, 2009 at 4:01pm

Jana,

Any thoughts on the glycine question?

Dan

Comment by Jana Connell RVT, CVT on October 14, 2009 at 3:57pm

Jeffrey,
You bring up an interesting point about excesses. The problem with many foods on the market is just that-there are excesses in the food to start, so when you overfeed, which most owners seem to do, you do create a very unbalanced diet. Most food is too low in essential nutrients and too high in others so that the dog or cat must eat more and more just to try and meet its energy needs or RER. This is a major cause of obesity in pets. I call it my ounce of protein from a pound saltine cracker syndrome. You feed a poor quality food and your pet has to make up for the lack by eating more and more costing the owner more and more. It's like trying to get an ounce of steak protein from a box of saltine crackers. It's not going to happen.

If the percentages of Ca/Phos are high in a normal 8 oz of food, then you can bet it will the cause of nutrient-related excesses later on due to overfeeding. That includes, fat, protein, cal/phos etc.

The problem, as most of you know, with a high phosphorus/ca level in growing puppies of large breeds is the over-production of growth plate and bone which can be a cause of hip and elbow problems before the age of 1 yr. The high ratio later on with other pets is a kidney/organ issue.

Comment by Jana Connell RVT, CVT on October 14, 2009 at 3:50pm

I have no idea why you think our opinions would be polar opposites. I think all ingredients should be listed and labeled. When my dog was a puppy I had started her on a food that Hill's no longer makes, which was called (I think-it's been years!) HealthChoice. I took her from puppy food to adult at one year and in two weeks she was broken out with pustular dermatitis.
She looked like she had chicken pox it was so bad. The only thing that had changed was her diet, so we put her back on the puppy food for the time being and investigated the ingredients in the adult food. I then put her on W/D, which is a weight maintenance diet for adults and she did great on it. After all the sores were gone we put her back on the HealthChoice Adult and in two-three weeks the same thing happened. We got the ingredient labels from Hills on both foods and they were identical in ingredients except for one thing- the HealthChoice was sprayed with beef digest for flavor. That was the one ingredient that made her break out. She is now almost 12, has been on W/D all her life and is in better shape than any other dog I know. She still runs like a 5 yr old and she is one lb heavier than her one year old weight. My point behind all of this is that without that labeling of the beef digest we might never had known what it was. I think ALL food, vitamins, supplements etc should be labeled. However, the law gives these companies a lot of leeway in what they can call something. Like the break down of what is 'natural' or not. It has to have a percentage of that ingredient by law before they can call it natural, or all natural, etc. I think even rice gluten should be on the label because some pets are allergic to rice.
So I agree with you -although you didn't exactly make a statement about it. You can contact each company and ask them directly. I have not memorized the laws but the ethics are pretty clear to me. If it's in the bag, it should be on the label.

Comment by Danielle Park on October 14, 2009 at 1:41pm

Jana, I have a question for you about an ingredient. Petfood company 'A' buys their fish along with Petfood company 'B' to get a better deal. The are both made in the same plant. However, only 'A' adds ON LABEL the synthetic source of vitamin K. When "A" was asked about this ingredient and why it was in theirs and not 'B's they replied company 'B' also adds it but it isn't on the label. Silly me-I thought that was illegal. What are your thoughts specifically on the laws, and ethics(as I know our opinon about the ingredient will be polar opposites) of this situation?
Another example of this situation was when Natural Balance had rice gluten sprayed on one formula but it wasn't on label. How do the companies get away with false labels and adding or leaving out ingredients?

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