Pet Food Ingredients

There is a huge debate over what types of pet food ingredients should or should not be included in pet food. Holistic pet food recipes and natural pet food recipes call for different and more exclusive and expensive ingredients than cheaper, mass produced pet foods. The question may come down to the best pet food for the best price for a lot of pet owners.

Recipes for pet food aside, the ingredients are the important thing. Pet food ingredients in 2007 meetings of veterinarians and pet health officials have been assessed and there have been many different opinions. Pet food recipes for mass produced, cheaper pet foods often include something called “meat by-product”. This has become a very controversial ingredient in a pet food recipe.

“Meat by-product” – not to be confused with “poultry, chicken, etc, by-product”, which is a different debate - is very questionable. Meat by-product is the parts of a slaughtered animal that is not fit for human consumption. This would be the brains, bones, connective tissues and intestines or pigs, cows, fish and poultry. But that is not all this means. It also includes cats, dogs and sick and diseased animals. This is a very questionable practice as it is possible for the bacteria from the sick animals to survive in the pet food. It is not likely, but it has been argued as being possible.

Proponents of holistic or natural diets for pets insist that “poultry by-product” or other protein source specific by-products are also very bad for pets. These are just the parts of the animals slaughtered for human consumption that were mentioned above, minus the cats, dogs, and sick animals. This is argued to be a problem because these types of tissues can carry bacteria that can survive in the pet food. Again, it is argued as being possible, but is not probable.

Holistic and natural pet food diet proponents argue for people to make their own pet food or to buy raw or holistic pet foods. Some offer homemade pet food recipes. Home made pet foods recipes are argued as being beneficial because they do not require the use of preservatives, something that is questionable in pet foods. There are also people who prefer the raw diet for pets. They believe that dogs and cats need meat only, and they believe that cooking the meat degrades the nutrition in the meat.