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The pet food recall that began in March of 2007 was the worst in history. No one can tell you for certain that a pet food will not be recalled, but there are things to look for and avoid that can improve your chances to locate a healthy, safe food for your dog or cat.

Judging the safety or the nutritional value of a pet food starts by ignoring the advertising, the price of the pet food, and ignoring the front of the bag. The real signs to the safety of a dog food or cat food lie on the back or side of the bag or can in the ‘Ingredient Listing’. Regardless of what marketing terms (’choice’, ‘premium’, and so on) are on the front of the bag or can of pet food, a pet owner cannot determine the quality or how safe the food is unless they look at the ingredients. With dry foods there can be 90 different ingredients (or more), with canned foods there can be 50 or more different ingredients. But don’t panicyou don’t have to understand hundreds of different pet food ingredients! You just need to be aware of a few key ingredientspet food ingredients that you do NOT want to see in a dog food or cat food (or treats).

‘Wheat Gluten’, ‘Corn Gluten’, or ‘Rice Gluten’. These three ingredients were the bad boy pet food ingredients of 2007. Tainted glutens were found to be the cause of thousands of dogs and cats becoming ill and dying. It is not that glutens themselves are toxic to pets - these ingredients have been used in pet foods for years. The problem was the source or manufacturer of the glutens - imported from countries with far less quality standards than in the US. (The majority of glutens used in the US pet foods are from imported sources.) These imported glutens contained added chemicals that caused crystals to form in the kidneys of dogs and cats.

As well, glutens provide little nutritional value to a pet food. They can be used as a thickener and as a protein boost for pet foods. Adult maintenance dog foods must provide a minimum of 18% protein, adult maintenance cat foods must provide a minimum of 26% protein. Often times a pet food does not provide the required percentage of protein from meat ingredients and glutens can be added to boost the protein levels. An optimal pet food protein should be from a meat source.

‘By Products’. By-products have never caused a pet food recall, but an understanding of this common pet food ingredient is required to understand the controversy that exists about it. To explain by-products, I am comparing it to pies. There are apple pies, cherry pies, chocolate pies, meringue pies, meat pies, mud pies, pie in math, cow pies, and so on. Imagine if you purchased a pie without knowing what type of pie it was - no clue if it was an apple pie or if it was a cow pie. The same holds true with by-products in pet food.

The official AAFCO (American Association of Feed Control Officials - responsible for all animal feed manufacturing rules and regulations) defines by-products as “meat by-products is the non-rendered, clean parts, other than meat, derived from slaughtered mammals. It includes, but is not limited to, lungs, spleen, kidneys, brain, livers, blood, bone, partially defatted low temperature fatty tissue, and stomachs and intestines freed of their contents. It does not include hair, horns, teeth, and hoofs. It shall be suitable for use in animal food. If it bears name descriptive of its kind, it must correspond thereto.”

By-products are a catch-all pet food ingredient. Any or all left over animal tissue materials from the human food industry are clumped into this one ingredient. A pet owner has no certainty of what is in the pet food. One batch of pet food could contain liver or bone by-products, while the next could contain intestines - there is just no way of knowing for certain what is actually contained in the pet food.

‘Meat Meal’, ‘Meat and Bone Meal’, or ‘Animal Digest’. These three ingredients are similar to by-products. AAFCO defines Meat and Bone Meal as “the rendered product from mammal tissues, including bone, exclusive of any added blood, hair, hoof, horn, hide trimmings, manure, stomach and rumen contents, except in such amounts as may occur unavoidably to good processing practices.” Again, a catch all ingredient name for the left-over parts of animals used for human food. No consistency to what is contained in these ingredients (all three of these pet food ingredient definitions are similar) - no way of knowing what is actually in your pet’s food. Avoid dog foods, cat foods, and dog and cat treats that contain ‘meat meal’, ‘meat and bone meal’, or ‘animal digest’.

‘Animal Fat’. In 2002 the FDA released a report with a list of many popular pet foods that contain the drug pentobarbital. This is the drug that is used to euthanize dogs, cats, cattle, and horses.

The FDA’s report confirmed that euthanized animals are rendered (cooked) and end up in some pet foods. However there is no answer to the question if the euthanized animals are rendered dogs and cats removed from animal shelters nationwide or if as the FDA suggests, the pentobarbital comes from rendered euthanized cattle and horses. Animal shelters nationwide - if they do not have a crematory - have euthanized dogs and cats removed by a disposal company and the animals are rendered. The FDA did develop a test in an attempt to solve the mystery - is the pentobarbital from rendered dogs and cats or is it from rendered cattle and horses? Their testing method provided no results - neither dog or cat DNA or cattle or horse DNA was found.

However, the one thing the FDA/CVM has determined through their testing is the pet food ingredient ‘animal fat’ is the most common ingredient to contain pentobarbital. In other words, if you are feeding a dog food or cat food (or treats) with the ingredient ‘animal fat’ in the ingredient listing - you are (more than likely) feeding your pet euthanized animals. Not every batch of pet food tested that contained the ingredient ‘animal fat’ has proved to contain pentobarbital - but why would any pet owner want to take the chance? Avoid dog foods, cat foods, and dog and cat treats that contain the ingredient ‘animal fat’.

‘BHA’, ‘BHT’, ‘TBHQ’, and ‘Ethoxyquin’. These ingredient are chemical preservatives that you will need to scan the entire ingredient list on your pet food to find. All of these chemical preservatives are scientifically linked to tumors and cancer. A Google search of any of these preservatives will provide you with tons of controversy and scientific data. All of these chemicals are rarely used to preserve human food and if used, in far less quantity than is allowed in pet food.

‘Corn’, ‘Wheat’, ‘Soy’. While there is no scientific evidence that proves these ingredients are dangerous to pets - they are potentially dangerous ingredients associated with recalls in the past (1995, 1999, and 2005). These grains are highly prone to a deadly mold (aflatoxin). It is suggested (by AAFCO) that all pet food manufacturers test grains for the mold, but as recalls of the past have proven - that doesn’t always happen. I do not think these ingredients are as risky as others mentioned above, but they are ingredients I avoid for my own pets.

There is more to selecting a healthy pet food for your dog or cat than simply avoiding the above mentioned ingredients. Continue to learn as much as you can about what’s going into your pet’s food bowl. Andalways read the ingredient listing on the label!

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