Pet food - did anyone see this article (even tho is Daily Mail!)

[iggypiggy]

Just wondered if anyone had seen this - a friend sent me the link, before you all think I read the daily mail!:

Pet food Article

It is basically saying that pet food is not always the best thing for your pets...

Which is something I've know for ages (and why I feed a raw diet) - but am interested that it has been covered by the media, there's not been much interest in this before.

Incidentally - there are good brands of pet food - I am just always surprised at how few people worry about what they feed their pets!

pmsl - wrong link!

This had better be the right one this time

LOL @ bella

Bertiebotts I wondered about that too - ours love their dried food (one cat chooses it over her wet food time and again) so I feel bad taking it away completely. 'Purely Scrummy' (FFS!) do a dry food too, which is 60% meat, so I'll probably still leave a small bowl of that out for them (it's also good for their teeth - when they're not eating mouse bones!). I think the issue with the dehyrdation was that cat's aren't built to drink water, but rather take all the moisture they need from their food, so their kidneys can suffer if they drink a lot to compensate for the food. Ours drink a fair bit of water (they especially like it straight out of the bath tap or from the slobbery dog bowl on the floor for some reason) but I think this is mostly down to the dry food.

"The 23-year-old's dimply thighs were once again visible"

OH MY GOD! WHAT A CATASTROPHE! FOR THE LOVE OF GOD, SOMEONE CALL THE MILITARY

I find it so weird that how you feed your animals always seems to generate such emotion.

It is an obvious and undisputed fact that wholesome food is better for animals and humans. My family would survive on ready meals but it is cheaper, easier for me to make wholesome home made meals. The same applies to my dogs.

How you choose to feed your animals is your choice. But rather than line the pockets of stores like PAH which also sells dog beer and dog water!!!!! I would rather save the money. But it is each to his own. But I bet my vets bills are cheaper than those that don't feed raw.

If you are interested (if not read no further and no offence taken!) there are many ways of feeding raw but I tend to work on the following approach. Billingshurst method does tend to rely a bit heavily on bones and the modern idea is a little less bone

The basic diet is 80% meat (inc poultry), 10% edible bone, 10% organ meat,
balanced over time, not just in one meal, one day or even one week. Feed 2-3%
of your dog's ideal adult weight. This is a general guide. Individual dogs
can vary a lot.

So I start with bone in chicken breasts and see how you go with them. If you are
worried about fat you can remove the skin first. When your dog is accepting the
chicken (no loose stools) you can start adding variety in the form of different
meats. Don't start adding organs until the diet is established, and remember
that 10% is a small part of the diet whether we're talking about organs or bones.

Bella pmsl must start reading the Daily Mail

Oooh no minimu, don't tell people that, if PAH went out of buisness where would my rabbit get his beloved willow balls? I can hear him stomping his foot at the very thought!

MrsL, willow bunny toys

and again

and a whole thread on a bunny forum about them here

I am sure they won't go out of business cos after all we all need one of these must have

or

this

Somebody please tell me it isn't true:

puppy booties

I think we ought to boycott PAH

Can't think of anything I would buy from them except the booties of course an essential puppy item

My cat won't eat raw meat or fish, though she does eat the odd small furry creature outdoors.
Any advice?
And should you add veg? I thought cats only need tiny amounts of green/fibre stuff.

I'd really like to get her off the processed stuff. I don't eat junk; I don't want my cat to, either!

pmsl at puppy booties! The thing is, somebody must buy this stuff! The mind boggles. We don't wander about in there because our monthly shopping list is usually quite fixed - dog food, dog treats, cat food, cat treats, rabbit food, rabbit treats (spotting a pattern here?!), hay, grass, sawdust etc - so I don't get to see all the wierd and wonderful things they do! I had to venture down the GP aisle a couple of weeks ago for an igloo bed, and I was amazed at the array of utter crap they sell. Sparkly harnesses for rabbits?! But the thing is, if PAH wasn't nearby we'd be stuffed. It's not really practical going to five different places to get all the animal bits - even when there were lots of pet shops in the town, there was never one shop that stocked everything you needed, and often we need to go after work but they wouldn't be open late. And there was one great shop that sold hay and straw dirt cheap, but you couldn't park nearby, so it was useless unless you wanted to trek up the high street with your bales! So I guess PAH is just the pet equivalent of ASDA really.

I think the whole fresh vs commercial food issue depends on your view of human food too. Ashamed though I am to admit it, DH and I are very much convenience food and takeway people - neither of us is particularly gifted in the kitchen department, and as much as I'd love to serve up fresh homecooked meals every night, it's not always practical (from a shopping point of view as well as the cooking time). By the time we've got home from work and sorted the dogs out, it's easier to just shove something from M&S in the oven or take something out of the freezer. Sometimes the mood will take me to make a stew or a casserole, but afterwards I sit back and think OK, it was nice, but it wasn't nice enough to justify all the mess and time spent making it - especially when I can buy one ready made from M&S and just shove it in the oven! We always try to get the better 'convenience' stuff, rather than cheap microwave crap, but it's still convenience stuff nonetheless. So I think that the same goes for the dog food - we buy the best commercial stuff we could find and hope for the best.

I love the idea of moving all the animals onto a more natural diet but I can't imagine facing a pile of raw bones some nights, and I wouldn't want to start it and then let them down because we didn't have the time or inclination to do it. Not to mention, I don't think my MIL would take too kindly to the barf diet when she looks after them - she is quite likely to barf herself, actually

So, for now, I'm not afraid to stand up and say I HEART PETS AT HOME

Actually I can think of a reason why PAH must stay. It is a great place to socilise puppies.

Practice your leave it, watch me, wait commands and then go to PAH full of smells, rabbits, toys, food etc and then work on the above commands with distractions.
Knew there was a reason I sometimes went there and I can practice self control by not buying a pair of puppy booties.

MrsL my family would pmsl if realised that in comparsion to you I am almost an earth mother homecooked meals everyday!!

I am proud to be an absolutely terrible wife

I have, however, linked his PS3 up to the wifi today so he can play games online - I don't think he'd swap me for a casserole maker any time soon

Just to demonstrate what an awful wife I am, I have just realised that it has actually gone dark around me as I have sat on this bloody computer all afternoon on MN - the house is a bomb site, I put a wash on this morning that is still sat in the machine soaking wet, and you can't even see what colour my kitchen floor is for the mud off the dogs. DH will be home from work in about 20 minutes, so now I'm going to have to run around like a tazmanian devil to get the place cleaned up a bit and pretend I haven't sat on my arse all day

You don't fool us, you know!

Mrs L

I wish bella! That waist would do me, for a start!

I have become the queen of deceptive cleaning - it's amazing what you can get done in 20 minutes! The lounge looks remarkably tidy (with nothing but a dim lamp on, obviously, to hide the dust and mucky carpet), I hoovered the kitchen floor, sprayed some flash on it and then used the dog towels on my feet to clean all the muck up, chucked the towels in the machine, and stashed the wet washing upstairs managed to sit back down on the sofa just as he came through the door and arrange myself into a "I certainly WASN'T just cleaning the kitchen floor barefoot" pose, and he's none the wiser! He's now taken the dogs out so I'll have time to dust and hoover the lounge and put the washing out while he's away - presuming, of course, I can put down the computer!

Pah, who needs a domestic godess?

You have to remember - they wore corsets back then. She's not smiling - that's rictus

I'm not doing any housework today - am taking it easy:

Bella

pmsl

Actually it's true about bloody corsets - the only part I remember about my wedding is how tight my dress was, I could hardly breath or bend down, at one point my brother had to help me have a wee (DH was nowhere to be found). Ahhh, memories....

It would seem we're very well suited, DH and I. When he came home earlier he'd been to morrisons to pick up some dinner. What did he present to me, as our feast for saturday night? Two packets of danish pastries! So am just about to put the kettle on and have a cup of tea with my cordon bleu meal!

Meanwhile the dogs had duck and rice

my dog wants to eat at your house MRSL - yummy duck

i have read that dogs, thrive on pasta type, buling foods, veg and meat. They are a totally different species to cats, and that cats just need meat.

Vets promote that bloody Hills fodd, becuaseit's in their commercial interest. cat have survived on meat, and scraps and the blade of grass for centuries. I would neve feed my cay dried food exclusively, howver good is says it is. Like living off soya mince.

I expect most cats supplement their diet with freshly killed stuff anyway pirate - well the cats my parents have had always did...

There is quite useful BARF diet info on the landywoods website here

For those that are interested:

My dog gets raw meaty bones in the mornings (eg. chicken wings, lamb bones like shanks and breast, ribs etc) - Then in the evening I give him minced meat most of the time (any kind of meat like beef, rabbit, lamb, game etc - whatever handy) and offal mixed in a few times a week (eg. liver, heart, kidneys etc). I add cod liver oil and sea kelp and he also gets glucosamine. I add veg puree in too - again not every meal.

I add add cottage cheese, raw eggs, tinned sardines or other oily fish in oil or tomatoes.

He also gets scraps from our food occasionally too - so I guess some is cooked

If I have to feed dog food for any reason (rare) I feed naturediet or nature's harvest.

Not been entirely convinced by barf diet, but i do feed the best quality dog food available. Anything that can be generally bought in supermarket or pet supermarket is not the best.

Can i ask, how do you keep an eye on the amount they should be eating on a raw diet? With petfood there is a certain portion, but if you are feeding a mix of different raw meat and bones how do you make sure they are getting enough, but not too much?