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Originally Posted by Taryn0405  I was talking to my vet the other day about corn in the dogs food, and I told her my thought process is corn has limited nutritional value and used as a flavor enhancer.
She pointed out that many dogs for years have had no problem with the corn additive while a few select showed allergies and overall health imroved without the corn. Case by case, in her opinion it's situational. And for that very reason, she does not immediately recommend another dog food if the owner has their pet on let's say "Alpo".
Just thought I'd put my two sense in. |
Dogs also lived many years with no problem without corn. Kibble was not even invented until the 1950's.
Dogs either ate table scraps or raw food. Keeping in mind that table scraps in the 1950's were most likely a lot healthier than table scraps of 2011.
Corn is cheap. It's a cheap way, IMO, to up the protein in a dog food. Things like corn, wheat, soy, etc, are a lot cheaper to load up in dog food than meat.
On the contrary, I don't think corn is like this evil ingredient either. I don't think it should be used as a first, second, or even third ingredient in a dog food. And I don't think dogs were meant to process a lot of carbs in general (in fact, simple carbs are pretty hard on the pancreas, from everything I've been researching). I believe corn and potatoes are known as complex carbs, so are things like brown rice, barley, and oats. So I don't necessarily think all grains are BAD and I don't really think corn is any worse than the others. Just maybe not necessary all the time.
But since each dogs system is different and can handle different things, there is no one perfect solution.