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for those people that still think its ok to feed your dog food from the grocery store read this its actually a really great read


Bad Dog Food
Ladies and gentleman, hold on to your hats. We?re about to tell you what bad dog food is, what?s in it, and who makes it. It?s not pretty.

The major dog food manufacturers are producing nothing but bad dog food. That may seem to be a grandiose claim, but there is a plethora of evidence to prove it. Behind the colorful bags, the jingles, the slogans, the commercials ? major dog food brands supply one thing: bad dog food. It?s an injustice to all dogs and dog lovers. What these producers of bad dog food are really offering your favorite furry friend is a foul admixture of disgusting by-products and a cornucopia of toxic chemicals.


When cattle, chickens, lambs, swine, and other animals are slaughtered for food, it?s common that just the lean muscle is cut and used for human consumption. The left over carcass is then sent to a rendering plant, along with all the other waste that is around. This foul mess is rendered and will soon become bad dog food. What this amounts to is an appalling mixture of chicken feet, dead animals, euthanized dogs and cats, lungs, ligaments, beaks, teeth, intestines, and more. This bad dog food is cleaned up with the all-encompassing label of ?meat-and-bone meal? and ?by-products? on the outside of the bag.

Have you heard of the ?4 D?s?? The ?4 D?s? encompass the kind of cattle that are sent to rendering plants:

Dead
Dying
Diseased
Disabled

When all of this putrid material comes to the rendering plant, it's put in a huge vat and shredded. It?s then cooked at 220 to 270 degrees for 20 to 60 minutes. After it cools, the grease is skimmed off the top. This is "animal fat." The rest is pressed and dried. This is what?s called "meat and bone meal? and ?by-products? ? otherwise known as bad dog food.

Who?s Responsible?

Huge corporate conglomerates use pet food companies as a cheap and profitable way to dispose of waste produced by their human food companies:

Corporation
Pet Food Brands

Nestle
Alpo, Fancy Feast, Friskies, Mighty Dog, Purina One

Heinz
9 Lives, Amore, Gravy Train, Kibbles-n-Bits, Nature's Recipe

Colgate-Palmolive
Hill's Science Diet

Proctor & Gamble
Eukanuba, Iams

Mars
Kal Kan, Mealtime, Pedigree, Sheba, Waltham's

So why do dogs eat this bad dog food? Their senses are being duped. To make this bad dog food pleasing to the eyes and noses of our canine pals is nothing more than a lesson in chemistry.


Some of the chemicals used in pet food include:

BHA (butylated hydroxyanisole) - known to cause liver and kidney dysfunction
BHT (butylated hydroxytolulene) - known to cause liver and kidney dysfunction
Ethoxyquin - suspected of causing cancer
Propylene glycol - causes the destruction of red blood cells
Some other things that may be added to bad dog food are:

Coloring agents
Drying agents
Flavoring agents
Lubricants
Texturizers

Let's look at those ingredients:

...THE GRAIN
Virtually all artificial diets are heavily based on grains and cereals. But dogs are not cows. A dog has the large stomach and short straight digestive tract required to digest meat. A cow has several small stomachs and the long winding digestive tract required to digest fibrous grain. The two are not interchangeable!
Even worse, many dogs are allergic to corn and soybean and wheat. They develop chronic digestive problems (loose stools, spitting up, gassiness) or itchy skin. You'll see them licking their feet or rubbing their face against the carpet. You might never think to associate these problems with the grain in your dog's diet, but that is often the case.


Finally, the quality of this grain is suspect. The good grain is reserved for the human market. What goes into the pet food bin is deemed unfit for human consumption. Mold, rancidity, contaminants -- yuck!

...THE MEAT
Contrary to what they show you on the TV commercials, don't even think about sirloin. Your dog gets:

The "4D" meat that didn't make the cut for the human market, which means it came from livestock that was diseased, disabled, dying, or already dead when it arrived at the slaughterhouse.

The "by-products" -- a catch-all term used by the pet food industry to mean anything stripped off the carcass other than meat, i.e. beaks, feet, head, lungs, blood, and other unmentionables.

To make matters worse, the meat and byproducts are laced with the hormones fed to the livestock to make them grow faster, and the antibiotics fed to the livestock to prevent massive outbreaks of disease in their crowded living conditions. These hormones and antibiotics trickle through to your dog.

...THE GREASY FAT
Many dogs gobble up their kibble, yes -- because it's sprayed with greasy fat to make it smell yummy. But we don't allow our children to eat only junk food because they love the smell or taste, do we?

The relish with which a dog eats doesn't indicate whether something is "good" for him.

...THE CHEMICAL PRESERVATIVES
Preservatives are always used in artificial diets so the bags and cans last longer. That's convenient for the manufacturer, yes, who can leave it sitting in his warehouse for a long time. Convenient for the retailer who can leave it sitting on his shelf for a long time. Convenient for the owner who can dish it out for a long time.

But what is this stuff
that keeps ingredients
from spoiling?

The most common pet food preservatives are:

Ethoxyquin -- which is actually manufactured by the giant chemical corporation Monsanto as a rubber preservative. The containers are marked POISON. The Department of Agriculture lists it as a pesticide. OSHA lists it as a hazardous chemical.

BHA and BHT -- both of which cause liver and kidney dysfunction, and bladder and stomach cancer.

These chemicals are all banned in Europe.

Most pet foods list these preservatives right on the bag or can, but even when it doesn't say so, it's usually in there, anyway.

How can this be? Because a legal loophole allows manufacturers to only list what THEY themselves put into the bag. If they buy some of their ingredients from a supplier who has already added the chemical to those ingredients... The pet food company doesn't have to disclose that on the bag. Isn't that nice?

Australian veterinarian Dr. Ian Billinghurst says: "If you look at the ingredient list on a can or a bag of pet food -- with understanding -- you will realize that what is being listed is a heap of rubbish. Definitely not the wholesome nutritious food you would want to feed to a valued member of your family!"

How commercial pet foods affect your dog's health?

Every day, unhappy dogs & cats parade through veterinary offices. They suffer from:

itching skin

hot spots

dandruff

excessive fur loss/shedding

foot-licking

face-rubbing

loose stools

gassiness

stinky dog breath

stinky cat breath

weight problems

What are these dogs eating? Artificial diets, virtually every one of them.

"Most modern dog owners are taught to believe that feeding dogs is such a difficult task, it is best left to the dog food companies. Nothing could be further from the truth." -- Dr. Billinghurst

Do the research -- It?s worth it!

http://www.thedogbowl.com/dogbowl.asp?category_ID=11