Purina files lawsuit against Blue Buffalo

[ladyjane]

Originally Posted by mygirlHalo

Attacking Dr. Remillard isn't going to in any way validate the DFA. I could care less what your impressions are, or what your reading reveals. I've done my own, and know this doctor, and I think it would be out of line for me to just say you are embarrassing yourself.


And just when did I do that ??? NEVER !!! BTW, I could care less what your impression are either.

Wow....that comment by 107barney was quoted and OBVIOUSLY meant for pstinard. You seriously need to stop taking things so personal!!!

[ladyjane]

Originally Posted by windsantz

I don't know what I would have done without all of yall. So, as for me, Piper and Piccolo. We will be here for a long time.

We are all happy that Piper is doing well AND that we have all of you here on YT!

[ladyjane]

Originally Posted by mygirlHalo

Look, I never said I LOVED anybody !! I merely SAID I had respect for the guy. I don't care if you disagree with me, I understand that no one agrees with everyone all the time. That's no reason to make someone feel small or embarrass them in front of other people. I'm NOT the idiot you three wanted me to look like I am. I've had Yorkies since 1982, I owned, bred, trained, competed in conformation and obedience and am an obedience instructor and have been for many years. I'm a former professional groomer and have worked in an animal hospital for over 22 years. I STUDIED NUTRITION for dogs longer than veterinarians do in college, yet you ripped me a new one and I don't understand why. Because you've been here longer than I have ? Well woopy do ! Pin a big red rose on YOU !!! To megansmomma, please stop sending me private messages, I will block you !

Obviously you DO care. I think you need to go back after you have calmed down a bit and read and digest this entire thread. NO WHERE do I see where anyone attacked YOU.

As to your credentials, you are not the expert we are discussing. This thread is not about YOU .. although you have turned the discussion towards yourself which is totally baffling to me.

I am not professing to be an expert on anything. I share my experiences and voice my opinions just like anyone else.

[ladyjane]

Originally Posted by pstinard

Oh no, it's not quite so easy as that. If think that some of her advice is DANGEROUS, you can be sure that I will state so publicly. That's what Yorkietalk is for, isn't it? Again, more on that later.

well now...cough it up now...not later. If you say it is dangerous, there should be NO delay!! This thread is likely to be closed soon and people should know what you see as dangerous! You might be saving the life of someone's pet. Isn't that part of the reason we are here? To help our beloved pets?

[107barney]

Originally Posted by ladyjane

well now...cough it up now...not later. If you say it is dangerous, there should be NO delay!! This thread is likely to be closed soon and people should know what you see as dangerous! You might be saving the life of someone's pet. Isn't that part of the reason we are here? To help our beloved pets?

Oh no... There must be a great unveiling....

[ladyjane]

Originally Posted by 107barney

Oh no... There must be a great unveiling....

Yeah, well it always makes me leery when a professional bashes another, especially when they are of different professions.

[Evermoremom]

This lawsuit is about truth in advertising. Sadly, the best dog food companies do not have multi million dollar advertising budgets. They have to put all of their resources into producing their food. If you really want to know what you are feeding your dog then you should select from the small list of companies that have taken "The Pledge" provided by The Association for Truth in Pet Food. ( Evermore Pet Food - a company co-owned by my daughter is among them.). These companies are completely transparent about the quality and the origin of their ingredients and the pledge is signed by the company CEO. This information is available for free at
Association for Truth in Pet Food – The Pledge
I might add that neither Purina or Blue Buffalo have taken this Pledge.
When it comes to food, no kibble can compete with fresh food, but you do get what you pay for and fresh food of the highest quality is expensive. If cost is an object then you might want to consider using a high quality product as a mixer. I might add that the two women who own Evermore Pet Food ate their dog food for lunch every day of March 2011. For the rest of the day they consumed only ingredients that were used in the food. This was to demonstrate the integrity of their ingredients.

[pstinard]

Originally Posted by 107barney

Oh no... There must be a great unveiling....

And without further ado, LOL! But seriously, what I was going to say, is that I did a lot of reading up on "meat and bone meal" (one of Purina's and other inexpensive commercial dog food's main ingredients) as a dog food ingredient. If you do a regular google search, you will find that most people have nothing good to say about it. You *could* chalk that up to the people writing about it being the ignorant masses acting on mob mentality. So I decided to check out the scholarly vet nutrition literature, and almost all articles (including Dr. Remillard's) say that it is a good source of high quality protein, and is not a bad ingredient to have in dog food. HOWEVER, the two most recent and frequently cited articles made their own "meat and bone meal" in house for their feeding experiments. They did not use commercial preparations.

My thoughts and conclusions are this: If you are going to make your own "meat and bone meal" or "poultry byproduct meal" and use known ingredients, then knock yourself out. It's probably healthy! BUT, the commercial grade "meat and bone meal" allows the use of dead and diseased animals, road kill, euthanized pets, and the fecal matter that may be present in the intestines. The cooking process will undoubtedly sterilize it, so your dog won't be ingesting dangerous bacteria (unless the food processor has additional health code violations), and the protein and nutritional content will *probably* be fine. But, I see the following problems:

(1) Antibiotics and other drugs might not be destroyed in the cooking process, and can contaminate food lots.

(2) If the meat is of unknown origin, it will be impossible to eliminate protein sources that your dog might be allergic to, should your dog be one of the rare few who has food allergies.

(3) Mad cow disease. That disease is now under control, but the indiscriminate use of "meat and bone meal" in animal feeds is what allowed it to spread. The infectious agent (a prion) was not killed in the cooking process. While mad cow disease may not be a problem any more, use of dead animals of unknown provenance *could* allow the re-emergence and spread of similar types of diseases.

Now, Dr. Remillard (and other trained vet nutritionists) say that "meat and bone meal" is a quality ingredient, and the DFA thinks that it is poison incarnate. I am closer to the DFA's point of view on this one issue. It would make me very nervous feeding my dog food that has unregulated and unknown ingredients. I WILL try to contact Dr. Remillard by email and see if I've mischaracterized her position on this. If I hear back, I'll let you know and give a clarification.

So, in summary, I take the good and the bad from all sources and form my own opinion, and that's all I'm asking people to do. As far as Purina and Blue Buffalo go, I feed my cat Purina One (which contains named ingredients as its main ingredients) and I feel Bella Blue Buffalo (which also contains named ingredients as its main ingredients).

[pstinard]

Originally Posted by ladyjane

well now...cough it up now...not later. If you say it is dangerous, there should be NO delay!! This thread is likely to be closed soon and people should know what you see as dangerous! You might be saving the life of someone's pet. Isn't that part of the reason we are here? To help our beloved pets?

There is really no reason to close this thread. Please, please Admin, don't close this thread! I haven't had a chance to address the issue of GMO corn, LOL! More on that later

[107barney]

Great, can't wait to see what she says.

[pstinard]

Originally Posted by 107barney

Great, can't wait to see what she says.

I'll copy what I just posted and ask her if it's accurate and a fair statement of the situation.

[pstinard]

Originally Posted by Evermoremom

This lawsuit is about truth in advertising. Sadly, the best dog food companies do not have multi million dollar advertising budgets. They have to put all of their resources into producing their food. If you really want to know what you are feeding your dog then you should select from the small list of companies that have taken "The Pledge" provided by The Association for Truth in Pet Food. ( Evermore Pet Food - a company co-owned by my daughter is among them.). These companies are completely transparent about the quality and the origin of their ingredients and the pledge is signed by the company CEO. This information is available for free at
Association for Truth in Pet Food – The Pledge
I might add that neither Purina or Blue Buffalo have taken this Pledge.
When it comes to food, no kibble can compete with fresh food, but you do get what you pay for and fresh food of the highest quality is expensive. If cost is an object then you might want to consider using a high quality product as a mixer. I might add that the two women who own Evermore Pet Food ate their dog food for lunch every day of March 2011. For the rest of the day they consumed only ingredients that were used in the food. This was to demonstrate the integrity of their ingredients.

Oh yes, I know that Purina states that their suit is about truth in advertising. They have even made a new ad campaign based around the lawsuit that is failing miserably, judging by public comment. This is one of those "spirit of the law" vs "letter of the law" situations. Purina is bashing Blue Buffalo for some of the same ingredients that Purina uses slipping into a couple of bags of Blue Buffalo dog food, some of those ingredients being in very small quantities by Purina's own admission. The suit doesn't even say who did the analysis, or how the analysis was done. FWIW, Blue Buffalo is preparing a counter-suit, so we'll see how this plays out in court.

[Maximo]

If a dog food lists "chicken meal" as an ingredient, is this the same as "meat meal"? Or does chicken meal guarantee that it does not include road kill and euthanized animals?

[pstinard]

Originally Posted by Maximo

If a dog food lists "chicken meal" as an ingredient, is this the same as "meat meal"? Or does chicken meal guarantee that it does not include road kill and euthanized animals?

Chicken meal means that it HAS to contain chicken, so it's safe in that regard. The "meal" part means that it can contain organ meats and other less desirable cuts of meat, though. It will NOT contain road kill or euthanized animals, since chickens are rarely picked up off the roads, or euthanized at animal shelters.

[ladyjane]

Originally Posted by pstinard

And without further ado, LOL! But seriously, what I was going to say, is that I did a lot of reading up on "meat and bone meal" (one of Purina's and other inexpensive commercial dog food's main ingredients) as a dog food ingredient. If you do a regular google search, you will find that most people have nothing good to say about it. You *could* chalk that up to the people writing about it being the ignorant masses acting on mob mentality. So I decided to check out the scholarly vet nutrition literature, and almost all articles (including Dr. Remillard's) say that it is a good source of high quality protein, and is not a bad ingredient to have in dog food. HOWEVER, the two most recent and frequently cited articles made their own "meat and bone meal" in house for their feeding experiments. They did not use commercial preparations.

My thoughts and conclusions are this: If you are going to make your own "meat and bone meal" or "poultry byproduct meal" and use known ingredients, then knock yourself out. It's probably healthy! BUT, the commercial grade "meat and bone meal" allows the use of dead and diseased animals, road kill, euthanized pets, and the fecal matter that may be present in the intestines. The cooking process will undoubtedly sterilize it, so your dog won't be ingesting dangerous bacteria (unless the food processor has additional health code violations), and the protein and nutritional content will *probably* be fine. But, I see the following problems:

(1) Antibiotics and other drugs might not be destroyed in the cooking process, and can contaminate food lots.

(2) If the meat is of unknown origin, it will be impossible to eliminate protein sources that your dog might be allergic to, should your dog be one of the rare few who has food allergies.

(3) Mad cow disease. That disease is now under control, but the indiscriminate use of "meat and bone meal" in animal feeds is what allowed it to spread. The infectious agent (a prion) was not killed in the cooking process. While mad cow disease may not be a problem any more, use of dead animals of unknown provenance *could* allow the re-emergence and spread of similar types of diseases.

Now, Dr. Remillard (and other trained vet nutritionists) say that "meat and bone meal" is a quality ingredient, and the DFA thinks that it is poison incarnate. I am closer to the DFA's point of view on this one issue. It would make me very nervous feeding my dog food that has unregulated and unknown ingredients. I WILL try to contact Dr. Remillard by email and see if I've mischaracterized her position on this. If I hear back, I'll let you know and give a clarification.

So, in summary, I take the good and the bad from all sources and form my own opinion, and that's all I'm asking people to do. As far as Purina and Blue Buffalo go, I feed my cat Purina One (which contains named ingredients as its main ingredients) and I feel Bella Blue Buffalo (which also contains named ingredients as its main ingredients).

I don't find myself qualified to do that. Call me a blind follower if you choose, but I have chosen to ignore the man I feel is behaving like a carnival barker. I have yet to see a vet or vet nutritionist employ such methods. I don't want to go back to school and I am not educated in animal nutrition. I see lay people every day googling and calling their information research. I just don't believe it is a way to educate oneself. Again, you would have to pick and choose because we all know there is valid and invalid information all over the web. I have chosen the people I believe are more qualified than the DFA. My choice for my pups and it has worked well for me and for them.
Not going to pick and choose from a man I have such distrust of.