Royal Canin Questions?

[Nancy1999]

I have three questions:


1. Where does Royal Canin buy the chicken meal?

2. Where does Royal Caniin buy its chicken by-product meal?

3. Where does Royal Canin buy all it's vitamins?

I know RC is an international company and wonder what countries they purchase these things from.

[Yorkiemom1]

Originally Posted by Opium88

Speaking from a third person point of view, We are a bunch of hens. Lol. A bunch of inquisitive, informative, challenging,logical, idealistic, argumentative, complacent,stubborn, appreciative, and sometimes distracted hens. Oh, and opinionated. We are definitely opiniated. Makes for good conversation when we're all declawed. That is all...

Loving this!
You forgot confrontational.....

[RoyalCaninCA]

Originally Posted by RoyalCaninCA

I do have a challenge for you: What would this ingredient deck represent? (I'm only giving you ingredients here)
Steel, cast iron, fibreglass, aluminum, rubber, plastic, glass, leather...

Hello everyone!

Lots of great discussions buzzing around the Friday challenge.

What we were looking for (and there were some really creative answers) was a car (I'll tell you more specifically below about it) .... but what kind of car? There were some really specific guesses out there, but what part of the ingredient deck made you think of that car?

- The first ingredient is steel. But if all cars contain it, is it the same? Same quality? Same supplier?
- Fiberglass is commonly found in boats and some types of new production cars. But what about re-builds, repairs or add ons? Speakers even contain fiberglass.
- Most people would think rubber is tires. But do we know what type of tires? If we knew more about the car, we could assume what the tires might be, how much tread are left on them, if they are summer/winter (in the case up here in the North)
- Leather is sometimes the giveaway. But is it? We commonly associate leather with luxury, but is this exclusively the case anymore? You can pretty much get leather as an option on any make and model. We know that the leather option on a compact will not be the same leather used on a luxury sports car. If leather appeared higher on the ingredient deck would we think it was a more expensive car because they could use more? Think about higher grade leather, is much thinner (and softer) than lower grade leather which is thicker, or even bonded leather, so it would weight more. Also sports cars tend to have 2 seats vs suvs that have 7 or more seats.

Thinking beyond the ingredient deck, could you derive the performance, quality or safety of the car? What is the 0-60 mph time? Gas mileage? Front or side impact safety rating? Handling on turns or in rain? Options that you might need (4x4, A/C, Heating, Air bags)?

Looking at the ingredient deck of a pet food would be very similar to buying a car based only on its ingredient deck. You do not have all the information required to know the quality, performance, safety or nutrients provided. All cars will get you from point A to point B (if they are in proper working order), same as all pet food will provide basic nutrition for survival based on the National Research Council (NRC) and in the US the Association of American Feed Control Officials (AAFCO), but what do they do above and beyond to help the dog/cat thrive? Just looking at the ingredients won't tell you about that.

The car that this ingredient deck is based on is actually the old shop car my husband worked on in high school for his entire senior year (maybe why he would never stop talking about it). It is a red 1994 Chevy Cavalier Z24 complete with bald summer tires, a front and rear bumper rebuild, torn leather seats (with a 2 inch layer of gum attached to it from all the students who sat in the driver seat) and a barely running, back firing, engine. It got the students from point A to point B and even helped some of them achieve their G1 (learners permit) but it definitely was not a luxury car.

There is a lot more to what goes into a car than the name of the parts that go into it. Similarly with pet food. If you are relying on the ingredient label, you are missing a huge (and potentially the most important) aspect of the nutrition it offers. Did you know that there are courses offered to pet food manufacturers showing them how to “doctor” an ingredient label to make it more appealing to the consumer? And those courses don’t focus on actually making the food better, just on making the ingredient label LOOK better.

If reading the ingredient label is important to you, understand what you are looking for when you are reading it. If you think meat should be the first ingredient, why do you think that? For the protein level? Then look to the protein level, look at the amino acid profile, look at the digestibility of it. Think about what the company is doing to ensure quality, safety and consistency. If a company is saying the food contains a specific protein source, what are they doing to ensure that that’s what the food contains? What if the supplier sends something different from what they order? What if it’s contaminated? What quality control measures do they have in place throughout the manufacturing process?

I don’t expect to change everyone’s minds on the correct way to evaluate pet foods, but I do hope that you start asking more questions (and demanding more answers) about pet nutrition, beyond just the order of the ingredients on the label. The American Animal Hospital Association (AAHA) provides a list of questions you should ask a pet food manufacturer https://www.aahanet.org/library/nutritionalasmt.aspx (questions located about half way down page, under Diet Factors).

Ashley

[RoyalCaninCA]

Hi everyone,

Sorry it wouldn't let me copy the quote inside a quote (...inception quote...?)

<Quote> Brewers' rice is the small milled fragments of rice kernels that have been separated from the larger kernels of milled rice. (AAFCO definition).[1] Brewers' rice is a processed rice product that is missing many of the nutrients contained in whole ground rice and brown rice thus reducing the quality
Brewers' rice and second heads are one of the many byproducts that rice milling creates. Second heads are milled rice kernels that are one half to three quarters of the original kernel. Brewers' rice is a milled rice kernel that is one quarter to half the size of a full kernel. Second heads, depending on their quality are used to make rice flour. "If the quality of the second heads are poor, they will be sold for pet food or dairy feed. Brewers rice is sold for pet food and dairy feed exclusively."[3] and, despite having little nutritional value is found in approximately one third of pet food sold in the US. Brewers rice - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia </Quote>

The AAFCO definition is correct. Remember that AAFCO outlines nutrient guidelines for basic formula creation in the US. That shouldn't be confused with the part "Brewers' rice is a processed rice product that is missing many of the nutrients contained in whole ground rice and brown rice thus reducing the quality" which is not in AAFCO's guidelines or definition of Brewer's Rice. See attached picture from the AAFCO 2013 manual.

Brewer's rice is an important part of RC's nutrition puzzle. As mentioned before, it provides a source of starch as well as protein. It is important to note that this type of starch is highly digestible. If you've ever had the stomach bug and had a hard time keeping things down, your doctor might have mentioned white rice. Why? Because it is highly digestible meaning less remains in your digestive tract (potentially complicating your GI upset more) and more is utilized by the body. When applied to pet food, it is an excellent carbohydrate and protein source because of its digestibility. Murray et al (2001) and the NRC "found that high-temperature extrusion of cereal grains (corn, potato, rice and sorghum) with high total starch content (>80 percent) increased the percentage of rapidly digestible starch and decreased the amount of resistant starch."

If you are talking about the fact the hull has been removed, this is a source of insoluble fibre. Because for different formulas we want a different level of and balances of fibre (for hairballs, satiety support, digestive health, stool quality etc.) we use a combination of other ingredients that provide fibre, such as cellulose, pea fibre, psyllium, and even brown rice. This allows us to be more specific with the nutrient profiles.

It is the nutrient profile of the diet as a whole that ultimately impacts the pet. If a specific ingredient is 'lacking' something, it is the responsibility of the manufacturer to ensure that nutrition is provided by a different ingredient.
Hope this helps
Ashley

[Yorkiemom1]

Originally Posted by Nancy1999

I have three questions:


1. Where does Royal Canin buy the chicken meal?

2. Where does Royal Caniin buy its chicken by-product meal?

3. Where does Royal Canin buy all it's vitamins?

I know RC is an international company and wonder what countries they purchase these things from.

She may (wisely, I think!) not go here with this line of questioning....any answers she may give directly to these questions could certainly be misconstrued by some as promoting RC. She is not here to promote RC, she is here to answer general questions regarding nutrition and balancing nutritional components in dog food formulas to achieve optimum effectiveness.

[Nancy1999]

Originally Posted by Yorkiemom1

She may (wisely, I think!) not go here with this line of questioning....any answers she may give directly to these questions could certainly be misconstrued by some as promoting RC. She is not here to promote RC, she is here to answer general questions regarding nutrition and balancing nutritional components in dog food formulas to achieve optimum effectiveness.

I think its important to know which countries manufacturers buy their supplies. How is that promoting her company? In her own words she says, "I do hope that you start asking more questions (and demanding more answers) about pet nutrition, beyond just the order of the ingredients on the label."

[Britster]

Originally Posted by Yorkiemom1

She may (wisely, I think!) not go here with this line of questioning....any answers she may give directly to these questions could certainly be misconstrued by some as promoting RC. She is not here to promote RC, she is here to answer general questions regarding nutrition and balancing nutritional components in dog food formulas to achieve optimum effectiveness.

???

Any company that I use, I would expect them to answer these very basic questions.

[Britster]

I like the car analogy, but I guess I am kind of confused. Because I get and understand what you're saying about how it depends on where the leather is coming from, the quality of the fiberglass, etc, and looking deeper into simply just saying 'leather' or just saying 'rubber'.

But, to me, using brewer's rice, would be equivalent to using... old tires on a new car. I am bad at analogies, but that's my basic thought process, if you catch my drift. And using by-products as the ONLY source of meat protein could be compared to using cheaper and thinner leather vs. the newer, better quality leather that may be in an expensive sports car. It'll still work, and get the job done, but is it the best you get for your money?

Yes, I am positive the food is scientifically sound, and well structured overall, and dogs aren't going to keel over dying (in fact, a lot may very well thrive) but to me, it's exactly like you said... "it will get you from point A to point B", but that's not ALL I want in a food. I want more than that.

And I am not someone (not anymore, anyway, in the past I was moreso) who simply looks at an ingredient list and compares foods. I DO realize it's SO much more than that. I've seen a lot of foods spouted as being 'the best' which contain high ash, ingredient splitting, and lots of marketing tricks to make it seem like a good diet for canines when in actuality, it was likely an ingredient list purchased somewhere, and thrown together.

I am just saying, in my non professional opinion, I think the old YT formula was fine. I never thought it was GREAT but I thought it was fine. The new formula, to me, is just a cheaper way to produce a "close enough" product that most Yorkies will likely still do "fine" on, but it's not worth the $$$ it's being sold for when there are other comparable products out there for way less money, with very similar research and nutrient analysis' available.

I won't say I dislike or distrust RC, I think RC is a reputable company overall, I just personally wouldn't choose to feed most of the formulas. I do however like their RX foods the best out of any other options so if I was feeding RX, I'd likely choose RC.

But I don't think I have any more questions at this point, so just weighing in my .02 cents one more time. I appreciate Ashley being here to answer any other questions others may have.

[Wylie's Mom]

Originally Posted by Nancy1999

I have three questions:


1. Where does Royal Canin buy the chicken meal?

2. Where does Royal Caniin buy its chicken by-product meal?

3. Where does Royal Canin buy all it's vitamins?

I know RC is an international company and wonder what countries they purchase these things from.

Originally Posted by Yorkiemom1

She may (wisely, I think!) not go here with this line of questioning....any answers she may give directly to these questions could certainly be misconstrued by some as promoting RC. She is not here to promote RC, she is here to answer general questions regarding nutrition and balancing nutritional components in dog food formulas to achieve optimum effectiveness.

If she can't answer these *very* basic questions, I'd have to wonder why she is even here. Anyone representing RC would have / should have easy access to this very basic info. These same questions are asked regularly of any pet food company. If she won't answer basic questions about RC to our members, then her presence here would be in question - and she should not then have "Royal Canin" in her user name.

Btw, the mere fact that she is *here* is considered already promoting RC, so let's be honest about that fact here. The same would be said about ANY food rep here at YT.

[Opium88]

Originally Posted by Yorkiemom1

Loving this!
You forgot confrontational.....

I think I softened it with Challenging , lol...
Imust say that Ashley came into this with her armor on. She handles the occasional negativity quite well. The only thing I have to say in argument has to do with the antioxidant issue. Unless you have your pet (and yourself for that matter) on something like Protandim, no amount of any ingredient with antioxidants is going to have even the slightest relevant impact on your level of oxidative stress cells. It all sounds good and healthy , but the reality of it is that every day billions of these cells are created inside of us, and the amount that those well meaning antioxidants alone in your food and drinks kill off is so insignificant that it doesn't even count. Like a massive English Army overrunning 20 well meaning high spirited Scottish men in battle. While she is right about the value of antioxidants, it's kind of a moot point because it makes no difference. The scientist who discovered antioxidants and their importance is also the one who later discovered that he was wrong about their level of effectiveness . you can eat all the corn, bananas, kiwis etc... that you could possibly consume in a day and it wouldn't come close to having any effect on your oxidation levels in your blood. That subject could go a lot deeper but I just woke up and I'm not ready for big words yet. Good morning all!

[Opium88]

and I might add that my mention of Protandim was only as an example. I do not sell it and am not promoting it. It was the only antioxidant related thing that came to mind that IS effective in reducing and killing off oxidative stress cells the way that we think eating or drinking things containing antioxidants will. Did I say that right? I haven't had coffee yet. Too much science, too little caffeine.

[Amazing Yorkies]

I think the answer is more complicated than just a few countries. I used to dispatch trucks to pick up ingredients for a well known dog food plant. Each week we picked up ingredients from different places due to prices. I also think that each country that produces RC, may independently order ingredients.
However, I think that these questions need to be answered. We DO know there are countries and places that produce ingredients that we NEVER want our dogs to eat.
My dogs and puppies are healthy and beautiful on RC, but I also want to make sure I continue getting great results. I'm not so food blind that I don't want what's best for my Yorkies. I have tried several other brands considered to be the best, but for one reason or another have always gone back to RC as they seem healthier, and happier.

[Britster]

I should add that my mom, stepdad and little sister are adding a cockapoo puppy to the family this week (Thursday) and she has been eating RC Puppy. We will likely continue with that food for a while at least, so long as she is doing well on it. I have nothing against feeding it if it works well. Knowing my mom and step-dad though, they'll likely end up on a 'grocery store' brand, due to easy access, unless I continue ordering the food for them online.

[Yorkiemom1]

Originally Posted by Wylie's Mom

If she can't answer these *very* basic questions, I'd have to wonder why she is even here. Anyone representing RC would have / should have easy access to this very basic info. These same questions are asked regularly of any pet food company. If she won't answer basic questions about RC to our members, then her presence here would be in question - and she should not then have "Royal Canin" in her user name.

Btw, the mere fact that she is *here* is considered already promoting RC, so let's be honest about that fact here. The same would be said about ANY food rep here at YT.

It seems to me these questions could easily be referred to as "baiting". It would not be that she "couldnt" answer these basic questions.....anyone with even a modicum of association with a company could answer these questions. It has already been tossed out there that there is a possibility of "conflict of interest".....those questions seemed to me like baiting doves in, then shooting them when they are on the ground. There have not ever been any other nutritionists on here from a pet food company, so while it may be true "these questions are asked regularly of any pet food company", they are not asked from the nutritionist directly on this forum.....more of a third party, hear say input sort of thing. She made the reason for her presence here absolutely crystal clear, and did nothing to hide or decieve anyone of anything. She started her own thread and titled it as she did....." I'm actually staying in this single forum I created. I completely understand there are many other discussions going on in YorkieTalk world, but to be fair to all the YT parents, I created my own thread so specific discussions from myself would remain here, and not take away from the discussions you are all having elsewhere." . Not really an effort to peddle RC.

Ashley is an intelligent woman, who means no harm and does not need me to defend her! I just hate to see innocent attempts to explane how different ingredients are utilized in a formula, any formula, in order to maximize effectiveness, rewarded by ambush.

I am looking forward to a response to 107barney's question. Answers to that question, and explanations about hearts and gizzards actually being less expensive than muscle meats, and elimination of excess protein, etc. are of interest to many. Ashley also shared, "Did you know that there are courses offered to pet food manufacturers showing them how to “doctor” an ingredient label to make it more appealing to the consumer? And those courses don’t focus on actually making the food better, just on making the ingredient label LOOK better?" I can imagine there are people that were not aware of this, so this is actually helpful to some. You cant just read the words on an ingredient list without understanding what you are reading may be deceptive or misleading.

Does RC purchase any of the ingredients used in their kibble, including vitamins and minerals, from China? Are the meat sources "prepared" in China, knowing how fearful we are of toxic products from China or are the products (whole chickens, beef products, fish products, etc) bought in bulk and then prepared at RC facility? (I know I had recently read where the USDA has apparently OK'd China to supply our chicken and chicken products for human consumption here in the USA.) I lived through that massive dog food recall years ago when everything around me seemed to be toxic....it was like walking through a mine field.....fortunately, RC came out on the other end of that disaster, unscathed, much to my relief!

Thank you Ashley. Looking forward to your answers!

[Opium88]

Does RC purchase any of the ingredients used in their kibble, including vitamins and minerals, from China? Are the meat sources "prepared" in China, knowing how fearful we are of toxic products from China or are the products (whole chickens, beef products, fish products, etc) bought in bulk and then prepared at RC facility? (I know I had recently read where the USDA has apparently OK'd China to supply our chicken and chicken products for human consumption here in the USA.)

I would like to know the same thing. That would be the only thing that could get me to switch up from RC right now. Not real big on China. Nothing good happens there either for or to most animals...