Variety is The Spice of Life

While watching the local news early this morning, Jim and I saw a segment on Vitamin D and foods that you can eat to increase your Vitamin D levels (featuring a nutritionist from Jewel-Osco, oddly).  This is a popular theme on news shows; I guess they have to talk about something.  Plus, it seems like every week, some scientist has come out with a study proving that we have to eat more of this, less of that, blah, blah, blah.  Watching the segment on Vitamin D, I remarked to Jim that I would love to see someone put together a spread of the ideal food to eat for an entire day that fits every single requirement.  I'm pretty sure it'd be impossible to do. 

What we can take away from these scientific studies then, is that variety is key to a healthy diet.  If you eat a (fresh) varied diet, over time, you're going to cover all of your bases.  But that got me to thinking (because this is a huge soap-box topic for me) that it is absolutely no different for our pets. 

I work part-time at a pet food store--high end, human-grade, quality food, of course--and it still never ceases to amaze me how people are content to feed their pets the exact same thing every meal of every day.  Not only is this booooooooring for the pet, but it also doesn't promote health.  (And I won't proselytize on kibble vs. raw, at least not today)  Think about it: each company has their own proprietary blend of vitamins and minerals that it uses in its products.  If, with every new bag of dog food (or even every meal--really, my pets typically get a different food at each meal) you used a different brand, and had a rotation of a minimum of three or four, every bag of food would afford your pet a different mix of vitamins and minerals, thus eliminating any long-term deficiencies. 

A healthy pet can typically handle food rotation.  (Don't try this on a dog with confirmed GI disease without talking with a vet knowledgeable in nutrition first)  We like variety in our foods; our pets  like variety in their foods.  We thrive on variety; our pets thrive on variety.  It's simple, it's easy, it makes sense.  So the next time you head to the pet food store to pick up a bag of food, try something different.  You'll be promoting health and making your pet happy all in one fell swoop.

Changing the Way We Think

Indiana teaches me something new nearly every day.  Oh, and Dr. Becker, our vet, too. 

Now that Indiana is nearly 13 years old, and suffering from kidney disease (although she doesn't really suffer,  but she does have it), her eating habits have changed drastically.  It used to be that if she didn't eat or, specifically, didn't inhale the food put in front of her, that indicated something was wrong with her.  But not so much anymore.  She eats three times a day (thanks to a missing pyloric sphincter from cancer #1), and if it goes smoothly once a day, I consider that a success.  Some days, she eats three meals really well.  But other days, well, let's just say it doesn't bring out the best in me.  I try to be patient.  I try to be understanding.  But I really wish she had a way to clearly communicate with me 100% of the time. 

Readers of my blog know that I firmly believe in the power of a whole, fresh diet.  This is the building block of wellness for any living being.  So when Indiana doesn't eat well, I worry that she's not getting the nutrients that she needs. 

We see Dr. Becker twice a month now, and we spend a lot of time talking about Indiana's over-all well being (short-term is kind of more important than long-term these days), which, naturally, includes her diet.  Her lack of interest in eating has concerned me, not because I worry that she's sick, but because it's not what is expected.  We expect our pets to eat the same amount of food with the same gusto their entire lives.  But, apparently, this is not normal.  So we shouldn't expect it.

You see, living bodies contain something called leptins (enjoy this manically complicated Wikipedia entry--good luck understanding it), which are essentially hormones that regulate appetite. Dogs (or humans, even) who are leptin-resistant never feel full.  But as the body ages, and as the dog (or human) becomes less active, the leptins tell the body that it requires fewer and fewer calories.  Little to no activity = little caloric intake.  This is why, if you are fortunate to have elderly parents or grandparents, you see them eating tiny amounts and then declaring themselves full.  But you only ate half a sandwich!  And now you're full?  It's the same with our pets.  A 13 year-old dog shouldn't require the same amount of food as a 4 year-old. 

Yet, we feed our pets the same way their whole lives and expect it never to change.  But it does.  And that's ok.  We are now offering Indiana smaller amounts of food and not worrying when she doesn't eat as much.  Some days, she just gets a can and a half of food, or 2/3 of a pound of raw meat.  It doesn't sound like much, and back in the day, she could eat a whole lot more.  But this is what her body wants, and actually, all it requires.  And now that I've learned that, I will respect it.

*Thanks to Dr. Becker for explaining all of this.  Any potential errors in this post are a product of my crummy memory and are completely mine*

***UPDATE***  I should note that while Indiana's caloric needs have decreased, her nutritional needs have not.  Therefore, we're starting to give her a multivitamin to cover any nutritional holes.

Puppies in Dog Food

There's a story that appeared on Good Morning America today, about a puppy, dropped off with his littermates outside an Oklahoma shelter, who survived euthanization.  The puppy is sure to find a good home now, though that doesn't help his dead siblings.  I won't get into all of the other issues that this story brings up, but I was initially struck by one thing, and I wanted to talk about.

When I first heard the story, my initial reaction was, "All the rest of those puppies died, and now they'll become dog food."  Because that's what happens all too often to euthanized pets.  Read this article from the FDA back in 2002.  While they state that dogs and cats would suffer "no adverse affects" from sodium pentobarbital (a euthanasia drug) in pet foods, I think it misses the bigger picture.  Why are euthanized cats and dogs in pet food at all?  Why are we feeding our pets rendered food?  The pet food industry denies that dogs and cats are used in rendered products, but that begs the question of how the sodium pentobarbital ends up in the food in the first place.  And when a big batch of rendered crud is delivered to the food processing plant, how are the manufacturers to know what's really in it? 

Over the weekend, at the dog show, Jim spoke with a pet parent whose husband is a trucker and has hauled shipments of euthanized animals to rendering plants.  Needless to say, this woman avoids pet foods without human-grade ingredients.  And everyone else should too.

I prefer raw, but I do feed processed foods to my animals as well.  Raw isn't for everyone, but I firmly believe no one should be buying products with rendered ingredients.  If only we could spread the message and inform everyone we know, maybe more pet parents would feed healthier, safer foods.