Raw food is better

[wvvdiup1]

I agree with WendyM! Let me make this very simple! For both humans and dogs, eat right and exercise and the both of you should be fit and healthy! If you and/or your dog aren't either one, get off your butt and walk your dog! You and your dog are the best of all the other support systems out there! Take this as a word of advice from someone who is expeienced in this!

wvvdiup1

[Nettle]

I agree with WendyM! Let me make this very simple! For both humans and dogs, eat right and exercise and the both of you should be fit and healthy! If you and/or your dog aren't either one, get off your butt and walk your dog! You and your dog are the best of all the other support systems out there! Take this as a word of advice from someone who is expeienced in this!

wvvdiup1

Me too - very experienced on nutrition both canine and human, which is why I don't fall for the vegan propaganda (I defend to the hilt anybody's right to eat how they like but not to promote it as the only way or the only healthy way or the only moral way).

FWIW cattle in UK live outside and eat grass and don't get antibiotics unless they are ill. They taste great, too.

Can we get back to dogs now please?

[emmabeth]

Getting back to dogs seems like a very good idea... any more bonkers ramming of propaganda down peoples throats is liable to be edited/removed because it is SO far off topic for this forum.

Stick to doggies and dog training and exchanging of ideas within the remit of this forum please folks

[WendyM]

I like doggies

I have to go with the all things in moderation, including moderation system as seems to work for my animals. While I don't think kibble is the root of all evil, I also don't think that one kind of food with absolutely no variation is going to do a body good.

My kids like pizza and I can make a nice rich veggie laden pizza but if that was the only thing they ate with no variation three times a day with no variation it wouldn't support their growth or development, it would keep them alive, and eventually they'd just get burnt out on eating pizza all the time.

Same with kibble IMHO in general it has enough of the right stuff to keep my dogs alive but with no variation in their diets, I don't believe they'd thrive on it-- since I can't afford to feed raw except as a supplement I switch recipes within a brand (Diamond/Kirkland) and on occasion grab a 4/5 star kibble (Call of the Wild, Solid Gold, etc) when it comes available to mix in with their regular dosage of nutritional goodness. We also have a rule that the dog in the car gets to order at any drive through (cup of water + grilled chicken salad or vanilla ice cream in the summer, except Greta who gets catfish anywhere they serve soul food)

[emmabeth]

Glad its not just my dogs who occasionally get to go to the 'magic food window'...

Here, doggies order a cheeseburger (they like the pickles), which is terrible of me...

But the rest of the time they eat raw...and mostly they eat from their own bowls rather than my food off my plate... cos we wouldnt want to do that ROFL...

[Mattie]

There are numerous credible studies documenting major disease with meat eating. A quick look at statistics worldwide, diets vs. disease, shows the highest incidents of major disease associated with societies eating meat. And that's only the beginning for arguing for plant based diets. Previously healthy immigrants --now living in the U.S. and who succumb to the Western diet find themselves acquiring disease at a much higher rate than their people left behind in their native countries. Such facts regarding meat-based diets are all old news. Many of these studies can be found in journals of medicine, nutritrition--I'm not going to list all here.

Man live for centuries eating meat but suddenly it has become unhealthy, do you really expect us to believe that? It isn't the meat that is at fault it is all the additives that are now added to everything we eat. If we just ate naturally reared animals we wouldn't have a problem.

As for the meat you herald as nature's finest for human consumption, beef from factory farming is acquired from cows forced fed grains WHICH IS NOT THEIR NATURAL DIET. Cows eat grass, not grains. But controlled grain feeding maximizes profits -- to hell with the real nutritional needs of the animal--it's not productive to have them lazily graze on grass--cows are also attached for months and years to indoor stalls not meant for movement (don't you think animals need sun?). Such practices are called factory farming, an abusive and unhealthy method for maximizing meat production (an industry subsidized heavily by the US government--the reason why, by the way, you don't often hear why beef isn't good for you.) These are just a few of the hellish reasons that animals acquire health problems and stress, solved with large doses of antibiotics. When these animals' antibiotic-fed meats are consumed by people over years -- it makes many antibiotics useless today in treating the same diseases against which they were effective in the past. You acquire cholesterol from eating meats that have cholesterol, you don't find cholesterol in plant foods. Chicken, pigs and lambs endure even worse factory farming abuse, geese have product force fed down their throats so that they produce "better" meat--but I'll stop with the beef example.

As I said, it isn't meat that is the problem, it is what has been added to it.

As for nutrition only gotten from meats, that's also nonsense. Asparagus are just one healthy protein source. A varied vegeterian or vegan diet provides all the nutrition you need excepting B12. However, some supplementation might be a good idea depending on where you get your foods. If your fruits and veggies are grown in depleted soils, you are not getting the nutrition you need being vegan or vegetarian.

No suppliments are as good as eating the right food, meat is very good for us humans, it helps us digest some vitamins. A good meat diet with meat from natural sources doesn't need suplimenting.

Finally, if the Western diet is so healthy, why is most of the population obese or otherwise unhealthy? Shouldn't we all be thin and healthy? Why are many people dying at 60-70-80-90 with horrible diseases, when we should be living until we die as healthy, clear-thinking, active human beings? Many people mindlessly buy into ads depicting happy people eating meat, sugar, dairy--and later accept that old age means nursing homes. Perhaps we need to think about how diets affect our health. Maybe with so many people getting sick and dying at early ages, maybe just maybe, it could be because of meats? Duh.

most people aren't obese although the numbers are growing, and they are obese because they eat too much food, the wrong food, and lack of exercise. People do think about their diets, many are more knowledgeable about food, having the money to eat what they should is another matter.

Certainly you can digest meat, just like cows can digest grains--but not healthfully. Guinea pigs digest cyanide easily, too. But eventually, failing to give your body what it was meant to eat causes the major diseases that are so prevalent today. Perhaps you believe like the ads suggest that Osteoporis is due to lack of calcium. When your body is highly acidic (like when it eats meats), it searches for sources to balance your pH. Where does it find its alkaline sources? Your bones--and in harvesting your bones, your body turns your bones into a series of breakable holes. This is one example of how your body tries to cope with your diet abuse, abuse it will only tolerate for so long before it gives up and succumbs to disease. Your body finally says, it has enough.

A balanced diet as well as rest and exercise doesn't cause problems, it is when we don't do these that causes the problems. Man thinks for themselves, we can't make them eat a balanced diet, get enough rest and exercise, people make their own choices.

Diet is not the only reason for bad health, but is the only reason I'm writing about here.

No diet isn't the only reason for bad health, were I live the amount of people with asthma is one of the highest in the country and this has nothing to do with diet but a lot to do with polution, when the oil seed rape is in flower the hospitals are full and many die in ashtma attacks.

[Mattie]

I knew I would forget something, I have a dog that can't eat raw meat or any dairy products because they cause him to have seizures.

[springermomx3]

Its a GOOD thing we dont have national health care....

And I will eat meat to my hearts content. You only live once and I sure as hell am going to enjoy at least the food I eat, since the rest of life is pretty crappy.

My cousin lived as healthy as she could... never ate beef, only meat was chicken or fish, lots of veggies, EVERYTHING she ate was organic. Didn't smoke, drink, etc. She passed away on May 1st at the age of 37 to breast cancer.

So really, who cares? Eat what you want.

[Esprit64]

Wow. As usual, when speaking about something that makes people uncomfortable, the name calling begins and credibility sarcasm comes into play. It's interesting how this happens.

OK.

Here we go, as was asked, just some credible sources of studies and statistical information nationally and worldwide that supports my position:

National Center for Health Statistics, a division of the U.S. Center for Disease Control
The World Health Organization (extensive library, months of reading available, comparing the US healthcare system with others worldwide)
Animal Protection Institute and their major investigation “What’s really in pet foods?â€

[Cheetah]

Wow... this was a good discussion about pet food, but it's probably going to end up getting locked because of some kind of hidden drama... <_< How disappointing.

Also, usually when I provide sources on an internet forum, they are links to informative news or scientific articles, as it makes it a lot easier for the readers who want my proof, rather than having to wade through google results. It's just that I'm trying to eat breakfast (yes, bacon included) and it makes it very difficult if I have to google 10 things.

Anyway, carry on. I'm most likely out of the thread now because it's gone way off topic and gotten all angry and negative.

[Mattie]

Wow. As usual, when speaking about something that makes people uncomfortable, the name calling begins and credibility sarcasm comes into play. It's interesting how this happens.

I can't see any name calling in this thread nor am I uncomfortable with it. I have my beliefs you have yours, but I don't try to make others think the same way as I do.

OK.

Here we go, as was asked, just some credible sources of studies and statistical information nationally and worldwide that supports my position:

National Center for Health Statistics, a division of the U.S. Center for Disease Control
The World Health Organization (extensive library, months of reading available, comparing the US healthcare system with others worldwide)
Animal Protection Institute and their major investigation “What’s really in pet foods?â€

[WendyM]

Glad its not just my dogs who occasionally get to go to the 'magic food window'...

Here, doggies order a cheeseburger (they like the pickles), which is terrible of me...

But the rest of the time they eat raw...and mostly they eat from their own bowls rather than my food off my plate... cos we wouldnt want to do that ROFL...

I LOVE how you call it the magic food window. I'm officially stealing that phrase from you.

[wvvdiup1]

I thought I was the only one who called a drive-up window, "the magic window!" But, I will credit emmabeth with this phrase because she is the first to publish it. So, I too, will steal that phrase!

wvvdiup1

[Esprit64]

Oh, good grief, Mattie, there you go again. There's nothing I like to read more than a person's criticisms, when her own message serves as best examples of what she is criticizing.

A request was made regarding the US AMA and its historical rise to power: http://www.lewrockwell.com/rockwell/medical.html The author, Rockwell, is associated with the Ludwig Von Mises Institute. Ludwig Von Mises was an internationally renowned 20th century economist and social philosopher and who advanced ethical research. This particular article appeared in the magazine Chronicles, its content appeals to persons holding advanced degrees in a diversity of professions—a subscription base that could hardly be considered “psychotic.â€

[Cheetah]

All the foods listed in recalls on those articles are mid-to-low-grade foods (I still consider Merrick to be mid-grade because they have yet to improve on their quality control).

None of the foods I have ever fed were listed, and none have ever been involved in recalls, so not ALL pet foods are bad. You just have to be informed, pay attention to all labels, and know what latest gimmicks to avoid.

Also, since we are posting informative links about nutrition, this one is my favorite:
http://www.dogfoodproject.com