What is An All Natural Dog Food?

What’s on your mind when you consider an all natural dog food? Could it be a commercial dog food which has the word ‘natural’ on the packet? Could it be you think of cooking your own dog food from scratch? Do you consider table scraps to be the ideal diet?

Wrong! None of the above will address your dog’s health, Why not?

Well, the commercial dog food starts off with very low grade meat, mostly meat by-products (the better quality going for the higher priced human food), high fat and sometimes euthanased animals, which contain the chemical sodium pentobarbital. Then, to bulk out the already cheap ‘meat’, a non-nutritional filler is added. That can be sugar, as there’s a world glut of it at the moment, or melamine if you live in China.

Then, to keep the product indefinitely at room temperature a preservative is added.

When you see a packet of dried dog food in the shop, with the slogan ‘preservative free’ ask yourself this question - how can dried ‘meat’ be kept indefinitely at room temperature without preservatives? Do you think you wouldn’t have heard of a new way to do this, if there was?

So either there is no ‘meat’ or there is preservative present. Trouble is, the preservatives used are very strong, cause huge health problems and aren’t allowed in human food.

So commercial dog food can be crossed off as an all natural dog food!.

I see quite a lot of ‘dog experts’ on the internet advocating you cook your own dog food. Whilst that is hugely better than commercial pet food, it’s still missing the nutrients that are lost in cooking. Typically these are vitamins and enzymes, both essential for a healthy dog. But other nutrients are altered by cooking. Fat changes during the cooking process from a beneficial food to a harmful one.

So you can cross though this one too, as an all natural dog food.

What about table scraps? That depends so much on the table scraps. If the human food is a good, natural one of lots of raw fruit and veg, with lightly cooked meat, then these table scraps have the potential of being the best dog food out of all three options, as long as there is enough left over to satisfy your dog’s nutritional needs.

If, however, your diet is typically fast food with a lot of processed food, then these table scraps will be little better than the commercial dog food.

Yet another cross through.

There is only one all natural dog food and that’s the one dogs evolved on. Nothing that mankind has done has improved one iota on that. And considerable decline has occurred.

Dogs have evolved over millions of years on an all natural dog food and it keeps them happy and healthy.

Once you get to grips with the idea of how dogs evolved, duplicating that diet within the constraints of what is available and the limits on your time, is not that difficult. However, there are a few important things you need to know such as:

• what food should not be given more than once a week
• should bones be given
• what carbohydrates are the best ones and how much
• are there any fruit or vegetables that shouldn’t be given
• what amino acid is essential to a dog’s healthy skin
• should you supplement the diet
• how do you convert the diet of an elderly or sick dog safely

When you change the diet of your dog from a commercial pet food to an all natural dog food, there may initially be a de-toxing period. This is normal and natural, but can seem a bit scary to you if you don’t understand why it’s happening and the symptoms. It should be of short duration, depending on your dog’s age and level of health.

Dogs digestion is robust. They have evolved on eating raw meat and carrion. They can’t cope with preservatives, fillers, high fat or low grade protein, none of which occurs (at least in high proportions) in nature.

Once you have your dog on an all natural dog food, you’ll find fewer and fewer health problems. I’m sure you’d be as happy as anyone, to cut your dog’s professional health fees.