I heard that some brands of cat food use euthinized animals as fillers in the ingredients and the government knows about it. Is this true?
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WHATS IN THE CAT FOOD
- Thread starter phyllisjones
- Start Date
Possibly. The ingredient "meat and bone meal" can contain anything that ends up in the rendering vat---shelter animals, roadkill, whatever. However, mostly the really bad ingredients go in livestock feed. . .fed to animals that we then eat 
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I have heard this too, that a lot of commercial pet food has euthinized animals as fillers. Also heard that they put road kill, zoo animals etc. Also harsh chemicals. That's why I switched my cat to a Raw Diet, she is not getting anything but the best from now on. Do more research and decide for yourself which you would prefer. But, as a warning, most of it will either make you mad, sick, or angry. The only ones who truly know what's in our pet food is the companies.
It could certainly be thrue 15 years ago. This is why we got the Mad Cow disease, as they used dead cows in cow food. Cannibalism isnt healthy in the long run!
As we dont have any know outburst of Mad Cat disease, nor even Mad Dog disease, I do hope they dont do so in the pet food industry.
As we dont have any know outburst of Mad Cat disease, nor even Mad Dog disease, I do hope they dont do so in the pet food industry.
A lot of the 'meat and bone meal' comes from the poultry industry. They take the birds they are processing, cut them into leg half and breast half, and each go to a separate processing line. The leg half gets split into leg quarters and part of them get split into drumsticks and thighs.
The breast half has the wing and breast segment removed on each side, and then split into wings and breasts, then the tenders are removed from the half, and the stripped top half goes into a large box that gets sent to the pet food industry.
Using euthanized animals, road kill and such is very inefficient and costly compared to 120 carcasses a minute coming off each processing line. This means that every 8 hours 58,000 carcasses come off each line. A very large processing plant might have 3 or 4 lines operating at the same time. Each line works 2 shifts, then is cleaned for 1 shift.
This information comes from personal experience and was accurate at the time. Now with automation in the plant where I worked, I could see the numbers doubled.
The breast half has the wing and breast segment removed on each side, and then split into wings and breasts, then the tenders are removed from the half, and the stripped top half goes into a large box that gets sent to the pet food industry.
Using euthanized animals, road kill and such is very inefficient and costly compared to 120 carcasses a minute coming off each processing line. This means that every 8 hours 58,000 carcasses come off each line. A very large processing plant might have 3 or 4 lines operating at the same time. Each line works 2 shifts, then is cleaned for 1 shift.
This information comes from personal experience and was accurate at the time. Now with automation in the plant where I worked, I could see the numbers doubled.
Here is a short video of Hersh Pendell - at the time the President of the AAFCO - in an interview on a news broadcast confirming that it is possible for euthanized animals to be in pet food:
[VIDEO][/VIDEO]
If you want to learn more about pet food ingredients and regulation, this is an excellent paper: http://leda.law.harvard.edu/leda/data/784/Patrick06.html
Rendered ingredients are always used in kibble, because it must be made with some kind of "meal." Most canned foods are not at the same risk because they don't usually use rendered ingredients.
[VIDEO][/VIDEO]
If you want to learn more about pet food ingredients and regulation, this is an excellent paper: http://leda.law.harvard.edu/leda/data/784/Patrick06.html
Rendered ingredients are always used in kibble, because it must be made with some kind of "meal." Most canned foods are not at the same risk because they don't usually use rendered ingredients.
I'm pretty sure chicken carcasses get made into "chicken meal". It's good clean identifiable stuff; they wouldn't de-value it by making it into "meat and bone meal", which is considerably cheaper than species-specific named meals.
"Meat and bone meal" is all the odd bits they can't find a name for :tongue2:. And roadkill, dead livestock, and shelter animals do go to the rendering plant. . .where something gets made out of them :dk:.
"Meat and bone meal" is all the odd bits they can't find a name for :tongue2:. And roadkill, dead livestock, and shelter animals do go to the rendering plant. . .where something gets made out of them :dk:.
I guess I was pretty uninformed about what went into 'meat and bone meal'. This just proves that most of the pet food industry doesn't give a rodent's posterior about anything but profits.
MDM is/has also been used for people food. In Australia, it is law to label MDM on people food...but there have been controversies where chicken nuggets, at fast food joints for example, have been exposed as being MDM. It is not recommended for people to eat MDM for reasons of disease like mad cow.
When things go into a vat, there isn't so much 'quality' control, so nervous system stuff can often go in - mad cow disease is carried in the nervous system. Plus is it legal for diseased and dying to go in - the poor animals that are on their knees, dying in the lot. With bad feed lot conditions, animals immersed in their own filth as they have no space, think also about the tracking of that filth (and contaminants in their feed!) into the pet food system. Mad cow is one of those things that is not killed by extreme heat; I saw a British report of cat deaths from pet food due to mad cow. There are others too - like mold endotoxins when poor grains are added - it is legal to add grains contaminated so badly they are not fit for human consumption - and of course they have detected the euthanasia drug in pet food as this doesn't break down beyond the point of identification. (I think also this was how they discovered the recent horse meat contamination thing in people food in the UK and Europe...the euthanasia drug?? Can't remember exactly, sorry.)
I often write to pet food manufacturers to ask about their ingredients. When I was searching for good treats, one of the responses I had was couched in glowing terms...but it was actually (unlabelled, as it was pet food) MDM!
We have a terrible problem with the whole food growing and production system I am afraid. Don't forget there are people deaths from system contamination too...I guess the best thing we can do is as much 'from scratch' and unprocessed that we can. And if we can stretch our dollars (and maybe eat less meat as omnivores can get away with smaller amounts), get organic, or at least free range.
When things go into a vat, there isn't so much 'quality' control, so nervous system stuff can often go in - mad cow disease is carried in the nervous system. Plus is it legal for diseased and dying to go in - the poor animals that are on their knees, dying in the lot. With bad feed lot conditions, animals immersed in their own filth as they have no space, think also about the tracking of that filth (and contaminants in their feed!) into the pet food system. Mad cow is one of those things that is not killed by extreme heat; I saw a British report of cat deaths from pet food due to mad cow. There are others too - like mold endotoxins when poor grains are added - it is legal to add grains contaminated so badly they are not fit for human consumption - and of course they have detected the euthanasia drug in pet food as this doesn't break down beyond the point of identification. (I think also this was how they discovered the recent horse meat contamination thing in people food in the UK and Europe...the euthanasia drug?? Can't remember exactly, sorry.)
I often write to pet food manufacturers to ask about their ingredients. When I was searching for good treats, one of the responses I had was couched in glowing terms...but it was actually (unlabelled, as it was pet food) MDM!
We have a terrible problem with the whole food growing and production system I am afraid. Don't forget there are people deaths from system contamination too...I guess the best thing we can do is as much 'from scratch' and unprocessed that we can. And if we can stretch our dollars (and maybe eat less meat as omnivores can get away with smaller amounts), get organic, or at least free range.
