Vet student discussing grain-free and raw foods

My husband went to Petsmart yesterday and saw they have installed a refrigerated section full of different raw brands. He said it was really big, but cannot remember which brand names. That is the thing that bothers me the most about what this girl is posting- that they strongly warn clients away from a raw diet and tell them it is dangerous. Raw feeding is not a new practice and it is absolutely becoming more popular. It is not going away. So instead of disparaging it and regurgitating debunked myths, students should be well educated on exactly how to feed a proper raw diet in order to advise clients. They need to support their clients and be capable of critiquing a menu and suggesting proper changes, if necessary. If not, the person is going to go home and continue their bad habits or just leave that vet for one who will support their choices. That person chose to feed raw for a reason and is unlikely to embrace dry food. More education is always better.

peaches08 said:

 
I should have said homemade raw, but in my area commercial raw isn't available.  The closest commercial raw is 40-something miles away.  Because ths is a hot area and many of us work long hours, having it shipped to the house may not seem like an option.  In some apartment complexes it isn't an option at all.

I understand what you're getting at about making it sound hard/complicated, but since these people are throwing plain raw chicken at them and then adding cooked bones from work "for calcium"...I can't help but to say yeah, please stop.  People that have common sense?  Yeah, I point them to websites like here and others and even write down premix products for them to look at.  Following Dr. Pierson's recipe IS pretty much what I do!

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There are people out there that are already and have been, feeding cooked (and probably raw) meat to their dogs and cats, without the benefit of being balanced, because it is easier to do this than buy proper food or follow a recipe on proper home-cooked food for pets. I don't see this practice going away anytime soon. Some people just have different priorities, and feeding their pets properly isn't one of them.

peaches08 said:

 
I think it's funny they're calling raw a fad diet, especially since commercial foods have been available for only how long?

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I was thinking the exact same thing. Pets have been around a LONG time...way before "pet food" was created. It's the manufacturing and marketing of convenience foods that has taken over...and this applies to pet food and how it is marketed to humans.

What really frightens is the comment, "I hope to focus a lot on client education when I am in practice."    

One last response from Reddit OP.

I don't have time to do all the research I want on this site right now, but I would disagree with Dr Pearson that a raw diet is the only correct way to feed your pets. That is probably a matter of opinion that we would never agree on anyways though, but the point that I was trying to make here today was that commercial food is not the horrible thing that many people would want you to believe. For example my cat at home frequently drinks from his water bowl, and he produces plenty of urine on his own. So he is just fine with a diet I'm giving him. Each cat is different, and if somebody is concerned that there cat is not getting enough, then wet food is a great thing together. It is more expensive, but if people are okay with that and are willing to spend a little bit more then it is great! You can also do things to increase your cats drinking water which I have found pretty effective. I read just a bit of the first sight and she seems knowledgeable, so that is good. As I said I would disagree with some of her statements on commercial cat food, but she is perfectly entitled to her opinion as well. Anyway this is been fun, but I do need to get to studying now. If I get more time to reply later in a couple days then I will get back to you! Thank you for the information, and have a great day! Finals await...

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LDG said:

Actually, feeding raw *can* take no more time in learning than feeding canned or kibble. Buy commercial. "Raw" does not HAVE to mean "homemade." !!! It usually costs less than commercial canned to feed, unless you need to have it shipped (frozen), or if you feed really cheap canned.

http://catcentric.org/nutrition-and...y-cat-or-i-can-afford-to-feed-commercial-raw/


Want to make homemade but don't want to learn how? Follow Dr. Pierson's recipe (or Anne Jablonsky's on http://www.catnutrition.org)

It is re-inventing the wheel and doing it yourself from scratch that requires time and effort.

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Very true. I haven't done a ton of reading on raw, homemade or commercial. You're right in generalizations that "raw" is often associated with homemade, which may very well be the case in some areas where commercial diets aren't yet available. It was only in the past year or so that I'd seen my first frozen/raw commercial section available in one specialty food store, and now they're sprouting up in more chain-based stores here and there. Being in a bigger city probably helps. When I lived with my parents in a smaller city, there were no stores in the area that had freezer sections for raw diets in any pet stores I'd ever been to in the region (which is about 4 small cities referred to as one region).

pinkdagger said:

 
One last response from Reddit OP.

Very true. I haven't done a ton of reading on raw, homemade or commercial. You're right in generalizations that "raw" is often associated with homemade, which may very well be the case in some areas where commercial diets aren't yet available. It was only in the past year or so that I'd seen my first frozen/raw commercial section available in one specialty food store, and now they're sprouting up in more chain-based stores here and there. Being in a bigger city probably helps. When I lived with my parents in a smaller city, there were no stores in the area that had freezer sections for raw diets in any pet stores I'd ever been to in the region (which is about 4 small cities referred to as one region).

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With this last response and reading later replies in the reddit thread, my impressions have changed about this person. She is clearly no dummy, but perhaps just lacks more outside of class, real-world experience as a vet. I think in time, she may very well change her opinions on many things.

peaches08 said:

 
Many of today's vets still push kibble for dental benefits.  My last vet did, and thankfully my new vet does not. 

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Probably the scariest cat food review I've read was for Science Diet, IIRC it's called Oral Care, or some such nonsense. Apparently the kibbles are larger than normal. One reviewer wrote that his cat had tried to swallow the kibble whole (surprise, surprise) and would have choked to death had he not been home to alleviate the situation.

Of course, when the "nutrition consultant" from Hill's, part of whose job it is to read and "comment" on the low reviews on Amazon and other sites, responded, it was only with a cut-and-pasted form comment (which she also posted on numerous other reviews I read - she has a series of them) that did not address the fact that this food almost killed his cat, who had tried eating it the normal way that cats eat their food!!

That is another reason I would love to see Hill's and their ilk disappear from existence.

peaches08 said:

 
Because ths is a hot area and many of us work long hours, having it shipped to the house may not seem like an option.

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One of feline-nutrition.org's YouTube videos shows someone unpacking a shipment of raw rabbit meat. The box is completely insulated.

happybird said:

My husband went to Petsmart yesterday and saw they have installed a refrigerated section full of different raw brands. He said it was really big, but cannot remember which brand names. That is the thing that bothers me the most about what this girl is posting- that they strongly warn clients away from a raw diet and tell them it is dangerous. Raw feeding is not a new practice and it is absolutely becoming more popular. It is not going away. So instead of disparaging it and regurgitating debunked myths, students should be well educated on exactly how to feed a proper raw diet in order to advise clients. They need to support their clients and be capable of critiquing a menu and suggesting proper changes, if necessary. If not, the person is going to go home and continue their bad habits or just leave that vet for one who will support their choices. That person chose to feed raw for a reason and is unlikely to embrace dry food. More education is always better.

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ITA. What the hell do these so-called "experts" and wanna-be experts think cats and dogs ate before there was such a thing as store-bought, mass-produced pet foods? I swear, sometimes I think I was born too late, because dealing with people who are too young to remember the times before cable TV, computers, push-button and cell phones and other modern conveniences is really starting to be a drag.

happybird said:

My husband went to Petsmart yesterday and saw they have installed a refrigerated section full of different raw brands. He said it was really big, but cannot remember which brand names. That is the thing that bothers me the most about what this girl is posting- that they strongly warn clients away from a raw diet and tell them it is dangerous. Raw feeding is not a new practice and it is absolutely becoming more popular. It is not going away. So instead of disparaging it and regurgitating debunked myths, students should be well educated on exactly how to feed a proper raw diet in order to advise clients. They need to support their clients and be capable of critiquing a menu and suggesting proper changes, if necessary. If not, the person is going to go home and continue their bad habits or just leave that vet for one who will support their choices. That person chose to feed raw for a reason and is unlikely to embrace dry food. More education is always better.

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I wonder if the Petsmart food is Freshpet Vital? I think I've seen this stuff somewhere else, Petco, maybe?

http://pets.petsmart.com/brands/freshpet/vital.shtml

I couldn't agree more about education. Our vet, who has a cat-only practice, isn't keen on raw food, though she seems okay with commercial foods, particularly if they process out the bacteria. It's funny: I prompted her on which brands do that because she didn't remember! I think she's pretty open-minded but most afraid people will feed unbalanced homemade diets. To her credit, she recommends Dr. Pierson's site. OTOH, our previous cat went to another vet practice and one of her last vets, who is fairly young, (among other things) talked about Rad Cat as if it were some sort of curse: she referred to it as "that Rad Cat" and told us not to feed it. Of course I did anyway (the cat was very sick, most likely with IBD) and it was one of the only foods, along with Dr. Pierson's recipe, that our cat ate, enjoyed, and even digested a little better in her last weeks and days.

In any event, I think the best thing I can do to improve our current vet's view of raw foods is to keep feeding our cats the way I do -- roughly half raw, half canned -- so she can continue to see the benefits of raw foods in the cats' diet. She was really happy with their growth and appearance at their last visit.  

Thank you to everyone for all these posts about the Reddit thread -- it's been interesting to read!

AutumnRose74 said:

ITA. What the hell do these so-called "experts" and wanna-be experts think cats and dogs ate before there was such a thing as store-bought, mass-produced pet foods? I swear, sometimes I think I was born too late, because dealing with people who are too young to remember the times before cable TV, computers, push-button and cell phones and other modern conveniences is really starting to be a drag.

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I feel the same way, and I am relatively young I think.

Hill's and Royal Canin are just babies - with Hill's canning their first food in 1948 (source) and Royal Canin being founded in 1968 (source).

Smithsonian reported that house cats have lived with people for 12,000 years!

http://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/a-brief-history-of-house-cats-158390681/

pinkdagger said:

 
One last response from Reddit OP.

"So he is just fine with a diet I'm giving him."

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What an interesting statement...pretty much verbatim...

AutumnRose74 said:

 
One of feline-nutrition.org's YouTube videos shows someone unpacking a shipment of raw rabbit meat. The box is completely insulated.

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I'm aware of that and have mentioned it to people, but others and myself have received packages of frozen goods that were thawed (NOT pet food). Considering when some of these folks go to work and when the truck runs, that can be a problem.  It's an even bigger problem for many of the apartment dwellers that work longer hours on the weekends (this is a resort island) and their package is locked up in the main office of the apartment complex.  Often times Fed Ex runs at 7 pm here, and the main office of the apartment complex closes at 5 pm, so all you get is a note.  Thankfully I live in a house, but not everyone does.

peaches08 said:

I'm aware of that and have mentioned it to people, but others and myself have received packages of frozen goods that were thawed (NOT pet food). Considering when some of these folks go to work and when the truck runs, that can be a problem.  It's an even bigger problem for many of the apartment dwellers that work longer hours on the weekends (this is a resort island) and their package is locked up in the main office of the apartment complex.  Often times Fed Ex runs at 7 pm here, and the main office of the apartment complex closes at 5 pm, so all you get is a note.  Thankfully I live in a house, but not everyone does.

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How many days did it take to ship? Frozen goods shouldn't be shipped later than Wednesday, and 3 days is about the max number of days it should be in transit. I tell Fedex to leave the box in front of my door instead at the apartment office where it usually goes.

Fhi09 said:

 
How many days did it take to ship? Frozen goods shouldn't be shipped later than Wednesday, and 3 days is about the max number of days it should be in transit. I tell Fedex to leave the box in front of my door instead at the apartment office where it usually goes.

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Most apartments here, you don't have that choice.  I used to live in apartments here so I feel their pain.  It depended on who I was ordering from as to when it was shipped.  If I was ordering shots from Jeffers, it could be shipped anytime.  If it was steaks from Omaha Steaks then yes it was set days that they did shipping.  Weddings here are a big money events that go from Thursday through Sunday.  When I say "big events", I mean celebrities and such.

I buy from HareToday and RodentPro - they fill insulated boxes with dry ice and have specific shipping days, depending on where you live. For me, they ship on a Monday, I'll get it on Friday. Everything was always completely frozen. I actually wouldn't have minded the large stuff being thawed a bit but still cold as in the fridge because I'd have to thaw anyway to portion it out.

And, before I lived in a house, I had stuff shipped to where I worked (lots of colleagues did, too) - there's always a way .

Getting this thread back on track, have there been any more PMs? 

LDG said:

Even if someone opts to feed a commercially available complete and balanced product?

My vet didn't even know they existed. When I told him about them - including the sterile products - he had no hesitation in saying he thought that was great. (The most traditional of the 3 vets we work with).

I think "we" (raw feeders) as a community need to emphasize the importance of feeding homemade raw right - but we need to stop making the blanket statement that feeding raw is hard or complicated or requires work. With commercial products now available, it just isn't, and if someone wants to feed raw without the time investment, they can go to a store and buy it. It IS as simple as that.

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I wanted to comment on this again, after reading more responses.  You're right, the OP over there kind of backpedals from her original statement about raw being bad to saying that raw is either too expensive or is extraordinarily difficult to make.  I make 18 lbs, portion it and clean up in 2 hours.  2 hours due to watching TV while I do it.  As far as costs, does she eat kibble herself to reduce costs?  Seriously, I don't understand why she wouldn't considering her argument about how perfectly safe and healthy it is.  And why is she posting snake studies? 

 Funny enough Natural Balance tried making and selling a hamburger pellet food for snakes, with the logic that today's rodents aren't healthy enough and could be unsafe so you should feed these instead.  Unsurprisingly, it didn't take off.  I wouldn't have thought it was rocket science to figure out if we half digest food, it will be less stress and work on the stomach, that doesn't prove it's a healthier diet or good for the animal.  I'll stick to rodents for my snakes. 

peaches08 said:

And why is she posting snake studies? 

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Because it's the only study in a carnivore that compares the energetic significance of cooking that shows cooking is better than raw. It takes less calories to metabolise cooked food, I guess it what it means. I can see how that benefits humans, but not cats.

This article explains the significance to humans: http://www.anthro.utah.edu/PDFs/CarmodyWrangham09cookingHumEv.pdf

Though why use the snake study when there is a study in cats, comparing raw meat, cooked meat, and extruded diets: http://www.2ndchance.info/homemadediets-Kerr2012.pdf

Cooking and raw were roughly the same (you can see in the table, the raw was more digestible), and superior to kibble. Dr. Becker's write-up on the study (easier to understand than the study, LOL), and a review of the literature on the subject, all of which indicate raw is more digestible: http://healthypets.mercola.com/site...protein-in-real-meat-are-better-for-cats.aspx

And there is a price we pay for cooking meat to well-done at high temps: cancer. http://www.medicinenet.com/script/main/art.asp?articlekey=47818

And here's a problem with grains in food: http://www.aseanfood.info/Articles/11018285.pdf


Oh - found this. Dry food is a predisposing factor in urethral obstruction: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21145768

GoingPostal said:

 
 Funny enough Natural Balance tried making and selling a hamburger pellet food for snakes, with the logic that today's rodents aren't healthy enough and could be unsafe so you should feed these instead.  Unsurprisingly, it didn't take off.  I wouldn't have thought it was rocket science to figure out if we half digest food, it will be less stress and work on the stomach, that doesn't prove it's a healthier diet or good for the animal.  I'll stick to rodents for my snakes. 

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GMO mice, I guess? 

LDG said:

Because it's the only study in a carnivore that compares the energetic significance of cooking that shows cooking is better than raw. It takes less calories to metabolise cooked food, I guess it what it means. I can see how that benefits humans, but not cats.

This article explains the significance to humans: http://www.anthro.utah.edu/PDFs/CarmodyWrangham09cookingHumEv.pdf

Though why use the snake study when there is a study in cats, comparing raw meat, cooked meat, and extruded diets: http://www.2ndchance.info/homemadediets-Kerr2012.pdf

Cooking and raw were roughly the same (you can see in the table, the raw was more digestible), and superior to kibble. Dr. Becker's write-up on the study (easier to understand than the study, LOL), and a review of the literature on the subject, all of which indicate raw is more digestible: http://healthypets.mercola.com/site...protein-in-real-meat-are-better-for-cats.aspx

And there is a price we pay for cooking meat to well-done at high temps: cancer. http://www.medicinenet.com/script/main/art.asp?articlekey=47818

And here's a problem with grains in food: http://www.aseanfood.info/Articles/11018285.pdf


Oh - found this. Dry food is a predisposing factor in urethral obstruction: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21145768

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I guess what stumped me is the comparison of snakes to cats.  I don't see the similarity.  Then again, someone else bothered to compare horses and cows in that thread.  Anyone who's owned horses knows that they aren't similar.  Cows are much more resilient.

Wow, cool stuff about that cooked meat and cancer.  I remember hearing a supposed correlation between grill marks and cancer when I was a kid...I don't know if there are studies on it or not.

Another interesting thing about cooked vs raw that I saw with my own cats, as you probably remember I used to lightly bake the outside of the chicken to reduce bacteria.  Immediately when I stopped doing that, my cats went crazy over their food like they did their first time eating raw. 

Yeh, the whole snake study thing doesn't make any sense. It's a reptile for crying out loud.

LDG said:

Though why use the snake study when there is a study in cats, comparing raw meat, cooked meat, and extruded diets: http://www.2ndchance.info/homemadediets-Kerr2012.pdf

Cooking and raw were roughly the same (you can see in the table, the raw was more digestible), and superior to kibble.

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I read this study and reviewed the charts. The study's conclusion doesn't favor one over the other (raw vs. cooked), but, like you said, both were more digestible than kibble. In fact, the conclusion seems to be presented more as raw/cooked VS. kibble.

LDG said:

Dr. Becker's write-up on the study (easier to understand than the study, LOL), and a review of the literature on the subject, all of which indicate raw is more digestible: http://healthypets.mercola.com/site...protein-in-real-meat-are-better-for-cats.aspx

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And I read Dr. Becker's page, which has a similar approach and seems to focus on real meat (raw and cooked) VS. kibble, with kibble being the bad guy.

LDG said:

And there is a price we pay for cooking meat to well-done at high temps: cancer. http://www.medicinenet.com/script/main/art.asp?articlekey=47818

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This is an interesting study, and a good resource to provide to people who opt to provide a home-cooked diet to their pet. It may help them choose a better cooking method. I wonder where the slow-cooker method would fall...perhaps the low temp category? I'm not sure I agree with their recommendation to microwave the meats to reduce HCA content.