LABELS DO NOT IDENTIFY THE BEST PET FOOD

Consumers consider two things when they think about food, the beginning (farms) and the end (the packaged food). It's assumed that if corn, wheat, cheese, meat, etc. are on the label, then that's what's in the package.

But ignored is the wild card, the middle, what happens between the farm and the package, namely processing.

Once foods are milled, fractionated, blended, extruded, pelleted, dried, retorted, baked, dyed, breaded, fried, sauced, gravied, pulped, strained, embalmed, sterilized, sanitized, petrified to permit endless shelf-life, and finally prettified with smells and colors, they become something entirely different from the wholesome farmer's starting materials.

Processing includes high heat, breaking the shells of natural ingredients and pulverizing the contents, adding various chemicals to assist processing and improve cosmetics and shelf life, and mixing together the resulting thousands of natural and unnatural chemicals. The resultant brew is entirely unlike what is imagined by reading the ingredient list and totally unlike what dogs and cats are genetically designed for.

The vast majority of modern foods are processing concoctions of a few base ingredients - white sugar, oil, flour and salt - all highly refined and processed and resembling nothing from nature. Not only are the resulting myriad products on grocers' shelves nutritional shells of the real thing, but processors have the audacity to call these products "value added."

This is not to say processing is all bad. If foods are going to be put in packages in stores and have shelf life, they need to be processed and stabilized. Moreover, grains and legumes would be indigestible if not properly cooked so as to inactivate antinutritional factors and gelatinize starches. Meats would spoil if not sterilized by heat. Products would grow mold generating mycotoxins and become infested with insects if foods were not properly dehydrated and packaged.

In our age of convenience, packaged products are here to stay. Nevertheless, creatures are genetically designed for foods directly from nature. Attempting to reconcile these two facts is the challenge in your search for the best pet food.

Ponder these illustrations to help you choose most wisely:

Thought for the day: "Knowledge dwells In heads replete with thoughts of other men; Wisdom in minds attentive to their own." – William Cowper (1731-1800)

Phrase for the day: 'shelf-life' - the amount of age a food can have and still be safely consumed. The phrase is misleading. All food that is worth anything begins to degrade immediately after harvest. The best idea is to buy foods that spoil rapidly, but then use them before they do. Keep all nutritious foods refrigerated or frozen (except foods in cans).