Expensive Pet Foods Aren't Any Healthier Than Cheap Ones

But theres not much difference between these foods and the cheapest by-product-filled kibble.

Heres what you’ve got the option to expect to find in your pets food.

What Does Chicken Mean, Exactly?

So pet foods should, and do, usually contain plenty of animal tissue.

Take beef, for example.

Poultry has a similar definition, but it may include ground-up bone.

Its nutritious and delicious, if youre a dog.

For poultry, by-products can include heads and feet.

Meals, like chicken meal or fish meal, are rendered.

This means the producers take edible partseither meat or by-productsand cook and dry them into a powder.

(These are rarebut remember, again, that this can include mechanically deboned chicken slurry.)

Chicken recipeimplies that chicken is part of the food, but that there are other ingredients.

Made with real chickenmeans it must contain at least 3 percent chicken.

Chicken flavordoesnt require a minimum amount of chicken, as long its somewhere in the ingredient list.

The same goes for meatyyou can use that word on any pet food that contains meat.

Sometimes these flavoring ingredients are sprayed on the outside of the kibble.

Some premium or superpremium pet foods contain actual chunks of meat, but many do not.

As a rule of thumb, salt is somewhere around one percent of a pet food.

So anything that appears after salt in the list is only present in trace amounts.

Thats sometimes the case for fruits and vegetables pictured on labels.

In their book, Nestle and Nesheim were able to rule out some of the things thatarentin pet food.

For example, none of the by-products include hair, horns, teeth, or hooves.

Traces of euthanasia drugs have been found in pet food samples, but at very low levels.

But should they really be eating grains and veggies every day?

Even though grains are unfashionable for humans and pets these days, theres nothing wrong with them.

There are two small caveats.

One is that barley and soy tend to make dogs fart a lot.

More expensive premium foods tend to result in less poop.

So, lets say you find a grain-free food you like.

Thats fine, but youre paying extra for a food thats nutritionally similar to the cheaper grain-containing foods.

What about the other reassuring-sounding words on the label?

Most dont mean what you think they mean.

Thedefinition of naturalis so vague that its not very meaningful.

Human-grade is another meaningless buzzword.

Some pet foods and treats use it, butthe AAFCO considers it misleading the way its typically used.

Pet foods just arent the same thing that you would feed yourself, and thats okayyour dog doesnt mind.

We also clarified the AAFCOs position on human-grade.