What’s Your Dog Eating?
By Holly Noonan

Have you ever noticed that dogs tend to develop growths after a decade or so of eating commercial pet food? My sister’s dog has a couple of growths on his leg that are developing their own personalities and arguing with each other. It’s fascinating in a grotesque sort of way. And did you hear about “Gus, the World’s Ugliest Dog?” He must be seen to be believed. He had some tough competition, too. Poor Gus is missing one eye and one leg and will be spending his prize money on cancer treatment.

OK I’m getting predictable in my refrain “It’s all about the food,” but doesn’t that make a heap of sense? Modern industrial commodity pet food is literally the garbagey by-products of our industrial meat system, which isn’t that clean or palateable to start with.

Our dog Tenzin started growing growths on her face and body last year and that’s when I made the switch away from commercial dog food. (Her growths have stopped growing.) Also, she is part husky and blows out her undercoat in the spring. Every year it was getting earlier and earlier, until at 7 years old, she started losing her undercoat in the coldest part of winter: February. We switched to natural dog food (more on that below) and this year she didn’t start losing her undercoat until May. It was a really conspicuous change in one year.

According to the Animal Protection Institute, we should “avoid foods that rely on by-products as the sole source of animal protein. By-products consist of organs and parts either not desired, or condemned, for human consumption…. (Another) potential problem with commercial pet food is pesticide residues, antibiotics, and molds contained in pet food ingredients. Meat from sick animals may be loaded with drugs, some of which are known to pass unchanged through all the processing done to create a finished pet food (such as penicillin and pentobarbital).”

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