It is shocking that the FDA still allows the pet food industry to add harmful and disgusting ingredients in their products after all the recalls in the industry. These are the same brands that have the wonderful commercials on TV, sponsor ACK Dog Shows, and have full page ads in most dog magazines. Advertising at its best.

These are just a few of the ingredients found in some well known brands of pet foods. A warning to those with weak stomachs please read with caution!

*Animal meat meal and animal by-products: this is what is left of the slaughtered animal after the meat is removed. It can include things like beaks, feet, blood, intestines, bones, and tissue.

*Beef and bone meal: another by product of beef which can include hair, hooves,horn,manure, entrails and blood.

*Chicken Byproduct Meal: Consists of the dry, ground, rendered, clean parts of the carcass of slaughtered chicken, such as necks, feet, undeveloped eggs, and intestines — exclusive of feathers except in such amounts as might occur unavoidably in good processing practices.

*Corn bran: which is the outer layer of the corn kernel. It has no nutritional value.

*Corn Gluten: is the residue from corn which can be used as a protein but can cause allergies in many dogs just like wheat gluten.

*Wheat Gluten: The tough, viscid nitrogenous substance remaining when wheat is washed to remove the starch. An inexpensive byproduct of human food processing with almost no nutritional value left, serves mostly as a binder.

Wheat also exacerbates pain in dogs and humans.

Take the time to research your pet’s food before buying a pretty package. Most of the smaller pet supply shops carry the healthy brands. It is difficult to find those in most grocery chains unless it is a natural health food store.

If you would like to learn more about the best commercial dog foods on the market please visit the link below. Your dog will thank you!
www.dogaware.com

West Hollywood expected to ban dog, cat sales
Associated Press

WEST HOLLYWOOD — West Hollywood is expected to ban the sale of cats and dogs at pet shops under a measure designed to strike a blow at so-called puppy mills.

The City Council will take a final vote on the ordinance today after giving it a preliminary approval earlier this month. It would take effect next month and give existing pet stores until September to stop sales.
City officials say the idea is to reduce demand that can lead to inhumane conditions by breeders at puppy mills and kitten factories.
The law exempts home breeders, animal rescue groups and shelters.
The ordinance says 35,000 dogs and 67,000 cats were euthanized in city and county shelters in Los Angeles in the past year

Join the Planet Dog Foundation to Fund Canine Search Teams in Haiti

Here is a message from Planet Dog:

Dear Friends:

The Planet Dog Foundation specializes in grant funding for programs that work with dogs to help people in need. Nowhere is there more need to help people in crisis than in Haiti. Search dog teams are working around the clock in Port-au-Prince and beyond to locate survivors and dangerous materials in the rubble.

PDF will be making an emergency donation to the National Disaster Search Dog Rescue to support the efforts of their teams currently active in Haiti. Their teams train rigorously for years, so they can immediately mobilize in times of unthinkable disasters like this one.

If you have not yet given, or would like to offer additional support to fund the work of life-saving dogs in the rescue efforts, please make a donation to the Planet Dog Foundation by Monday, February 8. Your donation will be matched by PDF, and then our donation to the Search Dog Foundation will be matched by Joanne Woodward Newman, of Newman’s Own, and the Newman Foundation – so your gift will be QUADRUPLED!

You can make a donation at the Planet Dog Company Store at 211 Marginal Way in Portland, or mail your donation to PDF, 49 York Street, Portland, ME 04101. When sending by mail please note that it is a gift for the Matching Grant Program for Haiti.

PDF will match all pledges up to $1,500 and send a donation to the Search Dog Foundation on Wednesday, February 10. The Newman Foundation will match the PDF gift on February 15. You contribute $20. PDF sends $40. Newman contributes an additional $40 = $80 to SDF – your contribution go FOUR times as far.

To learn more about the work of these incredible dogs, and see daily updates on their successes on the ground in Haiti, visit http://www.searchdogfoundation.org/98/html/1-2_haiti.html

Thank you very much for considering a donation in support of this amazing example of how dogs are helping people in need. Please pass this along to all of your dog loving friends.

Kristen Smith
Executive Director

New Patient Special at Four Paws Acupuncture ! We will donate 10% of the fee for your dog’s first acupuncture session to this fund.

Long way to go’ after dog inquiry

A report on pedigree dogs calls for breeders to make sweeping changes to improve the animals’ health. The inquiry follows concerns highlighted in a BBC documentary.
Jemima Harrison, the film’s producer/director, welcomes the recommendations but believes they may not be implemented fully.

The Kennel Club’s 137-year-old self-appointed role as the governing body of dogs has come to an abrupt end.
The eagerly-awaited Bateson Inquiry recommends that responsibility for the health and welfare of pedigree dogs is devolved to an independent body. The Kennel Club has been sent to the doghouse.
The inquiry is the third to publish since our Pedigree Dogs Exposed, the film we made for the BBC in 2008 that lifted the lid on the extent of health and welfare problems in pedigree dogs – what we dubbed “the greatest animal welfare scandal of our time.”
In graphic detail, we showed what more than a century of inbreeding and selection for the show-ring had done to some breeds and it was not a pretty sight.
Well, other than to those judges who seemed to think that a German shepherd is supposed to look like a frog.

The film provoked uproar from the public – and denial from the Kennel Club, although they have since introduced changes, including the revision of many breed standards, a ban on mother/son and brother/sister matings and a specific decree that no healthy puppy can be put to sleep on purely cosmetic grounds (a practice that we highlighted was still going on). ”
To read more http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/8460012.stm

Scientists in Moscow say stray dogs have learned to use the subway to travel to the city centre in search of food.

Biology professor Andrew Poyarkov said he had seen several dogs unaccompanied on the city’s underground rail system, reports rupor.org.

He claims the dogs travel into the city centre, where they can more easily find food, each morning and travel back to where they live each evening.

“They do not just go to the subway station, they actually board the trains,” he said.

“They seem to have learnt how long they need to stay on the train to leave at the right station.

“Sometimes they fall asleep and miss their stop. Then they get off take another train back to the centre.”

Dr Poyarkov said he had also noted the same dogs waiting for a green light to cross the road.

He says they have somehow managed to pick up habits from humans and is investigating the phenomenon.

Duke is a 1 1/2 yr old male purebred GSD, healthy and loves kids. He is about 85 pounds. Up to date on shots and is fixed. Eats Evo brand dog food.

His owners are not home during the day and he is put outside in the yard for long periods of time in the yard. His neighbor Mary takes him in from time to time and he gets along with her other dogs and kids. He may be OK with cats.

Duke will need some training and a home that he will have lots of exercise and stimulation. He is a smart dog and needs a job. I think he would be great in a home with kids since he loves them. He loves to play.

If you are interested in Duke please email Mary at mary.walsh@net1plus.com

Help Stop Puppy Mills

Join us, Saturday, September 19th
1:00 – 5:00 PM,
The Salem Commons
Washington Square
Salem MA

Come and learn what you can do to save the lives of puppies

Food, Music, Raffle (good stuff for you and your pet), local rescue groups with animals to adopt, and more!

Animals and Humans welcome!

In conjunction with www.AwarenessDay.org, part of a NATIONWIDE effort to put an end to puppy mills

www.awarenessday.org

I recently learned that Iams, the famous maker of pet foods actually tests on animals. I am not talking about taste tests! Below is a website with more information. Please note that some of the pictures on this site are revolting.

I have never endorsed Iams products as they are filled with too many unknown fillers, by-products and harmful substances for animals. Unfortunately they do a brilliant job by marketing as one of the best pet foods available. It is shocking that a company who promotes dogs would allow such atrocities in their plants.

(There are so many other great pet food companies that use human grade quality food and have no strange fillers and chemicals, such as Innova, California Naturals, Solid Gold, Blue, Halo, Wellness, Orijen and more.)

Iams: A Recipe for Cruelty
For nearly 10 months in 2002 and early 2003, a PETA investigator worked undercover at Sinclair Research Center, a laboratory hired by Iams, and discovered a dark and sordid secret beneath the wholesome image of the dog- and cat-food manufacturer.

Dogs had gone crazy because they were confined to barren steel cages and cement cells, dogs were left piled on a filthy paint-chipped floor after chunks of muscle had been hacked from their thighs, dogs were surgically debarked, and horribly sick dogs and cats were neglected and left in cages to suffer without any veterinary care.
To read more visit:
www.iamscruelty.com

Please help spread the word on behalf of all those animals who are victims of this large corporation.

From the SPCA

Dear Friends,
U.S. troops and their beloved animals need your help right now! Very soon it will be too hot in the Middle East to rescue dogs and cats from Iraq.

We only have 2 weeks to save the soldiers’ dogs and cats pictured here – our window of opportunity is closing fast.

If you don’t act today Jasmine, Samantha, Whiskers, Hammer and many more will be lost. Please visit our website right now to see how you can help.

This Memorial Day, please remember those who have served our country selflessly. Support our troops – help us save their buddies today!
Thank you for your immediate action. We cannot succeed without you!
For the animals,

JD Winston
Executive Director
SPCA International
P.S. Help us spread the word! Please forward this email to family and friends.

Why we treat our pets like royalty
By Michael Schaffer
March 29, 2009

BACK IN NOVEMBER 2007, Utah’s Deseret News wrote up a five-year-old Shih Tzu whose wardrobe included a pink mohair sweater and a fur-trimmed parka. The same month, the Arizona Republic reported on the growing popularity of puppy Tupperware parties. And in South Carolina, the Greenville News highlighted an increasingly common sight on local sidewalks: pet strollers. Such conveyances might have proved popular at the six Dallas-area malls that announced preholiday “pet nights,” where animals could sit for a picture with Santa.

Gilded-age indulgences that ended when recession officially arrived a month later? Hardly. According to the American Pet Products Association, the pet industry – which includes everything from old-fashioned kibble to new-age veterinary acupuncture – grew by $2 billion in 2008. For 2009, the association predicts $45 billion in sales. Fifteen years ago, that number was $17 billion. “We’re as recession-resistant as any industry I can think of,” declares Bob Vetere, the association’s president.

Read more of this article at “a href=”http://www.boston.com/bostonglobe/ideas/articles/2009/03/29/the_family_dog/?p1=Well_MostPop_Emailed2″>bostonglobe.com