Health Tips

THE DARK SIDE OF RECYCLING

More about the horrors of what goes into commercial pet foods.

[Author's name withheld by request] In February 1990, the San Francisco Chronicle carried a macabre two-part story detailing how stray dogs, cats and pound animals are routinely rounded up by meat renderers and ground up into - of all things - pet food. According to the researcher who brought the information to the Chronicle, the paper buried the story and deleted many of the charges he had documented. A report he worked on for ABC television's 20-20 was similarly watered down. In exasperation, he sent the story to Earth Island Journal.

The rendering plant floor is piled high with "raw product": thousands of dead dogs and cats; heads and hooves from cattle, sheep, pigs and horses; whole skunks; rats and raccoons - all waiting to be processed. In the 90-degree heat, the piles of dead animals seem to have a life of their own as millions of maggots swarm over the carcasses.

A LOOK INSIDE A RENDERING PLANT

This article by Gar Smith

is quite an eye opener when we look at the billions spent on feeding our pets.

Rendering has been called "the silent industry". Each year in the US, 286 rendering plants quietly dispose of more than 12.5 million tons of dead animals, fat and meat wastes. As the public relations watchdog newsletter PR Watch observes, renderers "are thankful that most people remain blissfully unaware of their existence"

Feeding Pets to Pets

Would you knowingly feed your dog or cat pet food containing other dogs and cats?  Doesn't sound very appetizing does it?  Unfortunately, in many U.S. states it is completely legal - and common practice - to add euthanized pets from animal control and veterinarians to the rendered meats pot.  Which is where the "meat" that is used in most commerical pet foods comes from.

Feeding Our Pets - Why NOT to leave it up to a Multi-National Corporation

The “Big 5" pet food manufacturers (Nestle, Colgate-Palmolive, Procter & Gamble, Nutro and Heinz) would like us to believe that all our companion animals need to eat is lovingly packaged in affordable servings, readily available at any local store.   It is easy and convenient to believe that this is true while ignoring the Wizard behind the curtain.  After all, aren’t we shown how years of research and all the finest ingredients go into every can and bag.  Don’t we all see the colorful ads and TV spots highlighting healthy, glowing pets running up stairs, performing heroic feats and thanking us repeatedly for feeding them brand X?

What we don’t see is the ugly underbelly of the agribusiness industry. They don’t tell us that 1 out of every 2 dogs in the U.S. will die with cancer! That pet life spans have shortened substantially since the advent of packaged pet foods.  That cancer, obesity, liver & kidney diseases, reproductive failure and congestive heart failure are all directly related to this diet!