Raw Feed Are You Joking

Let’s think about this for a minute: God did not design our animals to eat pre-packaged, kibble or pellet-like food. In the wild, dogs don’t tell each other, “Hey, I’m hungry, let’s go to the pet food store and grab us some lunch.” As if!

No, together, they go out and hunt down their food, then dig right in while it’s still warm. Sorry about the graphic image, but well, that’s nature for you! They also do not stoke up a campfire and sit around singing Kum Bi Ya while the meat gets cooked. Nope they just have at it in the natural raw form.

Now you might be thinking, “Yeah but that’s wild animals, not our sweet kitties and dogs.” Think again. They are and will always be carnivores. They need raw meat and bones to be healthy with a fully supported immune system. Also the raw, non-weight bearing bones such as the shoulders and backs give dogs and cats strong, clean white teeth eliminating the need for dentals done under anesthesia at a veterinarian’s office, something that is not only much riskier but much more expensive than feeding your dogs and cats what they were designed to eat: meat.

Your other pets such as horses, guinea pigs, birds and rabbits also need natural raw food in order to thrive. They do not forage for pellets, let me tell you. Many birds are omnivorous so they’ll eat fruits, veggies and meat. While our other furry and feathered friends need to eat fresh fruits and vegetables.

Kim Christopher states, “Proper diet is among the more important considerations in the health maintenance of your pet and essential in the management of many diseases. To feed correctly, a knowledge of dietary nutrients and their availability is important.”

And Dr. Russell Swift,”Carbohydrates are not needed by dogs(or cats). Carnivores cannot maintain long term production of the quantity of amylase enzyme necessary to properly digest and utilize the carbohydrates. In addition, the proteins in grains are less digestive than animal proteins. As a result, the immune system becomes irritated and weakened by the invasion of foreign, non-nutritive protein and carbohydrate particles.”

So just what do you think most packaged pet foods commonly know as premium kibble contain? Grains. Byproducts. Toxic preservatives.

The question would then arise, if pet food manufacturers know this (they must because they’re in business to know) why are these things added to our pet food and why are we told that these packaged foods are so good? Even our mainstream veterinarians are selling these foods to us.

Good questions. Part of the reason is because it’s cheaper to use grains and byproducts. Byproducts can be anything we’d normally throw out such as beaks, feathers, feet/hooves, euthanized animals, road kill, you name it. It all gets rendered and added into our packaged pet foods.

Oh but it gets better. These foods are then baked. Here is what Dr. Betty Lewis stated on her website, “What’s wrong with commercial foods? The number one item which makes commercial foods inappropriate for pets is that these foods are cooked. No one has ever reported seeing wild animals routinely barbecuing their meals! Raising the temperature of food above 118

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Essential Oils and MRSA

Natural preventative pet care isn’t a new thing but it certainly isn’t fully mainstream yet. One of the challenges is being able to re-educate the public to think outside of the box. For so many years we’ve been told over and over again by traditional care providers that our pets need yearly vaccinations, prevention medicines for heartworm, fleas, and ticks, and feeding premium kibble. We’ve been told these will all lead to ultimate wellness in our pets. Nothing could be further from the truth.

While we continue to struggle with conquering the mountain of “alternative care is for new age, crystal toting, chanting hippies”, our pets are getting sicker rather than healthier. One of the most challenging problems on the rise is super resistant bacteria that are increasingly resistant to the traditional use of antibiotics. Most notably is the rise of MRSA (methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus). This is a staph infection that the antibiotic methicillin can no longer kill. MRSA is passed from humans to pets and it is still mutating into strains in different species animals. Horses have developed their own strain and antibiotics are not the answer! In fact, the overuse of antibiotics is part of the main reason that these bacteria have mutated and evolved.

This staph infection is deadly and can and does kill humans and animals. In fact, this very thing happened to Jill Moss’ most beloved white Samoyed, Bella. Jill lost Bella to this staph infection a little over a year ago. It prompted Jill to take serious action and bring the knowledge of this deadly strain of bacteria to the world so that other pet owners and people would not have to suffer the loss she has. Jill has instituted the Bella Moss Foundation (http://www.TheBellaMossFoundation.com ) and Pets-MRSA (http://www.Pets-MRSA.com ) to help bring not only knowledge about MRSA, but hope, help and healing.

Research has already begun on finding ways to stop these virulent bacteria. Scientists at the University of Manchester in England have found that three essential oils destroyed MRSA! Dr. Peter Warn, who was involved in the research, told the BBC (British Broadcasting Company) back in December of 2004 that when he tested the oils in the lab, “absolutely nothing grew. Rather than stimulating bacteria and fungi, the oils killed them off.”

One diligent product formulator for a therapeutic essential oils company discovered that two of the oils used were Melaleuca alternafolia and geranium.

So why are essential oils proving so effective at killing even the most virulent bacteria such as MRSA? According to Jacqui Stringer, the Clinical Lead of Complementary Therapies at the Christie Hospital in Manchester, England which treats cancer patients, the reason that essential oils are so effective is because they are made up of a complex mixture of chemical compounds which super bugs such as MRSA find difficult to resist. I would add that because these compounds are naturally occurring and derived from plants -the “blood” of plants - no two oils are exactly alike ever, which is the perfect complex compound to combat a mutating super bug! Current treatments, according to Stringer, are made up of single compounds (like antibiotics) so the MRSA becomes resistant very quickly and leaving only 50% success in the cases of MRSA. Think about that: only a 50/50 chance of survival. Those are not good odds. The hope comes with this new alternative approach to battling these superbugs.

Another added benefit of using essential oils to combat and help prevent (prevention is the goal in stopping MRSA) the spread of MRSA is the application: inhaled either directly or by diffusing them. MRSA is often carried inside the nose so inhaling the essential oils is all that is needed to prevent patients being at risk. This makes them very easy to administer to both humans and pets.

The biggest deterrent to progressing further in the research with the essential oils and combating these superbugs has been funding. In January 2005, the Manchester researchers were having problems obtaining the

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