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Food
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Friday, 07 December 2007 12:01 |
As a pet owner, no doubt you want to give your dog or cat the best care possible. And caring for your pet means feeding him the best diet you can. By making your own pet foods, you"ll be saving money, up to 80%. And to top it off, it"s easy; making pet food at home is probably a lot less time-consuming than you may have thought. With hundreds of websites offering free pet food recipes online, it"s now easier than ever to make your own pet food.
To prepare healthy and nutritious food for your pet you should study your pet"s natural habitat and food sources, and then prepare foods that most closely resemble their own natural or original diet.
Animals, because they are color blind, choose their foods by smell. Most dogs like gamey flavors best, as well as liver, fat, garlic, onions, horsemeat, lamb, beef, cheese and fish. Cats enjoy chicken, liver, fish, turkey, lamb, and yeast, and prefer fresh to aged flavors.
Cats are fussy eaters and it is not wise to continually feed them their favorite foods. Soon they will refuse to eat anything else; it is your job to see your cat has a balanced diet.
Animals do not need salt added to their diet as the natural salt in the food is enough for them.
Dogs may eat any vegetable they want, but cats should not have any starchy veggies, like peas and corn. Some dogs and cats even enjoy fruits!
It"s a good idea to always add a grain, such as Kibble, wheat germ, cooked oatmeal or whole wheat bread to meat dinners. For dogs use 75% carbohydrate foods (grains and vegetables) to 25% meat; for cats use half carbohydrate foods to half meat.
You will find, once you begin making your own pet foods, that it is really relatively simple and you will save some money as well. Remember that all pet foods should be served at room temperature; don"t serve food cold from the refrigerator nor hot from the stove.
Homemade pet food should take a ridiculously small amount of your time. As a general guide meats should be raw and vegetables must be finely chopped in a food processor or by a hand grater.
When it comes time for feeding, it is important that you let your dogs and cats eat as much as they want at the time of feeding. Once their body becomes nutritionally satiated, they will cut their food intake, sometimes by half the amount, and go on a maintenance diet. Incidentally, you should know that cats should be fed three times a day, while an adult dog needs only one meal a day.
To get started, find a good book with pet food recipes and use it to start preparing simple meals. You can also get free recipes from many websites online. If preparing your own pet food is not an option for you visit the website below for some healthy pet food: http://www.pet-care-supplies.co.uk/food/
About the Author
Copyright © 2005. Bridget Mwape of
Pet Care Supplies UK: http://www.pet-care-supplies.co.uk/ which offers thousands of products to help you care for your pets. This article may be reprinted as long as all the above links are active and clickable and this author box (byline) is not edited. |
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Monday, 29 October 2007 00:01 |
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We have talked about the importance of both diet and exercise when dealing with a pet that has arthritis. I think that diet is such an important issue that it is one we should discuss in greater detail. It is becoming common knowledge that as humans, our bodies perform better when we "eat right." It is equally important for pets to follow healthy food guidelines as well.
The Generic Foods
There are three "groups" of processed foods and it usually one or more of these that we purchase to feed our pets: 1) the "Generic" group, 2) the "Premium" group, and 3) the "natural foods" group. The first group is the focus of this discussion. All three groups appeal to us for obvious reasons. We like the convenience factor. All we have to do is "scoop and dish it."
This first group that I will call the "generics" is the least desirable from a nutritional standpoint. Of course, that is why they carry the lowest price tag. Unfortunately, when you are trying to provide a healthy diet to an arthritic pet, it frankly does a less than desirable job in my opinion.
What is that stuff?
This is the category of pet foods that contains animal and plant by-products. If you are paying attention, they also contain artificial preservatives and additives. This group of pet foods uses the cheapest possible ingredients. Unfortunately, manufacturers are not held to extremely high standards here.
It is also important to note that pet food is a "spin-off" of the human food industry. As we all know, the standards are certainly higher for food manufactured for humans than it is for pets. What happens is that the pet food segment of this industry gets the opportunity to "unload" ingredients that would not pass muster for humans.
This is where you will find that even the "grains" purported to be in these foods is either over processed or is whole grain that is simply not fit for humans to eat. As well, there are often parts of an animal used in manufacturing pet food that frankly put, is not the least bit desirable.
Measuring Up
You do not have to become a "food expert" to make decisions here. Assuming you can afford to spend a little extra for pet food, use some common sense.
Price is a good guideline. If you see a 40-pound bag of dog food that is on sale for $12.95, it is likely not on the most desirable food list (a least, not from my standpoint.) If you study the label, it likely will tell you that this is correct.
Premium and All-Natural
When you move up in price, you are likely looking at "premium" and "all-natural" offerings. The premium brands are going to be on most store shelves and usually they are sold by veterinarians as well. Even this food group does not necessarily have the finest ingredients. Unfortunately, price alone does not always tell the story here.
The "all-natural" pet foods, generally speaking, are the best of the bunch. These use natural preservatives and you are not going to find artificial flavoring or coloring. Of course, the price corresponds to the quality and for some of you it is not feasible from a budget standpoint.
I have recommended using raw vegetables as part of your pet"s diet. It is far less expensive and once they get used to it (and, if you do not overdo it) it is a healthy and less expensive approach.
Pets with arthritis need solid and healthy nutrition. If your budget allows you the luxury of giving them the best, then opt for the all-natural group.
Remember, high-quality liquid glucosamine is only part of the picture. To get an arthritic pet healthier overall, it requires attention to both diet and exercise as well.
About the Author
JR Rogers is the owner of Synflex America Inc. makers of Syn-flex, a premium glucosamine arthritis formula for humans and household pets.
The author"s statements have not been evaluated by the FDA and are not provided to diagnose or to suggest that liquid glucosamine and chondroitin will treat, cure, or prevent any disease. |
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Friday, 29 June 2007 17:01 |
Stingrays will eat a wide variety of foods. Maintaining a varied diet is extremely important in captive animals, as monocultural diets incur a risk of nutritional deficiencies. Stingrays are very active, and should be fed at least once a day, preferably twice or even three times daily. The daily diet can be varied in order to create some environmental enrichment as well as balanced nutrition for the rays.
First Foods
First foods for newly acquired rays should be blackworms or tubifex worms. These foods seem to be the most readily accepted, and are small enough to be inadvertently ingested either by mouth or through the spiracle, thereby giving the ray an opportunity to taste these possibly unfamiliar foods by chance. Foods that have been used for very small specimens, such as the teacup rays, are small insect larvae such as mosquito larvae, small shrimp known as ghost shrimp or glass shrimp, live adult brine shrimp, and blackworms. Chitinous foods such as shrimp provide less nutritional value than do soft-bodied foods, and so should not be used as sole food items.
The best way to be certain that your new stingray is feeding is to watch the spiracles as the ray passes over food on the bottom of the tank. If it is eating, you will see the spiracles opening and closing rapidly, or fluttering, as the food is ingested and water is passed from the mouth and out the spiracles. Once you observe a newly acquired ray readily feeding on black-worms or redworms introduce finely chopped night crawlers in small quantities. Once stingrays recognize these as food, most will readily eat them. Later, experiment with other types of food.
Types of Food
Live Foods
Feed live foods, including blackworms or tubifex worms, in quantities adequate to allow a small amount to be left in the tank so the rays can browse later. However, when cleaning the substrate, note whether a significant amount of living worms is present; blackworms and tubifex worms will colonize the substrate if not eaten and add to the nitrogenous waste production in the aquarium.
Nonlive, Nonaquatic Foods
Chopped earthworms, redworms, or night crawlers and any nonlive, nonaquatic foods should be fed in smaller quantities to prevent any overlooked food from decomposing in the tank. Keep in mind that stingrays have relatively small mouths-a 10-inch (25-cm) ray may have a mouth that is 1/2 to 3/4 inch (13 to 19 mm) wide, so chopped food items must be small enough to be eaten easily. If a ray ingests a piece of food and repeatedly spits it out and ingests it again, this usually indicates that the particle is too large. Some ray species, such as antenna rays, have extremely small mouths relative to their size.
Once acclimated, rays often develop techniques for eating larger pieces of food; for example, newly imported rays may have difficulty consuming even small chopped pieces of night crawlers. Eventually, however, they learn to eat an entire worm by sucking it into their oral cavity without chewing. Newly acquired rays also often ignore feeder goldfish but they quickly learn to chase down and consume feeders, even learning where they hide in the tank.
Commercially Prepared Foods
Stingrays may learn to eat other unfamiliar foods such as brine shrimp, pellet foods, or other commercially prepared foods. While there is probably no harm in offering these foods to rays, it is best to use fresh, live, or frozen foods as the dietary staple. Although stingrays often do not initially accept frozen or other nonliving foods, they may soon learn to eat these foods after they have been acclimated. A benefit of frozen foods is that they are less likely than live foods to introduce diseases or parasites.
Hand-feeding
Occasionally, a well-acclimated specimen will fail to gain weight, even though you are offering enough food. Several things may cause this problem; the most likely possibility is that it is not competing efficiently for food against other fish in the aquarium, or it may have a parasitic infestation. Stingrays occasionally do not seem to learn where foods can be found during feeding times, and are always in the wrong part of the tank during those times. In these cases, it is helpful to hand-feed such specimens. By this I do not mean feeding with your hands. Although some aquarists do this with stingrays, I do not recommend it because of the possibility of being accidentally stung. Remember that stingrays are wild animals, and no matter how accustomed your specimens become to your presence, it is impossible to always accurately predict their response to humans. Instead, you should always perform the hand-feeding of specimens with long forceps or a similar instrument. Stingrays generally avoid metal objects and appear to be frightened by metal; however, because they can sense metal, they will quickly learn that when there is a metal object in the aquarium, food is being offered. In this way, you can teach your stingray to feed directly from forceps, and selectively feed it more food.
Simply hold a night crawler (or a piece of night crawler) in the forceps, and hold the worm in the aquarium so that the ray can touch it with its fin. It should eat the worm immediately. After a few feedings in this manner, allow the forceps to touch the ray while it is eating the worm. It will quickly learn to associate the forceps with feeding and soon you will find that the ray will pounce on the forceps as soon as it touches it, eagerly looking for a treat!
How Much and How Often
The key to having well-fed stingrays in your aquarium is providing plenty of food. Unlike most fish that swim quietly between feedings, stingrays search constantly for food, looking under and around tank ornaments, moving driftwood, rocks, filters, and even other fish! This high activity level translates to a high metabolic rate, which means that while searching for food rays continue to burn energy. If they use up energy looking for food, but do not find any, they will lose weight. To compensate for this loss of energy, it is essential to provide adequate food. I cannot stress this enough. Hobbyists sometimes tell me that they feed their rays three times weekly, thinking that this is adequate. Stingrays should be fed at least twice, and usually three times, daily. In spite of these frequent feedings, rays will still constantly look for food between feedings!
When feeding significant quantities of live feeder goldfish, it is wise to add vitamin B1 to the feeder supply. Goldfish contain the enzyme thiaminase, which destroys thiamin, or vitamin B1, and this vitamin must be replenished. It should be your practice to add one 50-mg tablet to each 500 gallons (1893 L) of water every two weeks. You can add the tablets directly to the sump of the wet-dry filter; or as an alternative, the tablets can be added directly to the tank.
About the Author
Brendon Turner maintains The Animal Gazette - a weekly edition of helpful articles for pet owners. Visit AnimalGazette.com for information about cats, dog breeds and tropical fish. |
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