Tigertail Foods is a wholistic pet food and treat company. We use only human-grade
ingredients that come
from trusted sources.
Your pet's health is our first
concern and everything we make is motivated by
the principle
that healthy food helps make healthy pets.
Health Matters
March 1, 2010
In the last couple of years the pet food industry has experienced an explosion of new products labeled and marketed as "natural", "holistic", "organic", and "human grade". It all sounds good, and as loving pet owners who want to feed our dogs and cats the best food we can afford. We consider the cans and bags that show beautiful, bountiful harvests, checkercloth tables loaded with veggies and meats that promise optimum health can be achieved with their products. Can we trust that the stuff inside is as good as the label looks? Maybe. It depends on what the label actually says. As we found out this month, the regulations for what a manufacturer can and can not say about its food depends on what's being said and where that claim is being made -- and while we are not saying that companies lie about the quality of their products, their marketing claims can certainly be misleading. Read on and be forearmed with the knowledge to make the best decision next time you go shopping for pet food.
*Standard disclaimer: while we will offer our opinions about how to best achieve optimum health for our animals, we do NOT profess to know what is better for your pet than you or your vet do! Always consult with your vet, then consult with another vet and get a second opinion (because we also believe in having options!).
Pet Food -
Natural, Human Grade, Holistic, Organic. . . What Does It All Mean?
When I was a kid everybody ate organic food. Food was defined as consumable organic matter. Life was a lot simpler; there was “animal, mineral, or vegetable.” Plastic was new and nanotechnology was unheard of. How far we’ve come!! For better or worse, our food supply has changed. Today we have genetically engineered foods, freeze dried meals, and recently a big surge in organic food. Our pets have suffered the same fate with the introduction of dry food (kibble), canned, and semi-moist meals. And recently natural, human grade, holistic and organic pet foods have become the rage. That is the difference between these four types of pet foods? What are we really talking about?
Neither the government nor AAFCO have a standard set of definitions for the terms “natural,” “human grade,” “holistic,” or “organic.” Let’s look at each term so that we understand the differences.
A. Natural
Because the federal government has never defined the term “natural” for human food, this term may mean whatever the manufacturer says it does. However, AAFCO (the Association of American Feed Control Officials) does have a definition relating to pet food: Natural: A feed or ingredient derived solely from plant, animal or mined sources, either in its unprocessed state or having been subject to physical processing, heat processing, rendering, purification, extraction, hydrolysis, enzymolysis or fermentation, but not having been produced by or subject to a chemically synthetic process and not containing any additives or processing aids that are chemically synthetic except in amounts as may occur unavoidably in good manufacturing processes.
This means that you can process the food until it is no longer recognizable as being a food product and it is considered “natural” as long as you haven’t added anything synthetic ~~ unless, of course, you “had” to. AAFCO also says that the term “natural” must not mislead: if it appears on the label, every ingredient in the finished product must meet the definition. But AAFCO knows that this is misleading because pet food companies are allowed to, through an exception to this regulation, buy vitamins, minerals, and other additives from overseas factories where quality controls are sometimes nonexistent. I guess they “had” to.
B. Human Quality
The FDA and USDA have strict requirements for producing, processing, and transporting foods suitable for consumption by humans, and every producer of the ingredients is licensed to perform those tasks.
AAFCO does not have an official definition of the term “human quality” and without such a definition, AAFCO members are not supposed to use the term on pet food labels. AAFCO says that the term “human-grade” is false and misleading, and constitutes misbranding, unless every ingredient in the product, and every processing method, meets FDA and USDA requirements for people food. However, that does not stop pet food makers from using the term, if not on their labels, then in their marketing and advertising campaigns.
C. Holistic
Neither the USDA nor AAFCO recognize, address, nor define the term holistic. The American Heritage Dictionary defines holistic as 1) Of or pertaining to holism. 2a) Emphasizing the importance of the whole and the interdependence of its parts. Random House dictionary adds this: … “and usually involving nutritional measures.” There is nothing to quantify in this term. However, the idea behind holistic diets is to use whole foods that are processed as little as possible to retain nutrients that are usually lost during processing. Holistic diets depend on their ingredients’ inherent vitamin, mineral, and antioxidant content to produce a healthy diet. Basically it is the belief that you can’t improve on Mother Nature and that you are what you eat. Holistic diets consider all of your pet’s needs with proper nutrition providing everything he needs for healthy skin, coat, teeth, eyes, skeletal development, immune system, and disease prevention. Sadly, because there is no standard definition, the term has become an overworked, touchy-feely marketing term that is used to appeal to the consumer.
D. Organic
For human foods, “organic” has a precise meaning defined by the USDA’s National Organic Program (NOP). The USDA defines organic not only as a product but also the method of growing, the environmental care, and transportation to market. Organic fruits and vegetables are grown in fields that haven’t been treated with pesticides or artificial fertilizers for three years. The crops must be rotated to replenish the soil and the crops must be transported to market untreated in a careful and timely fashion. Organic animals used for food are not treated with antibiotics or hormones and come from free range farms. No irradiation is used either on the meat or vegetables.
To be certified as organic, plant ingredients in pet foods must be grown without pesticides, artificial fertilizers, genetic modification, irradiation or sewage sludge. Animal ingredients must come from animals raised on organic feed, given access to the outdoors, and not treated with antibiotics or hormones. Producers must be certified by third party inspectors to make sure they adhere to these standards. These inspectors may come from either federal, state or private party accredited organic inspectors.
E. Organic vs. certified organic
There is a major difference between labeling products as “organic” and “certified organic.” It is the certification by the independent agent that designates the product as truly being organic. There are brands of pet food that incorporate the word organic in their names and use it in their advertising material but don’t have the NOP certification. If you really want organic for your pet or yourself, be sure the label bears the “certified organic” logo. If it doesn't, the term organic is only being used as a marketing ploy to help justify higher prices and convince the consumer the product is healthier than it really is.
So what is a pet parent supposed to do? How do we decide which claims or type of pet food is best for our companions? Is one type of food safer? Better quality? As we’ve discussed, “natural” and “holistic” have no meaning to the USDA and “human quality” and “holistic" have no meaning to AAFCO. That leaves us with “natural” and “organic” when choosing our pet’s food. Natural, while being defined, allows more wiggle room than a boa at a fire dance. AAFCO allows room in almost every description and definition for GRAS. GRAS stands for generally recognized as safe ~~ both ingredients and practices. That leaves quite a bit of latitude for the manufacturers to circumvent inconvenient and costly requirements. “Organic” is “natural” plus much more stringent regulations because it is based on the rules governing food for people. Therefore, it is safe to conclude that certified organic is probably better quality than just natural. However, the flip side to this statement is that organic doesn't guarantee healthy, safe food products. If you remember the spinach scare a couple of years ago, the culprit was spinach grown in a certified organic field. In Germany, their first case of mad-cow disease was identified in a slaughterhouse specializing in organic beef.
Today you can buy organic kibble, organic canned pet food, and organic raw dog and cat food. Organic food is marketed and advertised with a certain down-home snobbery and elitism. Here are a few examples, "Know Your Farmer, Know Your Food," “Organic farming. Good for nature, good for me,” and “Organic farming. In nature we trust.” By buying organic, you’re showing everyone that you care about yourself, your family, your environment, and the world! The message with organic pet food is basically, “Your dog/cat is your best friend, he deserves the best, feed him what you eat.”
Organic sounds wonderful, but it is expensive and probably not necessary for most of our pets. It is marketed to us based on our love for our furchildren and guilt in not being with them constantly. It makes sense to feed our beloved pets a species appropriate diet as close as possible to what mother nature designed them to eat. It makes sense to feed organic IF your dog has a special condition where exposure to normal human quality (USDA approved for humans) food might be detrimental to his health.
Natural dog food is better than most of the bag/can products sold in markets and big box stores. It may not be the very best, but at least you’re assured that the ingredients are real food, not created in a laboratory. The designation means that only the vitamins, minerals, and supplements are man-made. The problem with this is that if the food were not so over-processed it would still have all the natural vitamins and minerals in it and there would be no need to add in anything artificial. But the fact that the manufacturers have to add these supplements tells us that the food, while natural, wasn’t of the best quality to begin with and/or has been processed beyond all recognition.
The term “holistic” has gone from meaning that the food takes into account the whole body’s needs for proper nutrition to being a marketing tool for most brands. Unfortunately, it is difficult to find out what each company means when it uses the word to describe its food. Are they appealing to your consumer conscience or are they truly making a whole food filled with naturally intact vitamins and minerals.
Here at Tigertail Foods we make natural, human grade, holistic dog and cat food. We use the term “Wholistic", adding the W to emphasize that we use whole real food ingredients and a diet formulated to nourish the entire body, not just satisfy the stomach. We do this because we believe that the better quality food our pets eat, the longer they will live healthier lives. Although we buy USDA products grown only in the US, and as locally grown in their natural state as possible, our food is NOT organic because we don’t believe that the added expense is justified by any scientific proof that organic food is better than human quality. Taking into consider species appropriateness (ex. no chocolate, onions for them/raw meat for us), we believe that if it isn't healthy for humans, it isn't safe for our pets either.
