Protein Sources Used in Commercial Pet Food

The truth about pet foods.  Did you know?

The following ingredients is what AAFCO defines and allows in commercially made pet foods.  Meat, Poultry and Fish Sources used in Commercial Pet Foods.

Meat:  The AAFCO defines "meat" as the clean flesh derived from slaughtered mammals. This mammal flesh is limited to the part of the striate muscle that is skeletal or what is found in the tongue, diaphragm, heart, or esophagus.
Meat Meal: AAFCO defines "meat meal" as the rendered product from a mammal tissue exclusive of blood, hair, hoof, hide, trimmings, manure, stomach, and rumen contents except in such amounts as may occur unavoidable in good processing practices. (rumen is the first stomach, also called the cud, of a cud-chewing animal.)
Poultry-by-product meal:  This consists of ground, rendered, clean parts of slaughtered poultry, including necks, feet, underdeveloped eggs, and intestines, exclusive of feathers, except in such amounts as might occur unavoidably in good processing practices.
Poultry-hatchery by-product: This ingredient can include a mixture of eggshells, infertile and unhatched eggs, and culled chicks that have been cooked, dried, and ground, with or without removal of part of the fat.
Poultry by-products: This can include nonrendered clean parts of slaughtered poultry such as heads, feet, and viscera, free of fecal content and foreign matter except in such trace amounts as might occur unavoidably in good factory practice.
Hydrolyzed poultry feather: AAFCO considers this another source of protein- not digestible protein but protein nonetheless.
Fish: If you live with a cat, just open a can of food that contains fish and watch kitty come running.  The parts used are fish heads, tails, fins, bones, and viscera.  If the label lists "fish", this means that the fish parts come directly from the fish processing plants and do not go through the rendering process.  R.L. Wysong, DVM, states that because the entire fish is not used for most commercial pet foods, it does not contain many of the fat soluble vitamins, minerals, and omega-3 fatty acids necessary for good nutrition.  When the entire fish is used for commercial pet food, oftentimes it is because the fish contains high levels of mercury or other toxin making it unfit for human consumption.
Fish meal: This product is created by rendering residue from the fish processing plants and might include heads, tails, innards, and blood.  Fish meal is generally higher in protein quality then meat and bone meal.
Hydrolyzed hair: Is made from clean hair treated by heat and pressure to produce a product suitable for animal feeding.  This includes the hair from cattle, horses, pigs, or other animals who have been slaughtered.
Sprayed-dried animal blood:  Is produced from clean, fresh animal blood, exclusive of all extraneous material such as hair, stomach belching (contents of stomach), and urine.
Dehydrated food-waste: Is any and all animal and vegetable produce picked up from basic food processing sources or institutions, including garbage from hospitals, restaurants. and grocery stores.
Dehydrated garbage: Is composed of artificially dried animal and vegetable waste collected frequently so that harmful decomposition has not set in.
Dehydrated paunch products:  (ingested food and water) are composed of the contents of the rumen of slaughtered cattle, dehydrated.  Such dehydration is designed to destroy any pathogenic bacteria.
Dried poultry waste: Is an animal waste product composed primarily of processed ruminant excreta that has been artificially dehydrated to a moisture content not in excess of 15 percent.  According to the AAFCO, "It shall contain not less than 12 percent crude protein, not more that 40 percent crude fiber, including straw, wood shaving.
Dried swine waste: is an animal waste product composed primarily of swine excreta that has been artificially dehydrated.
Undried processed animal waste product: is composed of excreta, with or without the litter (litter is the ground covering in the chicken pens) from poultry, ruminants, or any other animal except humans.  As quoted by: Ann N. Martin (Author of Food Pets Die For). 

What's in your pet's food?

Compare what you are now feeding your pet with the ingredients of the safe and healthy choice of Life's Abundance.  Visit our websites to compare your brand with Life's Abundance.
Life's Healthy Pet Food ( Life's Abundance Pet Foods) is a Holistic Veterinarian formulated pet food and is made in small batches so you receive it on your door step within 4 to 6 years of being produced.   Dr. Jane personally selects all ingredients being used in her foods and is proud to have never been involved in any pet food recall in 14 years.


Start your pet's on a healthy, safe and nutritional pet foods, supplements, treats and grooming needs today.  Visit Life's Healthy Pet Food @ www.lifeshealthypetfood.com or Doggies Unlimited @ www.doggiesunlimited.com.