Let’s face it, choosing the best food for your furry friend can be a real nightmare. While it can be pretty easy to choose healthy foods for yourself by deciphering nutritional facts on food labels, that may not be the case when it comes to pet food products.
Every single pet food producer wants you to believe their foods are the best for your dog. And they spend lots of time and money on marketing to convince you to believe that. Of course, most dog foods aren’t very good, so the producers have to get creative with their labeling to make you believe otherwise.
The health of your best friend is completely your responsibility. That’s the reason you need to take the time to scrutinize the labels to be sure of what you are feeding your dog with. In this blog, we will be showing you some surprising food label tricks that most pet food companies use to distract you from the real truth.
Food Label Tricks You Likely Don’t Know About
#1: The first ingredients aren’t the main ingredients
That an ingredient is listed first on the food label doesn’t mean it is the main ingredient in the food. Everyone wants the best food for their dogs, and so we are always searching for a real meat source whenever we pick up a product to look at its label. Pet food companies also know this. So they came up with a trick to confuse you, using the “ingredient splitting” trick.
Ingredient splitting is manipulating the ingredient list by listing the ingredients in various composite parts. They do this to trick consumers that are simply scanning the label for that premiere protein. For instance, a product label that contains 20% meat and 80% starches could have its food label looking like:
Beef (10%), beef heart (10%), potato (10%), white rice (10%), pea protein (10%), brown rice (10%), potato starch (10%), English peas (10%), long grain rice (10%), split peas (10%).
While ingredient splitting is not necessarily a sign that the food is bad, it is a trick to confuse you about what is really in the food you want to buy. And coupled with other red flags, ingredient splitting could be a sign that the food is not as good as it looks at first glance.
#2: Natural dog foods don’t account for the chemicals
The word “natural” is used to refer to a product that has no artificial ingredients or added color. But that doesn’t mean such food product doesn’t contain additives like growth hormones, antibiotics, or other chemicals which PFI doesn’t legally define as artificial.
Whether your dog food label reads “natural” or “all-natural”, the truth is, there is legally no real difference between the two.
#3: “Human grade” in pet foods doesn’t represent its nutritious value
Human grade is simply telling you that the product is safe for human consumption but says nothing about its nutritious value. For a product to be really human-grade, it has to pay more attention to its safety and quality – made with 100% food ingredients and human-grade supplements.
Unfortunately, most pet food companies that tag their products “Human-grade” do that based only on how the food is cooked. Even without such a label, a wide range of dog food, including kibbles, are safe for humans to try and eat. Even though it won’t be palatable, a human won’t die if they try to taste such food.
So, even if you have “human grade” written boldly on your dog food, it doesn’t make it more nutritious. That tag has nothing to do with its nutritious value at all – but more with its cooking process.
#4: “Grain-free” products are not necessarily low-carb
While a product reading “Sans-grain” is technically free of wheat, oats, corn, soy, and barley, a product reading grain-free is not necessarily low carb. In fact, grain-free dog foods tend to contain just as much carbs as dog foods made with grains. Most of such foods use high-starch items like potatoes to replace grain.
Carbs aren’t bad, but they need to be fed in moderation. Having too much carbs in your dog’s food can disrupt digestion and cause unnecessary weight gain for your dog.
#5: 100% Organic
It is not uncommon to see some products try to use the word “organic” to represent the actual nutritional information of the product. But the truth is that many of these products branded “organic” are highly processed, and most of the ingredients used in them already lost their nutritional integrity before the food reaches your dog’s bowl.
But really, why call a product organic when in the real sense, you and your dog aren’t expected to be eating anything other than organic? For a food product to be called organic, it means it is made without the use of any chemicals, artificial growth hormones, antibiotics, artificial sweeteners, sewage sludge, pesticides, and fertilizers.
Therefore, there is no point in labeling such a product “organic” again. It should really just be called “food.”
#6: “Made with organic ingredients” is trickier than you thought
This is another common trick used by dog food companies. It is very similar to the “with” trick mentioned earlier. When you see any food label saying “made with organic ingredients,” that means a large portion of the ingredients should be organic. But in the real sense, many of these products are still highly processed.
For instance, a kibble labeled “100% organic” or “made with organic ingredients” may not be completely saying the truth. Kibbles are exposed to heat and moisture during extrusion – the process through which kibbles are made. That means much of its nutritional benefits must have been lost during processing before it finally lands in your dog’s bowl.
#7: Grass-fed
What comes to your mind when you see the word “grass-fed” on food labels? Free-range livestock, right? But that is not completely accurate. Cows can be grass-fed and still contained, and only let out to graze once in a while. While certain bodies tend to be doing well with regulating how the term is used on food labels, it is not doing enough when it comes to regulating how, in practice, these animals are actually fed.
#8: Feed-grade
Do you remember what we said about human-grade products? They are pet food products that humans can consume without bringing any harm to them – even though they may not be palatable. But food labeled feed-grade is not suitable for human consumption. In the real sense, any ingredient is suitable to be called feed-grade product, including dead animals from farms, waste, ranches, and many more.
Most products with this label are not held to food safety standards. However, some of them use high-quality ingredients in their foods, but there is no way to tell the quality of ingredients used in feed-grade products.
#9: “Meat flavor” may not contain any meat
Have you ever come across a dog food that has “meat flavor” on them? Yes, some of them even come with a picture of fresh-cut beef or chicken to trick you to think that there is meat in the diet. Unfortunately, most of these products may actually not contain any beef in them. In fact, you may not find beef listed as one of the ingredients on their ingredient list.
So if your dog’s food says flavor, don’t work yourself out expecting it to contain that meat or any meat at all.
#10: Meat meals may be by-products
Don’t be too excited when you see “meat meal” on your food label. It may just be meat culled from leftover animal by-products, such as feathers, hooves, bones, or teeth. Food companies boil these by-products before turning them into powder form.
Therefore, if your dog food doesn’t particularly identify the meat source in their label, chances are that the meat used is low-quality. The same thing is applicable when you find the word “by-product” on the label.
The pet food industry is full of manufacturers that will do everything to trick you into buying their products. The health of your little pup is your responsibility, and so you need to be sure you are buying the right food product from the right company. Hope these tips helped!
