When I was a child, I often heard an adage passed from my grandmother had to my mother to "never feed a dog potatoes or it would give the dog "black tongue" ..." Many present day prescription and hypo-allergenic diets contain potatoes, so this notion has certainly been disproved. So how did this myth get started?

Does "people food" make your dog fat or finicky? .................

NO TABLE SCRAPS!

During the Great Depression many families scraped by, barely able to feed their human family members a nutritious diet, let alone share the "good stuff" with their dogs. Before the advent of the commercial dog food industry in the U.S. after World War II, the family dog was generally fed a daily meal consisting of "left overs" - many ate an unbalanced diet of whatever was left uneaten from the family dinner. This contained a lot of fat, gristle and skin but little actual meat, and a large percentage of starch in the form of left over potatoes and cereals. The result: many dogs suffered a niacin deficiency* resulting in pellegra or "black tongue" as well as other health problems, including bone and growth issues like rickets. You don't hear of many kids today stricken with rickets or scurvy, nor dogs with black tongue, because our knowledge of proper nutrition has thankfully improved, as has the availability and selection of foods for our families and our pets.

The advent of the commercial dog food industry may have been a blessing for undernourished animals of their day - but in the 50's & 60's commercial pet food sales took off more as a matter of convenience than of nutrition. Of course, today the billion dollar pet food industry is thriving and now takes up an entire aisle in the grocery store. Pet food stores are filled with foods designed for every size, age, and special dietary requirement imaginable! There is a huge range in the quality of foods on the shelves and pet owners are advised to do their homework.

But I thought I was only supposed to feed my dog "dog food?"

Dog food companies would like you to follow this rule - recommending that you not only feed only commercial dog food, but stick to their brand. Marketing is all about the bottom line. Greed, cutting corners and that "bottom line" are also what gets companies in trouble when pets are accidently poisoned by lower cost imported food ingredients.

Dogs who eat "table scraps" may be more likely to be overweight.
Yes, indeed, as are humans who eat too much and make unhealthy choices. If there's a bite for you and a bite for Fido at every meal in addition to his measured ration in his dish, he's going to get fat. Anything you add to your dog's diet must be subtracted from his total calories for the day. Fats and sugars and starches add up - so choose healthy training treats! As with ourselves and our children, empty calories and "junk food" should be kept to a minimum. Large amounts of table scraps high in fat may cause stomach upset or pancreatitis. This is about too much of a bad thing, not about "commercial dog food" vs "people food."

"If my dog eats table scraps he'll become finicky and won't eat his dog food."
Dogs who fill up on unhealthy snacks are just as likely to not have room for dinner as are children who eat cookies before dinner. If a dog steps back from his dish and the result is added gravy or a bit of meat stirred in to encourage eating, he will certainly repeat this behavior again tomorrow. Food refusal is learned. Dogs repeat what works.

Owners of obese pets report to their vets that they are feeding the prescribed amount, but still their dog is overweight. Their vet will certainly advise sticking to nothing but the restricted diet of low-cal dog food to get those pounds off, so as to eliminate any chance for indulging the pudgy pet with that bit of toast or uneaten crust from your pie! Calories count! In many cases it's just easier to tell Aunt Mabel to "stick to dog food" than to go into how bad it is for Fluffy to eat cake.

It isn't about "dog food" - it's about healthy nutrition and number of calories per day.
"Dog food" is just people food turned into meat flavored cereal and put in a bag. Dog "kibble" is cereal grains and dried meat scraps along with dairy products, with vitamins and minerals added to make up for those lost during the cooking process, ground together into a flour, blended with water and formed into a dough and baked.

Your bag of "expanded dry dog food" is made from raw grains, meat meal, vegetables, dairy products, vitamins and minerals mixed with steam inside a pressure cooker and pushed through a machine that forms it into nuggets and then it's baked again. The dried, hardened nugget is usually passed through a spray chamber and coated with a liquid fat, carbohydrate or milk product which increases palatability. Red artificial coloring reminds us of fresh meat. Those whose labels claim to have fresh vegetables may have green, orange or yellow colored nuggets. This isn't for the dog.

It's all food: meats, grains, vegetables.

The real difference between the meat in dog food and the meat on your dinner plate is quality. You buy high quality meat for your family. The chicken meat meal in your dog food might very well be beaks and feet or the meat of old tough birds no human would consider eating. Don't give your dog the gristle and fat you wouldn't eat either, but don't toss perfectly good, healthy training treats down the garbage disposal!

Many of the dog treats in the pet food aisle of your grocery store are the most expensive, unhealthy thing you probably feed your dog - full of sugars and artificial colors and preservatives. Select carefully.

No people food?
We know that fresh, whole foods are better for us than processed foods. Cut up that left-over lean turkey or roast beef into small cubes and put it in a container in the fridge for your next training session!

See also:
FIT OR FAT
FOODS & FEEDING
BEGGING
WORK TO EARN

Interesting articles:

History of Dog Food 01

The History of The Pet Food Industry

* Niacin deficiency causes poor appetitie, diarrhea, and weight loss. In the advanced cases dogs my develop pellegra or "black tongue" characterized by oral ulcers and necrosis of the tongue. The quantitative requirement for niacin is influenced by dietary tryptophan which can be metabolically converted to niacin. Most of the niacin in cereals is in a bound form and unavailable or only partly available to the animal. - "Animal Feeding & Nutrition" - Marshal H. Jurgens