Mindconnection Brainpower Informational eNewsletter 2023-03-19

Many of us with pets consider them to be members of our family. So let's talk about pet health.

Please make a note to watch this 1 hour, 11 minute documentary: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x6LKP9Prfrs. The title is Pet Fooled, which is a play on the words pet food. It backs what I have been saying and practicing for many years.

You may recall that I've spoken out against including wheat, corn, or soy in your diet. That includes products derived from them. All three of these grains are contaminated with a powerful neurotoxin (glyphosate). The first two on the list have also been bred to have very large endosperms; their effect on your endocrine system is on par with that of processed table sugar.

Before World War II, or "The War" as my parents' generation called it, people who didn't make meals specifically for their pets often bought "dog food" or "cat food" in cans. Alpo is a famous brand, and for dogs it's basically a meat and veggie stew. During The War, the metal used to make those cans was needed for the war effort. So pet food manufacturers could not get metal for their cans. They needed something that could be put into a paper bag. Not plastic, which is a petroleum product, but paper. The obvious solution was to bake something and kibble was the answer. Kibble could be extruded into nuggets or other shapes and baked into bite-sized lumps.

There were (are) several problems with kibble, for example:

To make it bakeable, wheat flour was preferred. Much easier to work with than something healthy. But corn was even cheaper, so it was preferred even over wheat. This instantly made kibble both affordable and extremely costly. It was affordable to buy, but the resulting vet bills weren't cheap. Few people connected the dots, and few do even to this day. Huge mistake.
It had to be very dry, so it would keep. You couldn't make it like Keebler's moist and chewy cookies. It also needed to be dry so an animal would crunch it up instead of try to swallow something doughy and choke on it. This dryness meant that cats fed a diet that's exclusively or even mostly kibble would die from renal failure at around age 12.
Making it dry and giving it a shelf life when packed in porous paper also meant not including essential oils and healthy fats. So fat soluble vitamins weren't absorbed. Nerve damage and brain damage also became normal.

How to use kibble:

Buy only the best. Read the ingredients panel online (you can't read it on the package without a big magnifying glass, and who wants to carry that around in a store?). Eliminate from consideration any formulation that contains any wheat, corn, soy, corn syrup, sugar, safflower oil, vegetable oil, or canola oil (all of these are highly toxic). If any kind of meat byproduct is on the list, make sure it's far down the list. Look for ingredients that you personally would not mind eating. If you cannot determine what is in the kibble, then don't buy it. Please note that package claims are usually bald-faced lies; only the ingredients panel should be considered.
Buy the smallest bag offered. Else, you will be feeding your pet stale kibble.
When you get it home, transfer from the bag to an airtight container.
Use it to supplement the regular diet. Leave a small plate or bowl of it readily accessible to your pet. This way, if Fido gets the midnight munchies he has something to munch on.

What to feed your pet:

High quality canned food makes a good base for the general diet. As with kibble, you have to carefully read the ingredients panel. Once you open a can, transfer its ingredients to a sealable glass container (if you don't have a suitable one, buy a 3-pack of them at your grocery store).
For cats, the canned food is typically too dry. When you transfer to a bowl, add water, raw egg, or (organic) chicken broth to make a puree (not a soup). Your cat's kidneys will thank you, but also you will see less choking and vomiting.
Dogs tend to do well with meat and veggies on a bed of rice. Experiment to see what your dog(s) will eat. Buy high quality rice, it makes a difference. Most dogs love sweet potatoes, which are a nutritional bonanza. Pumpkin is, too. Cats are similar in this regard, but the meal needs to be more meat-heavy than for dogs. Cats love tuna, but use it infrequently due to the mercury in it. Same for salmon.
Raw eggs are good, if you are buying them from Amish farms or other sources that produce a similar quality. If unsure, you can try scrambling an egg using butter or lard on the pan.
If your cat loves to hunt, don't discourage that behavior too much. Chipmunks, rabbits, snakes, toads, mice, moles, and voles are excellent nutrition for cats. Wiping out songbird populations is a cat problem that makes many people hate cats, and you can reduce this behavior by providing good wet meals for your cat. Who will still hunt, just not as much.

How to wet feed your pet:

When feeding your pet "wet" (real) food, don't just fill a bowl and come back later. That is gross. Instead, provide an appropriate serving (for example, a teaspoon or two at a time for a small cat) and wait while they eat it. Then remove the bowl or whatever dish for washing (don't leave it there to be re-used, that's disgusting).
If your pet follows you into the kitchen, that's a clue he or she wants to be fed. Take a few minutes to make that happen. You can do what you came to do and perhaps wait a few minutes for your pet to finish. As much time as most people waste on (anti) social media or filling out surveys, making this small accommodation for a beloved pet isn't too much to ask.

Watering your pet:

Many people conclude that if they put out a bowl of water, their pet will drink enough to be adequately hydrated. That is not the case. Early one morning, pour yourself a cup of water. Take a few sips. Then let it sit until afternoon. Now just smell the water. Gross. This is what most pets are expected to endure.
Treat the water like wet food, except you can leave it there for an hour or so. And you can leave a bowl overnight.
Cats are notoriously difficult to hydrate. In the wild, they get much of their hydration from eating the blood and guts of their prey. They don't like drinking from containers. Some cats will use a pet fountain, and some will "adopt" a particular faucet as theirs to drink from. A bathroom faucet is fine, but don't allow this for a kitchen faucet (the reasons are legion).

Inject your pet?

If your cat does go outside to hunt, there are many risks to consider so make a list of all of them and have a plan to eliminate, reduce, or mitigate each one. For example, protect your cat from ringworm, ticks, fleas, and heartworm with a topical medication for that purpose.
Feline leukemia is another risk, but it's questionable whether annual vaccine shots for it are appropriate. Here is why. If a virus is fast-mutating, no vaccine will protect against it (exactly what we found with the Covid "vaccine" scam). If it is slow-mutating, the antibodies from a single vaccination will be sufficient for many years.
How many years? Well, we get the polio shot only once and we get the vaccine for measles and rubella only once. But for tetanus, a booster is recommended every ten years.
If you get a vaccine too often, the body's immune system develops a tolerance for it the same way it develops a tolerance for allergens if you get on a program of allergy shots.
If you ask your vet, you will get an opinion rather than fact-based advice. Most municipalities require a rabies shot either every year (bad idea) or every three if you get the three year shot (which is apparently the same as the one-year shot but just more, go figure).
You can play with all of these numbers in your head and come up with something. I've decided no more vaccines for my pet other than what is legally required because I don't want my pet's immune system compromised and I personally don't get vaccines anymore either (flu shots are stupid, think about it). She does get the topical medication, because she goes outdoors; but its efficacy doesn't depend on her not developing a tolerance for it.

Mindconnection eNL, 2023-03-19

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