Thirty years ago, a vet told Susan Thixton that dog food had given her dog bone cancer, and the dog had two weeks to live.  "That day changed my life," she said. She dove into researching pet food, and found an industry doing its best to keep its practices opaque to pet owners. Too often, she discovered, we are literally feeding our dogs garbage. In the decades since, Susan has become a full time blogger on the subject and a consumer advocate, lobbying to try to improve the quality of the food we feed our pets. She and Annie discuss the difference the precise definitions of terms like "food" and "feed,"  "with" and "meal," and Susan reveals what she feels is the single most important thing to look for when selecting a pet food. This episode may forever change how you think about dog food. 

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Notes: 

This conversation was recorded as a webinar, a replay of which can be found here.

TruthAboutPetFood.com: What is feed grade and human grade pet food? Learn the differences.

TruthAboutPetFood.com: Pet food ingredients differ from human food ingredients.

TruthAboutPetFood.com: Learn how to add some real food to your pet’s diet.

TruthAboutPetFood.com: 2020 List Of Preferred Foods

Association For Truth In Pet Food

Dr. Becker's Real Food For Healthy Dogs & Cats

PlanetPaws.ca's food recipes

Pet Food Politics: The Chihuahua In The Coal Mine by Marion Nestle

Dr. Judy Morgan's naturally healthy Pets Recipes

EvermorePetFood.com

BalanceIt.com 

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Partial Transcript:

Annie:

Hello, Sue, why don't you just go ahead and introduce yourself.



Susan Thixton:



I'm Susan Thixton. I run the website TruthAboutPetFood.com, and run a consumer stakeholder organization association for truth in pet food, providing food consumers with a voice at pet food regulatory meetings, and with FDA, when they choose to listen to us.  It's strictly their ballgame and sometimes they listen to us and sometimes they don't.

Annie:



Now I first found you through your blog Truth About Pet Food. Did the associations start the blog or vice versa?

Susan:



Truth About Pet Food started first and I was going to AFCO meetings and wanted to ask them for an advisory position to where, you know, I could give them consumer opinion more than just being in the audience. And they denied me year after year. And when a president, former president, finally went off the board of directors, he told me that the trick is we didn't want a blogger to be an advisor to AFCO.



Full Transcript available at SchoolfortheDogs.com/Podcasts/

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