Through my years as a pet nutritionist, the number one reason I have found pet parents to be adverse to starting their pet's on a balanced raw meat diet, which is the top healthiest diets for our cats, was due to the fear of bacterial contamination of the meat to make their pet's sick.  As with many things in life, I find that when we can share information and people understand the facts it often takes away much of the fear.  

Therefore, I am happy to take this opportunity to share with you the reasons why your pet's GI system is built to digest raw meat and keep them safe and healthy while doing so!

• Our cat's and dogs intestinal tract from the esophagus to the colon is actually very short with cats averaging only 3 feet in length and dogs 3 to 14 feet opposed to humans average of 22 feet. 
• This shorter GI system allows the actual transit rates, the time it takes from when our pet's eat their food, until the time the food is fully digested and waste is excreted to be much shorter than compared to us humans.  It takes only 6-8 hours transit time for dogs, and 10-14 hours for cats as opposed to 20-30 hours in us humans.  
• The less time the raw food actually spends in the digestion process the much greater risk of any food borne illness even if the meat has any pathogens. 
• The final point to consider is the PH of the pet's stomach acid which is very acidic, more so than us humans averaging around 1-1.5 PH versus humans 1.5 - 3.5 PH.  This extremely acidic stomach acid is ideal for both breaking down the tough fibers of the raw meat as well as neutralizing any pathogens contained in the meat which may be harmful like salmonella or ecoli.  

The fact is that our pet's GI system is not only made for eating raw meat, but the only way eating raw meat is unsafe for our pet's is if it is not deep frozen for at least 7 days prior to feeding and if your pet is currently ill; and many many pet's fall ill in fact from eating highly processed cooked foods which are not made for their bodies creating a breakdown of the function of the GI system. 

So if your pet is healthy today, make the switch to a properly balanced home-made raw diet, or a commercially made raw diet.  If your pet is ill at the moment switch first to a fresh cooked diet then when they have regained health, switch slowly to a frozen raw diet.  

Download our FREE home-made pet food instruction guide HERE along with links to purchase the necessary balancer vitamin supplements. 

Also find links to my top recommended fresh-cooked and frozen raw diets HERE.  

Keep those pet's healthy and happy everyone!  

~PetCoachApril

April Arguin A.S., C.P.N., M.P.H.