Is There Horse Meat In Pet Food?

"It's all the same, pet food isn't it?"

This is something that we frequently hear in the consulting room, but I'm afraid we have to contradict. Pet foods are not all the same. At a time when we are becoming concerned about what is found unexpectedly in human food, we should have similar concerns about pet food. If a human food which claims to be beef, actually contains horse, then what is in pet food?

One of the best ways to guarantee a good quality pet food is to go for a food which is made to a "fixed formula" rather than an "open formula." Buying a fixed formula food means that the food will contain exactly what it says on the bag or tin and will not change this from batch to batch.

Open formula food will have the same approximate nutritional value, but will change the ingredients from batch to batch depending on what is cheaper. This is why, when you look at many pet foods, their ingredient label will say "meat and meat derivatives." This could be venison one week and lamb the next. Many dogs and cats with food allergies or insensitivities will suddenly develop problems, even though the owner has not changed anything at home. Well, they may not have changed the food, but the food could have changed despite being sold in the same bag.

Many of the good quality pet foods often use only ingredients which are fit for human consumption, meaning that we could safely eat them too. Cheaper foods use cheaper ingredients, which may not be as good for your pet.

Cost per bag can be deceptive. The good quality foods may be more expensive per bag, but because they are made of good quality ingredients and have a high nutrient density, you need to feed less food per daily. This means they that they may work out the same price, or are only slightly more expensive per day than the cheaper, poorer quality foods.

Food for thought?

There's a great blog about food on another veterinary site at http://303animalclinic.com/tag/fixed-formula/

Zoe and Foxy At The Royal Welsh Show

Meet Foxy she’s a 3 year old Warmblood x Welsh mare. I’ve owned her for over a year now and I suppose she is what you would call an impulse buy (though rather an expensive one I will admit) as I didn’t set out to buy a horse when I got her even though she is exactly the type of horse I've always wanted.

Being so young I wasn’t able to start breaking her in until this year so we tried our luck at some local level inhand showing with great success getting many wins and championship placings. When it came to breaking her in I had afew setbacks finding a saddle that fitted, Being quite a chunky horse normal saddles slipped round her belly with the slightest movement and doing it without one wasn’t an option I discovered when I kept bouncing straight off her back (a problem Foxy quickly learnt she could take full advantage of meaning I spent more time bouncing off then staying on!) though 

I eventually managed to find one designed specifically for horses of her build and after one more failed attempt at bouncing me off she took to her work like a pro progressing so quickly she is now backed, walking and trotting and getting better everyday but I’ll talk more about that another time. She is still competing this year and our big aim was the Royal Welsh show which we attended on Monday 23rd July. We went there with low expectations knowing the standard would be very high and not knowing how she would behave after her last show a few weeks before where she disgraced herself misbehaving in both her classes, She has quite a feisty attitude when she wants to!

We arrived Sunday night and after a mishap with a broken stable door got her settled in for the night. 5.30am Monday morning we went for a walk around the warm up arena by her ring to give her chance to take in the atmosphere. she had never been to anything that big before and I was expecting fireworks from her when she saw all the tents and everything else but I was pleasantly surprised by how easily she accepted it all only getting a little bit wound up near the end (though I think she was showing off for the Shetland pony stallion that turned up to share the warm-up with her after a while).

By 8.30am she was in the ring with the 14 others in her class and I could hardly watch expecting her to show her feisty side at any minute but it seems she set out to prove me wrong because she was perfectly behaved and got an amazing 4th place! I couldn’t have been more proud!!

She spent the rest of the day relaxing in her stable being thoroughly spoilt (I apologize to whoever had stable 502 after us because of the big hole she thought it would be fun to dig complete with water from her water bucket in front of the stable door! maybe she thought someone would steal her now she’s a big prize winner so decided to protect herself with a moat who knows? strange horse)

After such a huge success everyone is expecting big things from her next year when she starts her ridden competitive career though I think it might be a few years till we are back at the Royal Welsh, though again she might surprise me! I’ll keep you posted…

Zoe and Foxy

I Went To The Olympics

I apologise if you're sick of the olympics, but I'm really excited about them and watching as much as I can every evening, so please bear with me. I'm particularly thrilled with the olympics, because I actually got to see a live olympic event, which was amazing.

I'd tried to get tickets in every round for the ballot and failed. I wanted to go and see the cross country phase of the three day eventing at Greenwich, but I guess every other horse mad girl in the country did as well. Needless to say I was unsuccessful.

Eventually in the final free-for-all, I got tickets. To what? Beach Volleyball. Why? Well it came down to a straight choice between beach volleyball and canoeing, because we had a limited number of days we could have go. We decided that it would be more fun to go and see something in the centre of London than out in the countryside, so we chose beach volleyball (a sport I knew next to nothing about).

We drove to London on Saturday morning, listening to the cycling road race – poor Mark Cavendish, I was so hoping he would win. Checking into our hotel, we used the nine zone travel card which came with the tickets to see a little bit of London. One of the cultural events was the creation of a scale model of Stonehenge as a bouncy castle and last weekend it was in a London park. I went, I saw, I bounced – it was great fun.

We caught the tube back to central London and walked down the Mall. That was a terrific view – olympic and union flags lining the Mall down to Buckingham Palace, where the cycling road race had finished just a few hours before. 

The beach volleyball stadium was build in 30 days flat in Horseguards Parade; where they troop the colour. It seemed to be made entirely out of very thin scaffolding, but had great views and surprisingly comfortable seats! We and thousands of other people went through the very slick airport type security – bag x rays, metal detectors etc in about 10 minutes and into the holding park.

The atmosphere was fantastic – everyone else there seemed to know as little about beach volleyball as we did, but there was a very helpful explanation from a commentator at the start. We watched four games; two mens and two ladies , with music booming, a compere geeing the crowd up every so often and a troupe of dancers coming out in any gaps or dull moments.

By luck, we had a match between Australia and USA ladies (both medal winning teams in the past), who were incredibly skilled, with some amazing rallies.

Night fell and you could see the London Eye over the top of the buildings. It looked fantastic.

There were some empty seats in the olympic officials area, but most of the stadium was packed (except when people were in the queue for the bar or food). Everyone there was having a great time and in the same way as the great six nations games, there were fans of every nationality sitting side by side. It was a fantastic day and a truly memorable experience. 

Well done Great Britain. I think we can be really proud.

A word from our veterinary nurse student, Laura

Hi, I'm Laura, and I'm one of the student vet nurses here at Ash Vets. I'm currently studying Veterinary Nursing at Harper Adams University College, which is based in Newport, Shropshire. It's a 3 year course, which includes 60 weeks of placement in a veterinary practice, which I'm undertaking here.



As a student veterinary nurse, I help the rest of the nursing team and the vets within the practice carry out daily activities such as looking after the animals, general cleaning, and helping out on reception. I’m also learning more advanced nursing duties such as preparing intravenous drips and monitoring anaesthetics – all under the watchful eyes of everyone in practice!


I will be starting my second year of the course in September, and we will be doing modules such as anaesthesia and surgery, radiography and wildlife care. I have already learnt the basics of veterinary nursing in my first year, as well as animal body systems and client care.


The best thing about my course is the balance of theoretical learning at university, and the practical time in placement. By having all of my placements here, I am beginning to build relationships with some of the clients and their animals, and I am beginning to understand in a lot more detail what is involved in the daily running of a veterinary practice. I am also getting to know the staff a lot better - everyone’s so nice and willing to help me learn!


Outside of my course, I enjoying spending time with my family, friends and boyfriend, and I am a keen fudge maker, which I think Ash Vets are grateful for - everyone always seems happy when I bring in my latest batch for them to taste!


To anyone thinking of getting into vet nursing through going to university, I would tell them that it’s a lot of hard work, and you have to be very dedicated, but the rewards are amazing, and are worth everything that you put into it and more!

Laura

How Are Mel's Chickens Doing?

Two weeks on........

Well the new girls have been at the farm for two whole weeks now, and things are going well. They have come out of the new ‘enriched cage’ system, unlike their battery caged predecessors, and I must say they do seem to be in somewhat better condition. The new enriched cages allow more room for the hens to move and stretch than the tiny old barren cages; they have perches and they do allow small areas to nest and scratch. There are still many restrictions with this system – the chickens are still kept in relatively small cages, without access to the outdoors.  Anyone who’s seen a hen take a dust bath, or stretch her wings in the sunshine will tell you just how much they love to be outside.  But that is a discussion for another day. This blog is about my girls!  

We had an uneventful journey home  from Carmarthenshire to the farm on collection day.  The occasional cluck from the boot and the rather wiffy smell of the new chickens ensured that I didn’t forget about my new charges on the drive back! Bluebell and Dau, the resident chickens, were rather put out to say the least when we opened the three cat carriers to reveal six new hens! 

There was a reasonable amount of squabbling in the early days as the eight worked out the pecking order (I had no appreciation of how that saying came about until I kept my own flock of chickens!!).  Things are settling down now in that respect, but the new girls do still get the occasional squawk and peck on the comb if they dare try out a little tit bit I’ve provided before Bluebell can get to it!! 

Those of you on Facebook may have noticed that we had one casualty early on.  One of the new girls developed a severe limp, which is rather a problem when you only have two legs to start with (and not the best balance if I’m really honest!!).  An examination confirmed, as far as possible without an x-ray, that she hadn’t broken a bone, so we set her up in her own little pen to rest and recuperate. We had to separate her from the others, as chickens do have a rather mean tendency to pick on anyone showing weakness – so poor old Cassy (short for ‘Hopalong Cassidy’) had become quite a target overnight. 


Anyway, I am very pleased to report that she is doing very well and her limp has almost fully resolved now. We plan to return her to the flock in the next day or two. I’ll let you know how she gets on.

Egg production is going well. We are still getting the reliable two eggs from Bluebell and Dau, with the new girls laying anything from one to four eggs a day (including three from Cassy, bless her) between them. Based on past experience this should continue to increase as they settle in and get back to full health. We’re also looking forward to seeing those feathers start to grow.

The girls are all currently living in the barn, but work is very nearly finished on the new deluxe chicken coop and run. And they are due to all move out into the big outdoors together later this week. We are all very excited about it and can’t wait to see them tuck in to their first meal of insects and bugs. Fingers crossed they get some sunshine to bask in.............


Mel

Can You Help?

Today we've given our blog over to one of our local RSPCA inspectors, who does great work locally, helping look after the welfare of animals in the Merthyr Tydfil area. I'll leave it up to Gemma to explain what she wants to talk to you about. I hope you can help her out.
Rachel

My name is Gemma Cooper and I am an RSPCA Inspector, covering Merthyr Tydfil, Aberdare and Mountain Ash. As an RSPCA inspector I am part of the front line team who work to prevent cruelty, promote kindness and alleviate suffering to animals.
 
We have made huge strides in animal welfare over the years but there is still work to do. As part of my role, everyday I witness first hand, acts of neglect, cruelty and violence towards animals. the RSPCA needs to raise more and more money rach year in order to continue responding to animals in need. 
 
As such, I am volunterring to take on a a challenege of a life time and climb Mount Kilimanjaro to raise funds for the RSPCA. Mount Kilimanjaro is the highest peak in Africa, standing at a massive 19,341ft.
 
I am hoping to raise £4,000 in order to continue helping to save the lives of animals in our local area.
 
The RSPCA is not funded by the Government. Every penny spent by the RSPCA has been donated by people like you.
 
Last year I attended a house where the Spinger Spaniel had been hit by a car 3 months previous, breaking and dislocating his leg. His owners hadn't taken him to a vet, simply putting it down to, "A bit of a limp". I have no doubt that Fudge would have lived the rest of his life with a broken leg if it hadn't have been for the RSPCA. Fudge's operation to have his leg amputated was paid for by people like you. I have now adopted Fudge and he has been helping me train for the mammoth challenege ahead. 
 
If you are in a position to donate a couple of pounds, please visit my just giving page
 
http://www.justgiving.com/gemma-cooper1
 
 
Thank you
 
Gemma and Fudge

How Does Your Dog Smell?

We're all used to guide dogs and the fantastic work they do, helping blind people in many aspects of everyday life. We treat a number of guide dogs and puppies in training at the surgery and they're always a pleasure to deal with. However there are far more working dogs than just guide dogs and assistance dogs can help in a variety of different ways.

Medical alert dogs can be used to monitor people with diabetes and warn when they are about to suffer a hypoglycaemic attack (a time when their blood sugar drops to levels which are potentially dangerous).  Low blood sugar produces a distinctive smell, which these dogs are trained to detect and react to. They can then summon help, or fetch vital supplies for their owners. More information about these dogs can be found here.

Interestingly a number of pet owners have noted that their pets, which have never been trained to do so,  will behave differently when the owners are having a hypoglycaemic attack. In some cases, the owners were asleep and the animals have actually woken them up!

Dogs may be able to detect problems in people with Addisons Disease; a serious condition which can cause collapse, fits and severe pain in sufferers. Cardiff University are currently involved in research into exactly what these dogs are smelling.

It seems that dogs can also be trained to detect certain types of cancer, so jokes about a 'lab' test aren't wide of the mark! There is research going on about this at the moment, but more details can be found here.

Sniffer dogs have been used for years to detect drugs, explosives and chemicals, but they're now being used to sniff out bed bugs as well. It's amazing what a dog's nose can find! Perhaps one day soon all doctors' surgeries will have a dog in the corner of the waiting room to tell the doctor what's wrong with you.