Some human food may be easier for your dog to digest than some dry dog food. Whether or not a more natural ancestral diet results in a healthier dog is another matter, but at the very least, it could get a dog to poop less.
The idea that all human food is bad for dogs has been around for a long time.
There are certain foods that dogs shouldn't eat, such as chocolates, seasonings, and fruit, but many types of vegetables on our plates can be fed to them.
Humans have been feeding their scraps to their dogs for thousands of years.
Commercial dog food was created as a way to make food waste more profitable.
Many pet owners think table scraps are dangerous for their dogs because they are full of all the vitamins and minerals they need.
As the history of 'Big Kibble' has come to light and certain pet foods have been recalled for safety concerns, many pet owners have begun making the switch to healthy, fresh, organic, grain-free and homemade alternatives.
Is it possible that those words are the best choice? We don't know at the moment.
Even though they technically meet standards for complete and balanced nutrition, many commercial pet diet have not been rigorously tested.
It's not clear how to determine what a dog's ancestral diet actually contained and what impact modern food might have on their health.
Some of the first research on human-grade dog food has found a number of benefits. Dogs poop less if they are fed a mix of meat and veggies.
When a dozen beagles were given a standard diet of kibble for four weeks, the canines had to eat significantly more to maintain their body weight, and they pooped up to three times as much as when they were given a diet of human-grade ingredients. Dogs were 1.5 to 1.7 times more likely to poop after eating kibble.
The dogs are more likely to digest the food they are fed. The latter two diet seemed to modify the dog's gut flora in a way that kibble could not.
The fecal communities of healthy dogs that were fed a fresh diet were different than those that were fed a traditional diet.
"Differences in diet processing, ingredient source, and concentration and type of fats that are known to influence what is digested by the dog and what reaches the colon for ferment are some of the factors that may have led to the unique microbial profiles."
More research is needed to determine how a fresh or raw meat diet can affect a dog's health.
Analyzing their physical activity, urine, stool, and blood, the authors found roasted diet was easier to digest than kibble, and both grain-free and raw diet resulted in lower blood sugar levels.
That doesn't mean these foods are any less healthy. A few years ago, some grain-free boutique dog foods were linked to a form of canine heart disease, which led the FDA to caution against that type of diet for dogs.
There is an environmental impact to consider as well as the health of our pets. Carbon emissions and climate change would be huge if every pet dog was fed meat, fish, and vegetables.
Some scientists think we should use insect-based diet, which can produce 25 times less greenhouse emissions per kilogram of farming than beef, while using 47 times less land, and using 20 times less water.
If a diet is shown to be safe and meet your dog's needs, she considers it an option. It's up to you if you want to pay more.
She said that the most important thing was testing the new diet formats.
It looks like a measured approach until we know more.
The study was published in an animal science journal.
The first version of this article was published in February of 2020.
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