How Do Preservatives Affect Dog Poop?
I previously discussed terrain theory and the concept that there is no waste in nature. Both explain that a microbe or other scavenger will always exist to clean up death and waste.
Unless that death and waste is full of preservatives…
From a holistic animal care perspective, what goes into an animal matters just as much as what comes out. That includes the dog food ingredients your pet consumes every day and what happens to those ingredients after they pass through the body.
What Dog Food Ingredients Are Really in the Bowl?
Just like the processed foods you buy in the grocery store or gas station, most kibble and canned pet foods are full of chemical preservatives. Sometimes these are antibiotics—designed to kill the bacteria whose sole purpose is to digest and decompose the dead processed ‘food.’ In other cases, they are formaldehyde and similar derivatives.
Why Does Formaldehyde Sound Familiar?
Because that’s the toxic-smelling chemical that was used to preserve the frog or fetal pig that you dissected in high school science class. That’s right—that stuff (anything with a similar name ending in –aldehyde) is in your food and your pet’s food—and it’s usually right there on the label, but not always.
Many people now know that they should read labels, but most stop after one or two lines because the chemical names become unpronounceable. We skim over these difficult words and ignore them, largely because they seem to be in everything, making them too hard to avoid. That’s exactly what you’re expected to do—give up, give in, and stop asking questions—but your pet’s health absolutely depends on you asking questions!
Understanding dog food ingredients is an important part of holistic animal care because the goal is not simply to feed your pet, but to understand what your pet is actually consuming. Nature offers a clear example of what can happen when animals, waste, and the surrounding environment interact.
What Nature Can Teach Us About Animal Health
Joel Salatin of Polyface Farms tells a story about how his chickens refused to pick through the cow patties of a neighbor’s cows. The story becomes especially interesting when you consider what naturally happens around large herbivores like cows: birds gather to eat the flies and bugs.
Similarly, in regenerative farming, farmers put chickens in the fields about three days after the cattle have moved through. They scratch through the cow patties to eat the fly larvae and other bugs while spreading the manure (compost) around.
This is a textbook example of terrain theory and that there is no waste in nature—there would be no birds if there were no manure and flies to feed them. After the worms and flies digest the cow manure, they become food for the birds. And the leftover manure becomes compost to feed the soil and grass.
Well, Joel Salatin’s cows eat only natural grass on his farm and receive no vaccines or dewormers. The neighbor’s cows—like most—do receive vaccines and dewormers. So when Joel tried to let his clean chickens follow the neighbor’s cows, the chickens refused to scratch or eat anything from their cow patties—because of the pharmaceutical dewormers in the poop. To the chickens, it probably smells like formaldehyde. What happens to animal waste in a pasture brings us back to what happens much closer to home—in our own backyards.
What Your Dog’s Poop Says About Diet
Kibble-fed dogs tend to have bulky, voluminous stools that stay around for weeks. But dogs fed a raw carnivore diet sourced from regenerative farms have smaller, lighter stools that often disappear within just a few days. These smaller stools contain very little waste. But it’s not just that there is less waste. The poop isn’t contaminated with preservatives and dewormers, so natural bugs and soil bacteria can quickly consume the nutrients they need. So, the soil and bugs ‘dissolve’ these stools.
This is another reason dog food ingredients matter. In holistic animal care, diet is part of the bigger picture of an animal’s health and its relationship with the natural environment.
Why are there parasites at the dog park?
Parasites at the dog park are a perfect example of both Terrain Theory and the concept of No Waste in Nature. These kibble-fed stools are more than the normal soil bacteria can digest, so all of the excess voluminous kibble-fed poop in a confined space will naturally attract worms & other parasites to consume the excess contamination.
If your dog has the same kibble contamination in his gut, then he is very attractive to the parasites at the park.Then, in the name of hygiene and in the spirit of Germ Theory, the local municipality sprays the park with pesticides to kill potential worms, but that also kills the soil bacteria.
So, the dog park is often full of the more robust parasites like Giardia and Coccidia to take the place of the “regular” parasites that the local municipality is trying to prevent, and the dog poop stays there forever if you don’t pick it up.
Terrain Theory is a two-way street—if there are preservatives in the poop, then the soil bacteria can’t digest the poop. But if your typical American yard has been contaminated (treated) with herbicides and pesticides, there aren’t enough bacteria and bugs to digest the poop! So, even the clean, healthy, raw-fed poop will stay around if all the bugs and bacteria have been killed.
You may have noticed cleverly named services that come around to clean up dog poop from the yards of more affluent suburban homes. Well, if dog poop weren’t full of preservatives, it would “dissolve” within a few days and wouldn’t leave such a messy yard full of “land mines.”
Simply put, if your yard is full of big, stinky poops, or your dog picks up parasites at the dog park, it’s absolutely because of the concepts of terrain theory and that there is no waste in nature.
Looking at diet, dog food ingredients, digestion, and the animal’s environment together is part of the bigger picture behind holistic animal care. If you’d like to understand more about your pet’s health, you can get started by visiting DrMattParker.com.
