But hours after the government's assurances, Hills, a major pet food
maker, announced that one of its dry brands is contaminated. Hills
recalled the brand: Prescription Diet m/d Feline Dry Food...

http://www.stltoday.com/stltoday/new...9?OpenDocument

--
Handsome Jack Morrison

Not everyone in Europe is a stupid as Rosie O'Donnell:
http://www.spiegel.de/international/...474636,00.html
Your United Nations at work!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BMEw0lZ3k_Y&eurl=
A Moronocy of Dunces!
http://www.julescrittenden.com/2007/...ocy-of-dunces/
How modern liberals think!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eaE98w1KZ-c&eurl=
Gore's Global Warming Religion:
http://www.humanevents.com/article.php?id=19927
Researchers Question Validity Of A 'Global Temperature':
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases...0315101129.htm
Liberal eco-preeners: Do as we say, not as we do!
http://www.time.com/time/magazine/ar...599714,00.html
Danish scientist: Global warming is a myth.
http://www.upi.com/NewsTrack/Science...-012154-7403r/
Scientists threatened with death for 'climate denial'!
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.../ngreen211.xml
The Great Global Warming Swindle - the video:
http://video.google.ca/videoplay?doc...global+warming

on Sat, 31 Mar 2007 13:53:46 GMT, Handsome Jack Morrison
wrote:

But hours after the government's assurances, Hills, a major pet food
maker, announced that one of its dry brands is contaminated. Hills
recalled the brand: Prescription Diet m/d Feline Dry Food...

http://www.stltoday.com/stltoday/new...citycounty/sto
ry/D02CD33481D14BD9862572AF00092429?OpenDocument

I checked all of our treats last night after Hills announced they used the
same wheat gluten supplier for that prescription cat food. Damned if all
but one brand doesn't contain wheat gluten, including 2 boxes of Nutro
treats. Some of them are the small, soft training treats, and some are
hard biscuits. They are all in the trash now and I'm trying to remain
calm. I'm just going to avoid all wheat and wheat gluten, but is that
enough?

What's really scary to me is that the FDA is saying the level of melamine
found in the food doesn't explain the symptoms they are seeing in pets who
consumed it.

Tip of the iceberg?

--
Lynne

Lynne wrote:

What's really scary to me is that the FDA is saying the level of melamine
found in the food doesn't explain the symptoms they are seeing in pets who
consumed it.

Tip of the iceberg?


Here's what I don't understand: Why aren't more dogs and cats sick? I
know that sounds horribly callous so let me explain myself before
everyone jumps down my throat. The recall was/is huge. The number of
pets exposed to possibly tainted pet food has to be huge. Yet I'm
hearing very relatively few reports of sick or dying pets. Believe me,
I think that's a good thing, but it doesn't make sense. When you look
at the numbers, it seems like there should be more. In my neighborhood,
all the dogs and cats are fine. You have reports of veterinarians
working overtime testing animals, but they're all fine. It doesn't seem
possible that the food isn't really tainted since some animals have died
from poisoning. What explains the fact that so many exposed animals
haven't gotten sick?


(How was your trip, and would you email me privately your notes on
airport recordings?)


--Lia

on Sat, 31 Mar 2007 16:36:48 GMT, Julia Altshuler
wrote:

Here's what I don't understand: Why aren't more dogs and cats sick?
I know that sounds horribly callous so let me explain myself before
everyone jumps down my throat. The recall was/is huge. The number of
pets exposed to possibly tainted pet food has to be huge. Yet I'm
hearing very relatively few reports of sick or dying pets. Believe
me, I think that's a good thing, but it doesn't make sense. When you
look at the numbers, it seems like there should be more. In my
neighborhood, all the dogs and cats are fine. You have reports of
veterinarians working overtime testing animals, but they're all fine.
It doesn't seem possible that the food isn't really tainted since some
animals have died from poisoning. What explains the fact that so many
exposed animals haven't gotten sick?

We don't know how many animals have gotten sick or died yet. I've heard
that in some areas vets have seen a dramatic rise in acute kidney
failure over the past 2+ months, so maybe the tainted foods were
distributed to some areas and not others?

(How was your trip, and would you email me privately your notes on
airport recordings?)

I already posted it in the original thread.

--
Lynne

In article ,
Julia Altshuler wrote:
Here's what I don't understand: Why aren't more dogs and cats sick?

1) We don't know how many dogs and cats are sick;

2) we don't know how much tainted food was produced by Menu
Foods; and

3) we don't know how much of the tainted food was sold
before being pulled off the shelves

I was at the feed store this morning and I asked them if
they'd been affected by the hullaballoo, and they said while
they'd gotten a lot of questions their stock hadn't been
affected because they sell very little of that **** to start
with and the little bit they did have hadn't been
manufactured during the dates in which the tainted whatever
was included in the food.

Someone on one of the mushing lists said that she'd
dissolved some cheap kibble in water and strained it and was
appalled by what was in there (bone, feather, beak) and did
the same thing with some "premium" kibble and was pleased by
what she found. I haven't tried it and don't know whether
or not she was exaggerating but it sounds like an
interesting thing to do. Crap like bones and feather and
beak oughtn't to make your dog sick but they don't provide
much in the way of nutrition, either.
--
Melinda Shore - Software longa, hardware brevis -

If you can't say it clearly, you don't understand it yourself -- John Searle

on Sat, 31 Mar 2007 16:52:46 GMT, (Melinda Shore) wrote:

Someone on one of the mushing lists said that she'd
dissolved some cheap kibble in water and strained it and was
appalled by what was in there (bone, feather, beak) and did
the same thing with some "premium" kibble and was pleased by
what she found. I haven't tried it and don't know whether
or not she was exaggerating but it sounds like an
interesting thing to do. Crap like bones and feather and
beak oughtn't to make your dog sick but they don't provide
much in the way of nutrition, either.

I have a very hard time believing that bone, feather and beak could be
distinguised in something that has been ground up, formed into kibble, and
then dissolved...

--
Lynne

In article ,
Lynne wrote:
I have a very hard time believing that bone, feather and beak could be
distinguised in something that has been ground up, formed into kibble, and
then dissolved...

Apparently it's a lot coarser.
--
Melinda Shore - Software longa, hardware brevis -

If you can't say it clearly, you don't understand it yourself -- John Searle

On Sat, 31 Mar 2007 11:10:42 -0500, Lynne
wrote:

on Sat, 31 Mar 2007 13:53:46 GMT, Handsome Jack Morrison
wrote:

But hours after the government's assurances, Hills, a major pet food
maker, announced that one of its dry brands is contaminated. Hills
recalled the brand: Prescription Diet m/d Feline Dry Food...

http://www.stltoday.com/stltoday/new...citycounty/sto
ry/D02CD33481D14BD9862572AF00092429?OpenDocument

I checked all of our treats last night after Hills announced they used the
same wheat gluten supplier for that prescription cat food. Damned if all
but one brand doesn't contain wheat gluten, including 2 boxes of Nutro
treats. Some of them are the small, soft training treats, and some are
hard biscuits. They are all in the trash now and I'm trying to remain
calm. I'm just going to avoid all wheat and wheat gluten, but is that
enough?

IMO, it's more than enough. In fact, I wouldn't worry about any wheat
or wheat gluten product that wasn't made by Menu Foods (from products
imported from China), no matter the brand.

What's really scary to me is that the FDA is saying the level of melamine
found in the food doesn't explain the symptoms they are seeing in pets who
consumed it.

Tip of the iceberg?

No, I really don't think so.

But "better safe than sorry" has always been one of my mottos.

--
Handsome Jack Morrison

Not everyone in Europe is a stupid as Rosie O'Donnell:
http://www.spiegel.de/international/...474636,00.html
Your United Nations at work!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BMEw0lZ3k_Y&eurl=
A Moronocy of Dunces!
http://www.julescrittenden.com/2007/...ocy-of-dunces/
How modern liberals think!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eaE98w1KZ-c&eurl=
Gore's Global Warming Religion:
http://www.humanevents.com/article.php?id=19927
Researchers Question Validity Of A 'Global Temperature':
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases...0315101129.htm
Liberal eco-preeners: Do as we say, not as we do!
http://www.time.com/time/magazine/ar...599714,00.html
Danish scientist: Global warming is a myth.
http://www.upi.com/NewsTrack/Science...-012154-7403r/
Scientists threatened with death for 'climate denial'!
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.../ngreen211.xml
The Great Global Warming Swindle - the video:
http://video.google.ca/videoplay?doc...global+warming

On Mar 31, 12:36 pm, Julia Altshuler wrote:
Lynne wrote:
What's really scary to me is that the FDA is saying the level of melamine
found in the food doesn't explain the symptoms they are seeing in pets who
consumed it.

Tip of the iceberg?

Here's what I don't understand: Why aren't more dogs and cats sick? I
know that sounds horribly callous so let me explain myself before
everyone jumps down my throat. The recall was/is huge. The number of
pets exposed to possibly tainted pet food has to be huge. Yet I'm
hearing very relatively few reports of sick or dying pets. Believe me,
I think that's a good thing, but it doesn't make sense. When you look
at the numbers, it seems like there should be more. In my neighborhood,
all the dogs and cats are fine. You have reports of veterinarians
working overtime testing animals, but they're all fine. It doesn't seem
possible that the food isn't really tainted since some animals have died
from poisoning. What explains the fact that so many exposed animals
haven't gotten sick?

(How was your trip, and would you email me privately your notes on
airport recordings?)

--Lia

What numbers are you basing this on? The "official" count, which is
really just the animals in Menu's feeding test? The Banfield numbers,
who have hundreds of cases, and project a number of several thousand
nationwide based on their own numbers? The numbers from the Veterinary
Information Network--who say that only 10-20% of their members have
reported in, but nevertheless they have reports of 1,000 sick animals,
and project that it could easily be ten times that? The Pet Connection
numbers?

There may not have been the same amount of contaminant in every can or
pouch. Given the way things normally work in manufacturing, there
probably wasn't an abrupt shift, on the manufacturing end, from wheat
gluten from one supplier to wheat gluten from another supplier.
Animals will have had different amounts of the tainted food--anything
from all their meals to little treats. And they'll have had different
levels of sensitivity. Some animals ate the food, eagerly or
reluctantly. Some refused it after a few bites, some refused it based
on smell alone. And different people will have had different reactions
to a pet suddenly refusing its food for no reason apparent to the
human, up to and including the Canadian woman who ate some of it
herself to encourage her dog to eat it. (It worked, and they're both
seriously ill.)

And, again, we really don't know what the numbers are. Lots of vets
are working overtime testing lots of animals--and a lot of them are
fine, but a lot of them aren't. There are a lot of very sick or dead
pets out there.

Lis

on Sat, 31 Mar 2007 16:56:13 GMT, (Melinda Shore) wrote:

Apparently it's a lot coarser.

it's the bone vs. beak that I find unbelieveable. So that blows the
person's credibility in my mind.

--
Lynne