Pet Food Ingredients to Avoid: Part III
Third in our “Pet Food Ingredients to Avoid”, written by Laurie Goldstein, is guar gum, another thickening agent. Guar gum is also a polysaccharide, but unlike xanthan gum – a product of bacterial fermentation produced in a lab – guar gum is derived from an actual food: the guar bean, or Indian cluster bean. These are the seeds of the Cyamopsis tetragonoloba tree that grows primarily in India and Pakistan. These seeds look similar to green beans and the food additive produced from them looks similar to flour.
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Greetings, I love, love, love this site, thank you for all you do!
Just a quick FYI: Nature’s Variety *no longer* sources their rabbit from China, as of May 2014, but rather from France. This change came from customers who were concerned about sourcing from China. Please update your commercial raw PDF re: NV’s rabbit. Thanks!
Thank you for the info, Lisa, I appreciate the update! Given the holiday season, it might take some time to get all the pertinent articles updated, but we’ll get it done.
Happy Holidays to you, hon!
Guar Gum is BAD for cats! I am getting really frustrated.. every time I THINK I have found a good cat food, I find something BAD in it! Can’t you just leave the guar gum out!!?? PLEASE. Please let me know when you remove it, and I will consider buying your cat food as otherwise it looks pretty good!
http://catcentric.org/nutrition-and-food/canned-foods/canned-food-products-ingredients-to-avoid/guar-gum/
I dont think a good cat food can be found, maybe we need to hand together and make a better one. I give my cat 50mgs tetracycline to clear out the bacteria induced by guar gum. It’s packets of fish tetracycline. Ziwipeak looks a little better, but it has chickpeas, so probably not by much.
I feel the same way. I don’t care if the food is bound neatlyly together leve out the guar gum, the xanthan gum, the locust be a gum etc etc.My kitty has CKD and is diabetic. I think I m going to have to make it.
James – Giving your cat an antibiotic only exacerbates the imbalance in the gut by killing off the healthy bacteria that kills the unhealthy flora, so not a remedy. I recommend you try raw (Darwin’s) or a freeze-dried raw (Primal, Stella and Chewy’s). You’re right, finding a canned cat food without any trigger ingredients in next to impossible. A couple of months ago, I decided to boycott all canned cat foods with additives and feed my cats a very high-quality GRAIN-FREE dry food, high in protein (45%) and fat (18%) required for an obligate carnivore feline diet (Evo, Wellness Core, Merrick Back Country/Raw Infused). Menadione sodium bisulfite is another ingredient that is dangerously toxic over time and should be avoided. I supplement with Primal which is popular among cats, including my two, and Almo Nature canned food that is whole food meat and water and no other ingredients, I feed one can daily for both cats. My cats drink plenty of water so the dry food diet is not an issue in that regard. Since following this diet, both cats are full of energy, no vomiting and I get peace of mind. Hope this helps you and your kitty.
you may want to try Stella & Chewys freeze dried raw …my cat loves it and is thriving on it…as are my dogs!!
Thank you for this terrific site! Both my cats made it to 18 years and one recently died of cancer. The only truly organic wet food I found had guar gum in it. Who feeds a cat ground up raw beans!?!
The best food I’ve found is Instinct Grain-free Chicken wet food and their raw nuggets.
They have a clay in them but this actually helps health, BUT it is still not organic