Warning: Pentobarbital found in US dog food

[Tobi]

Thank you very much for those links LPC.
I have read a lot about this awful practice before, and have been aware of it since about 2008! I am shocked utterly to see that it is still going on! Apart from the danger of pentobarbital in the euthanised companion animals, putting that rendered meat in cat and dog food means the companies are forcing our dogs and cats to be cannibals! How can they even dream up such a thing??
Plus, a large percentage of meat obtained from such sources is by its very nature -diseased!

The reports I found concerned some pet foods and practices in the US.

I remember -back about 2008, researching as much as I could about ingredients in commercial pet foods in the UK. As far as I could discover, there were no euthanised companion animals in the meat. However horse meat is/was used, presumably from horses who have been slaughtered/euthanised without pentobarbital.

Ingredients such as "animal fats", "meat", "animal by-products" etc, in the small print on labelling confuse us further because for some reason the "animal" is not specified, and the manufacturer doesn't wish to specify....
That always sets me to thinking!

Also, everything is so 'global' nowadays, and a manufacturer could buy from a supplier in another country in order to cut down costs. That supplier can -and has been known to do, even concerning human grade food! -deliberately mis-label the product.

[Catherine]

When you first posted this and pointed out that Pentobarbital is used to euthanize animals, I had a bad feeling. It just didn't seem possible though. How could euthanized pets end up in pet food! Now it turns out that it is true. I had never heard of this before.
There is something vile about making money from the bodies of dead pets. Maybe that is why some shelters kill so many animals. They get paid for their bodies.

It is obviously dangerous.  Euthanized animals are supposed to be cremated which would destroy the drugs used. You don't want the drugs getting into the water system. They would be dangerous to all living things.

Clearly pet food has some very dirty secrets. There may be ethical companies producing food, but they have trouble getting safe supplies. There have been other recalls.

Right now our whole food system is not safe. There is a baby food recall out because of possible botulism.

I think we need to eat local and eat fresh whenever possible, for ourselves and our pets.

[Tobi]

Well said Catherine.

I am just horrified and shocked that this is STILL going on! As I said, I knew about it way back....nine/ten years ago. How can it still be happening?

I buried Misty's body, and she was euthanised. The vet never mentioned anything to me about it when I said I would bury her because she was scared of fire and loved the earth. To be honest, I never even thought about it.
Same with my dog Toby.
Nasturtiums grew to an incredible height and width on top of her body (which was buried deep) The bees and butterflies, and so many species of insect came to those Nasturtiums. It was so beautiful.
I hope we didn't do any ecological damage. I didn't know cremation was mandatory with euthanised bodies.

[Catherine]

Cremation is not mandatory with euthanized animals. You chose good areas for burial and over time any drugs would break down and dissipate. I think you made a beautiful choice.

Shelters and clinics that have many bodies to dispose of are a different matter. They kill hundreds of animals and it would be dangerous to put that much pentobarbital into the environment, especially since they do it over and over again.

It never occurred to me that euthanized pets could end up in food until this post. This is wrong on so many levels.
It is no wonder we have so many food scares and food recalls. There are so many bad practices when it comes to food.
We have the knowledge and technology to make things very safe. Instead we make them unsafe on a much larger scale.
We can cause death and illness from one batch of food to hundreds even  thousands.

Why doesn't our progress feel like progress.

[Melanie Meow]

That's terrible that this drug was in some dogfood, that is bad news because that drug is a narcotic..so dangerous!! =((

[Catherine]

The bad thing was that they were selling the bodies of euthanized dogs and cats to pet food companies. We trust out food sources and they are supposed to disclose what is in the food. Would you buy dog or cat food that was labeled "Contains euthanized shelter dos and cats".
Of course not! If that is what is in the food then we need to be told. Because the euthanasia drugs are in the bodies of these animals, it is not safe to use them for food.
Dead dogs and cats should not be in our dog and cat food anyhow.