OK. Let's look at your post.
You were taught during 1 semester in college that a grain based kibble was the way to go by lobbyists that were essentially trying to get their foot in the door early.
I'm sure the representatives of grain based kibble companies will tell you that the formulation of their kibble is based on *good research and science*.
Science is often wrong. OR science will treat one theory as fact until a *better* theory comes along, and then they change their minds and adopt the new theory as more or less fact. So the former theory is essentially a fad or fashion.
However, more and more newer vets are seeing through the kibble goggles and realizing that the classic kibbles may not be the best option
OK. Perhaps the classic kibbles are now a passing fashion? Even though they were based on *good science and research*.
Most vets discourage raw and other homemade diets not because they believe they are bad for dogs....but b/c they are taught in that 1 nutrition course that you can't trust people to formulate them properly and its easier (and less likely to cause a lawsuit) to just recommend kibble
The above sentence doesn't speak very well of vets or how they view their clients.
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Kibble has actually been available for about 100 years because a few manufacturers started baked kibble around that time. Large companies did not start mass marketing kibble until post WWII. So yes, mass market kibble has been around for about 60 years.
Dogs have not been eating kibble for hundreds of years
Don't be patronizing.
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Historically I agree that dogs have been fed scraps. What would the historical US kitchen have had for scraps? I'm talking pre-WWII and not thousands of years ago. Say for example, since 1850.
Pre-WWII the average US population did not eat the quantity of meat that we eat today. If the average person did have meat very little went to their dogs and that which did was not fit for human consumption unless the family lived well above middle class and the dog was especially favored.
Hunting dogs were fed the offal from the game they hunted. This includes whatever the game ate. Remember most organ meat was/is saved to make sausage, chitlins, scrapple, brain sandwiches, etc.
The average pet would have gotten things like old biscuits, bread, vegetable and fruit peelings and scraps, beans, gravy, soured dairy, some meat fat or offal, oatmeal and the like. Left over soup or stew, perhaps. Not a meat heavy diet. The VAST majority of protein of any quality went to humans. The marrow in bones was used for stocks and soups and the like. The dog probably got the bone sans marrow. Most people in the US at the time did not have the means or desire to feed their dog better.
If the dog could or was allowed to hunt on its own I'm sure it would augment its diet with some small game. Oh yeah, and the ol' egg suckin' hound.
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Dogs never used to have so many allergy problems
This is probably caused by many more factors than just food. Perhaps dogs
have become allergic to certain foods. I expect some of this has to do with damaged immune systems from over vaccination. With pure breds at least some allergy problems have come from inbreeding or small gene pools leading to inadequate
immune systems.
But, obviously, dogs also must live in our environment and human allergies and asma, etc have gone way up. Our air and soil and the food we eat have never been more contaminated. So a toxic environment could also cause the immune system to weaken.
and used to live longer before traditional high grain kibble came along.
This I take exception to. Dogs that caught rats and squirrels died of lepto. Most of the dogs in the South caught heartworms. Rabies, parvo, distemper, internal parasites and fleas. Tick born diseases.
I do not feel the average life span of a dog pre-WWII exceeded that of today. At least their life span did not exceed those of my dogs - 15 was still considered a very old dog.
Also, people's views of dogs have changed over time. Pre-WWII I think people were probably less likely to take a dog to the vet and quicker to put them down, if for nothing else that money and resource issues.
Kibble is a commodity of convenience...not quality.
I agree with this.
1. Manufacturers are finding a way to make food with less and no grain.
I believe manufacturers have found out that people are willing to pay for food with no grain.
2. People are realizing that the classic kibble diet is not even close to what dogs have eaten historically.
Well of course not. It is WAY processed. People are suffering from this also.
3. Studies are being done on the effects of grain in a dog's diet that are showing negative effects.
I'm sure there are. I'm sure Purina and Hill's have done studies to show grain doesn't hurt a thing. Probably just depends on whose studies you choose to believe.
I fail to see how science is a fad.
A significant - I am not saying majority or even 30%, just significant - amount of science is flat out wrong. Science and research are done by humans who are, by definition, flawed.
Data is ignored or worse falsified. This has been in the news recently. Scientist's are worse than bathing beauties as far as egos go. Science ignores significant natural phenomena because they can't explain it. If they can't explain it, it must not exist. For example: The guys that did the first successful cold fusion experiment were vilified to the point that they still hide from the public. Now 'science' is starting to think they might have just been right.
There are many many examples of the shortcomings of science. I could go on but I bet EVERYBODY got really heartily sick of this a long long time ago.
How about we both just cool our jets.
And yes, of course you are free to express you opinion, just like everybody else.