Letter from Merrick to the FDA re: downed stock in pet food (2004)

I thought it was hilarious [sm=rofl.gif]

He's not making fun of people who believe in holistic foods....he's making fun of the people who are naive and believe that those things are the only thing that determines whether a kibble is "premium"...

I thought it was hilarious

Yes,i would expect you and a few other people of that same mindset to find comments like that 'hilarious'.But there are many of us who dont subscribe to the same feeding beliefs who find it anything but hilarious...

ORIGINAL: Edie

I thought it was hilarious

Yes,i would expect you and a few other people of that same mindset to find comments like that 'hilarious'.But there are many of us who dont subscribe to the same feeding beliefs who find it anything but hilarious...

Fascinating...really.

Grocery stores and food manufacturers buy different things. In pounds, groceries probably do buy more, but they get the good meaty parts. The dog food manufacturers get what is left over after the groceries get their parts. Chicken thighs and breasts aren't the pieces used in dog food. It's chicken frames and other typically discarded parts, which have no other value to the majority of the public. So it's going to be dirt cheap to the dog food manufacturers. I've seen chicken frames in the ethnic market for $.39/lb. But ethnic markets can't sell all the chicken frames produced.

 
Okay, I admit I am lost here.  When you buy whole chickens or cut up chickens, you get the thighs, drumsticks, breast, wings, neck,  and back and with whole, usually the liver gizzard and heart as well..  Or you can buy packages of just breast, wings, thighs, drumsticks, neck, livers, gizzards& hearts.  Feet are sold overseas as a delicacy (also in Walmart, called chicken paws) the throat is also a delicacy.    About all that is left is the innards( that humans won't eat) and feathers.  And the FDA says no feathers. So that leqves me wondering what part of the chickens are used in dog food.

He's not making fun of people who believe in holistic foods....he's making fun of the people who are naive and believe that those things are the only thing that determines whether a kibble is "premium"...

Exactly!  I was not making fun of people that feed a holistic food, I was making fun of those resources, I find it amazing that a few websites, most of which are run by people that have little or no nutrition training, and don't do any sort of testing of foods, are routinely used as evidence as to which foods are the "best".  I don't have any problem with someone who feeds a holistic kibble, if you are happy with the results then great, you have found the right food for your dog. Likewise, I don't have any problem with someone who feeds a food, that is not holistic or not on one of those lists, but is happy with the results.  I think there a very good reasons why someone may want to feed a holistic kibble, but I also feel there are very good reasons why someone might want to feed a kibble from a major manufacturer.  The bottom line are the results that you get, and not whether a food is on someones list on a website.
 

Yeah i have no doubt that he was kidding.But the same,old sarcasm is getting really boring and old now..

Ok well will just all agree with you and your feeding methods,  that will make for a fun and exciting forum instead of a "boring" one,

Sandra, there's far more premium cuts sold than whole chickens. A "frame" is the back, ribs, and often the neck - the vast majority of people in this country want boneless breast, wings, drums, and thighs. Don't think rural, as most consumers don't live there - think large urban centers. Trust me, it's hard even to find a major metro chain that sells chicken quarters and even whole chickens will cost an arm and a leg and there will be, um, maybe two in the case.

There's far more chicken feet sold as by products than as delicacies overseas, also. Additionally, many suppliers choose to seperate the parts they need from a chicken and ditch the rest.

For instance, a friend of mine takes loads of chicks to grow and often she'll say, "Those are for KFC." or, "Those are going to be Wendy's nuggets." Large corps that only use the white meat or certain parts will simply seperate what they want and sell on the rest and that meat is not grocery store quality. Ie, the breats from a nugget chicken aren't going to yield the kind of drumsticks a customer expects to see on the grocery store shelves - they will be rangy and heavy in bone to support the oversized breast. Same with a "wings" chicken - the breast won't be as thick and juicy because the legs wouldn't support such a bird with oversized wings AND premium sized breast.

Lamb is even more a victim of our ridiculously specialized tastes, now. When we eat lamb at all, we don't want anything but loin and the back leg. I grow an entire 125 pound animal so someone can eat a piece the size of a man's hand from the side, and the butt. Where does the rest go?

I believe this extra product will go to dog food. It's premium quality since it comes from the human food chain from start to finish. I used to buy "frames" from a plant that processed all-natural meats grown in Georgia - they were meaty and with just a teeny bit of meat and veggie supplementation, provided everything my dogs needed for over a year. And they were antibiotic free and humanely grown. Then they stopped selling small orders to the public - guess who started buying their product instead? Boo hoo - it's ironic that the premium kibble companies are actually making it harder for us little guys to feed their dogs by products from the all-natural food supply chain.

We rarely find lamb down here--i ate it often when we lived in Ohio, lamb patties.
 
HEB is THE store of Texas,  In Corpus it is the only store outside of the Super Walmart...ran off two others that use to be there when we first moved down here.  I shopped the HEB for the 16 years we lived in Austin and had no problem getting whole, cut up, legs, wings, breasts with bone in, etc.  In fact, boneless was hard to find.  I shop HEB here and when I want bonesless usually have to get the frozen.  I buy the family pack of thighs (about 5 pounds) every week to make the chicken stew for my dogs.  Maybe it is because Texas are so big on cooking out and thighs seem to be meat of choice for cooking out, but down here there is no shortage of either thighs, drumsticks or whole legs.

First, we're looking at boxed meat and carcass prices on retail meat - which is misleading. There is a lot of meat out there that IS fit for human consumption that sells for much less simply because it is less desirable. Here's a breakdown.

USDA isnspects ALL meat from commercial processors. It is pass-fail. Fail gets booted out of the human chain and must be made into meal. Grading is optional and only done on meat that has passed inspection. There are 8 grades. Prime, Choice, Select, Standard, Commercial, Utility, Cutter and Canner. Prime, Choice, Select, Standard are about the only ones you'll find in the meat case at the grocery store and these are NOT likely to end up in dog food.

As of today, the carcass price for Choice carcasses is $146 per hundred pounds and Select is about $137 per hundred pounds. Roughly $1.46 to $1.37 per pound. That is the price your grocery stores & butchers are buying the carcasses for and then cutting them up to sell to you. The pieces they can't sell are fit for human consuption - remember it passed inspection - but will go to a biproducts plant.

Now remember that list of grades? We still have Commercial, Utility, Cutter and Canner that didn't even get to the grocery store. They're the cows that are too old to produce calves or milk and the bulls too old to perform. Sometimes they just keep jumping the fence and Grandpa is tired of bringing them back home. Those are going to be used for ground beef, processed meats like hot dogs and lunch meat and pet foods. The Canner grade sells for $35 or so per hundred pounds of carcass - way less than the Select carcasses. That takes the price to 35¢ or so per pound for human grade meat that is perfectly healthy - we just don't want it because it's tough & gristly.

By-products run about 9-11¢ per pound, and it's not all diseased, decayed animals. Those usually end up as fertilizer. By-products are promarily composed of organs (haggis anyone?) and bruised or damaged meat. Bones, hooves, hair, etc. are NOT by-products acceptable in pet foods in the AAFCO (Association of American Feed Control Officials) definition.

The big issue right now is brains and spinal cord of cattle due to "Mad Cow Disease" and the related "Panicked Human Syndrome." Ironically, I have yet to see any fuss in the pet food community about our beloved venison formula foods and "Chronic Wasting Disease." Chronic Wasting Disease is closely related to "Mad Cow" and is much more prevalent in US Deer than Mad Cow has ever been in the US or even worldwide. Oh well, we have never been a nation that picks our panics on a rational basis.

Oops - almost forgot one of my main points! Just because the Meat Processing portion of Merrick uses 4D animals - it doesn't mean Merrick uses them in their foods. As a meat processing facility, I'm sure they also proccess meat that is sold to other companies.

Merrick also makes [linkhttp://www.beefnmore.com/]Beef 'n More[/link]. Anyone want to guess where that beef comes from? Here's a clue - it sells for $15.12/40 lbs [:'(]

He's not making fun of people who believe in holistic foods....he's making fun of the people who are naive and believe that those things are the only thing that determines whether a kibble is "premium"...

Yup exactly I guess it's ok to accuse people of not loving their pets, being cheap, not knowing if their dog looks good cause clearly it can't if they feed iams, etc if they don't agree with feeding super premium, but it's not ok to be sarcastic towords them. Makes perfect sense to me. I guess it's ok to be hurtful to others if you think you are "right", but you can't be sarcastic if you are "wrong". Great, now that we have the forum rules strait........

ORIGINAL: papillon806

he's making fun of the people who are naive and believe that those things are the only thing that determines whether a kibble is "premium"...

Yeah, but I don't think there are any of those people here. Not ones that rely on those particular things. I do see the point though.

ORIGINAL: papillon806
He's not making fun of people who believe in holistic foods....he's making fun of the people who are naive and believe that those things are the only thing that determines whether a kibble is "premium"...

 
I guess it would have been funny if  these "naive" people who blindly follow the recommendations of websites without thought were present here on the forum. 
 
 

Sandra, consumption of lamb is centered in the Northeast and the West Coast, with a small blip in the northern Midwest (Wisconsin, Minnesota, Upper Michigan). Processing is centered in Colorado, Ohio, and Pennsylvania.

Quarters, wings, and drums are still premium cuts. That leaves the frame - the spine, tail, ribs, and neck. Visualize how many chickens it took to put together a pack of quarters - 5 pound family packs have about six, right? Six chickens with no legs, lol.