Debate: Are dogs carnivores or omnivores?

Cat's are more pure carnivores than dogs, their bodies can handle it better. In the wild wolves for instance will eat berries, leaves, chew on sticks, etc. Decent dog foods today have both fruits & veggies inside as well as the meat, etc. High protein is proven to be very hard on a dogs body, especially the liver. I feed Innova EVO which is very high protein, I'm keep urine tests to watch there organ levels.

Could a dog live on vegis alone?

No. Neither can humans. Not all living things can live without a protein source of some kind.

They're opportunistic carnivores, rather than obligatory carnivores, like cats. They need meat, but they'll eat whatever's available.

Dogs can live on a vegetarian diet. I don't know how well they'd do, long term (probably about as well as any dog on low quality food). Emma was a vegetarian for close to a year. Her medical condition, at the time, required it. She did extremely well on her home prepared, vegetarian diet. She really enjoyed it, too. When her epilepsy became a serious concern, I switched her over to sweet potato and fish. It took a long time to reintroduce meat and build back to a varied, meat inclusive diet.

Dogs cannot naturally digest cellulose. They may eat, and enjoy, vegetable material but they cannot survive on it alone without human intervention.

[linkhttp://www.chu.cam.ac.uk/%7EALRF/giintro.htm]This[/link] is from Director of Studies in Medical and Veterinary Sciences, Dr A.L.R. Findlay, Physiological Laboratory, University of Cambridge

Efficient digestion (particularly microbial digestion) and absorption depend on an adequately slow movement of digesta through the tract; movement of digesta through the large intestine in a non-ruminant herbivore, such as the horse, is much slower than in a carnivore, such as the dog.

Carnivores obtain most of their food by eating other animals, and their digestion relies largely on enzymes rather than micro-organisms. Microbial digestion of cellulose occurs in the colon of the dog, but to such a small extent that the colon can be removed and the dog can survive perfectly well.

The small intestine of all mammals digests soluble carbohydrate, fat and protein, but cannot digest cellulose. The dog on a normal diet depends almost entirely on its small intestine for its nutrition.

I read that dogs are not considered true carnivores, becuase they cannot produce their own amino acids.  Cats are true carnivores.
 
Also, in the wild, dogs consume their prey's stomach, and it's contents, which often contains plant/vegetable matter.  So, a wild dog would get some flora in their diet[].

This might be THE most discussed topic on the forum! (Any way to measure that?) If you think Cesar Milan threads get heated, check out past discussions on the omnivore/carnivore question.

ORIGINAL: workingpaws

Could a dog live on vegis alone?

No. Neither can humans. Not all living things can live without a protein source of some kind.

NO animal of any kind can survive without some protein source of some kind. But, fruits and vegetables are a source of protein and are adequate for many animals, including humans. I think it would be possible for dogs to survive on a diet of plant material alone if legumes and high quality grains were included, provided the dog was not allergic to these protein sources. I certainly wouldn't recommend it though, and I certainly don't think it's anything near an optimum diet.

Also the point made by another poster that dogs can't digest cellulose is true, but some vegetables, while high in cellulose, do also contain digestible carbohydrates and at least low levels of protein. Some legumes might contain enough protein to support a dog's needs although again, I'm hardly recommending it. Just sayin' that I think it's theoretically possible.

Well, for a thread that has traditionally caused lots of strife, we are all agreeing! []

To me the label "opportunistic carnivores" fits the bill quite nicely for dogs.

You have to keep in mind too the way a body breaks down food. Food sources high in sugar (or food sources which turn to sugar when the body breaks them down) need protein to counter act the high glucose in the body. Some animals need higher protein than others to regulate.

Possibly a bad explanation, but I need food at the moment myself. []

Dogs are omnivores, in spite of their teeth. They do best on a high meat diet but they are capable of digesting some plant matter and will eat whatever is available.
 

I think dogs are facultative carnivores whereas cats are obligate carnivores.

Paula

Paulaedwina is technically right -- "in the wild" a dog will be a carnivore but they will also eat the contents of the stomach of their kill (usually vegetable matter).  They will also, when meat isn't available, consume vegetable matter to survive short term.
 
Enter domestication -- dogs **with help** can be an omnivore -- that means the vegetable matter needs to be extremely processed already (like "in the stomach of their kill") so it is essentially pre-digested.  And they do better on *less* than a full meat diet if you want longevity.
 
But a dog can't live WELL on a totally vegetarian diet.  Even if protein of some sort is balanced/added -- because they need the taurine and l-carnitine from meat and what can be supplemented just is not absorbable enough for them.  To do this is extemely difficult.  I've known vegetarians who imposed this diet on their dogs but you usually don't get a long-lived dog.
 
A dog can seem relatively healthy on a veg diet, BUT eventually (usually about the age of 5-7) you will see severe heart problems that are usually terminal.  The onset of those heart problems often seems sudden, but when they track dogs fed a purely veg diet it is predictable.  My sources are several of the vets at U of Florida (who are vegetarians by the way) who have studied this long and hard.  The small board I moderate is a veg*n board so this, altho I am not veg*n, is a topic I've studied a lot with/for friends.
 
There are a lot of veg*n foods out there, but unfortunately despite claims, long term prognosis isn't good.  It's just not natural for them.

think it would be possible for dogs to survive on a diet of plant material alone if

 
no way. Dogs can't digest plants unless they are processed first-- either in a herbivore's stomach or cooked by humans.
Dogs are carnivores who have fairly recently evolved into scavengers. They've survived for thousands of years eating man's garbage.

To me the label "opportunistic carnivores" fits the bill quite nicely for dogs.

 
I agree.  A dog is domesticated wolf.  It has the physiology of a carnivore (jaw, teeth, digestive tract) and lacks, for instance, the saliva enzymes and molars of omnivores. 
 
There has not been enough time for significant evolutionary change to a dog's digestive system.  The different sizes, shapes, and colors of dogs were largely produced by man's selective breeding.  There has been no selective breeding for changes to the digestive system.
 
Dogs can get some nutrition from vegetable matter, but it is easy to see that they have a hard time digesting it.  Look at the large poop of most kibble-fed dogs vs the small poop of a raw-fed dog.  Smell those two poops and you will find that the large one is the one that really stinks.
 
The Comparative Anatomy of Eating
[linkhttp://www.geocities.com/RainForest/2062/ana.HTML]www.geocities.com/RainForest/2062/ana.HTML[/link]
 
Myth: Dogs Are Omnivores
[linkhttp://rawfed.com/myths/omnivores.html]http://rawfed.com/myths/omnivores.html[/link]
"A black bear is a true omnivore, as are we. We have nice, large, flat molars that can grind up veggies. Black bears, while having impressive canine teeth, also have large flat molars in the back of their mouth to assist in grinding up plant matter. Dogs and most canids lack these kinds of molars. ...
 
Dogs (and cats) are equipped with powerful jaw muscles and neck muscles that assist in pulling down prey and chewing meat, bone, and hide. Their jaws hinge open widely, allowing them to gulp large chunks of meat and bone. Their skulls are heavy, and are shaped to prevent lateral movement of the lower jaw when captured prey struggles (the mandibular fossa is deep and C-shaped); this shape permits only an up-and-down crushing motion, whereas herbivores and omnivores have flatter mandibular fossa that allows for the lateral motion necessary to grind plant matter ...
 
Vegetable and plant matter, however, needs time to sit and ferment. This equates to longer, sacculated colons, larger and longer small intestines, and occasionally the presence of a caecum. Dogs have none of these, but have the shorter foregut and hindgut consistent with carnivorous animals.  ...
 
Dogs do not normally produce the necessary enzymes in their saliva (amylase, for example) to start the break-down of carbohydrates and starches; amylase in saliva is something omnivorous and herbivorous animals possess, but not carnivorous animals. ...
 
Wolves do NOT eat the stomach contents of their prey. Only if the prey is small enough (like the size of a rabbit) will they eat the stomach contents, which just happen to get consumed along with the entire animal. Otherwise, wolves will shake out the stomach contents of their large herbivorous prey before sometimes eating the stomach wall.  ...
 
The dog is, by all scientific standards and by evolutionary history, a domesticated wolf (Feldhamer, G.A. 1999. Mammology: Adaptation, Diversity, and Ecology. McGraw-Hill. pg 472.).  ...
 
From mouth to anus, dog and wolf physiology and basic anatomy are almost precisely the same. What is the significance of this? This means dogs should still be fed a carnivorous diet to meet their needs.   ...
 
Kibbled foods (which are cooked and highly processed) have only been around for the last 100 years. Evolutionary adaptations require much more time than this. The evolutionary changes—from gross anatomy down to the molecular level—that would be required for the development of such different digestive capabilities would take MUCH longer than the time that wolves have been living with humans.  ...
 
The oldest living raw-fed dog is Jerry, an Australian cattle dog-bull terrier mix. He is 27 and lives with his owner in Australia (Outback Mongrel Could Be Oldest Dog. USA Today. 7-13-2004.). To see the full text story," [linkhttp://www.usatoday.com/news/offbeat/2004-07-13-oldest-dog_x.htm]www.usatoday.com/news/offbeat/2004-07-13-oldest-dog_x.htm[/link]

Didn't they also pretty much domestic themselves for man's scraps?

And in the long run ended up with kibble.

 Oh, the irony of it all

Dogs are carnivores who have fairly recently evolved into scavengers. They've survived for thousands of years eating man's garbage.