Page 158 - Small Animal Clinical Nutrition 5th Edition

160 Small Animal Clinical Nutrition

Packaging and freight costs of dry pet foods are lower than
VetBooks.ir those of moist products. Bags are cheaper than cans and it
costs more to ship the additional water (60 to 87% water in
moist foods).Thus, dry foods cost about one-third as much as
moist foods on a cost-per-calorie basis. Dry food particles are
usually formed through extrusion; however, baking, flaking,
pelleting, crumbling and dry meals are other possible manu-
facturing methods.
Dry foods are usually acceptable to most pets, but generally
have reduced average preference when compared with moist or
semi-moist foods.
Dry foods are often perceived as providing dental benefits.
However, the perception that dry foods are superior for dental
Figure 8-3. Chubs are plastic tubes used to package high-protein,
health is a generalization. An epidemiologic study of progres-
high-fat moist foods. A chub’s contents are usually mixed with dry
sive periodontitis in poodles found no correlation between food
pet food or high-carbohydrate modules.
form and disease progression (Hoffman and Gaengler, 1996).
Chapter 47 provides more details about the relationship
between food and oral health.
Semi-Moist and Soft-Dry Foods
Semi-moist pet foods have an intermediate water content (25 to
35%), falling in between that of moist and dry pet foods. Semi-
moist foods use humectants and acidification with simple
organic acids to control water activity and inhibit mold growth.
Semi-moist foods often contain meat meals and artificial flavors
and provide a sweet, savory flavor to dogs and an acidic note for
cats. This pet food form is highly palatable and has an average
intermediate preference between moist and dry pet foods.
Semi-moist foods are often packed in pouches or wrappers.
Although patients requiring weight control and management of
diabetes mellitus benefit from a consistent food dose, the high-
Figure 8-4. Semi-moist kibbles are frequently blended with dry kib-
er sugar content and lower fiber content of semi-moist foods
bles to make soft-dry combinations. The soft-dry pet food shown
make them ill-suited for these feeding applications. Once very
here contains two different dry foods and two different semi-moist
foods. The semi-moist food improves palatability and provides popular, semi-moist pet foods experienced a greatly reduced
anthropomorphic appeal by simulating pieces of meat and cheese. market acceptance in the 1990s. However, this form continues
to be important as the high-flavor “bits” component of some
popular soft-dry pet food treats. In the soft-dry form, the semi-
moist component may look like burger pieces, cheese, pasta or
vegetables and provide anthropomorphic appeal to pet owners
because of the appearance of ingredient variety (Figure 8-4).

Treats
Treats are small food rewards that owners use for reinforcement
of their bonding with pets, as training aids and just for fun.
Dog owners in the United States spent more than $1.7 billion
on treats for their dogs, and nearly $234 million on treats for
their cats in 2005 (Euromonitor, 2006). A survey of 1,000
United States households revealed that 80% of dog owners
fed human foods or table scraps as treats and almost nine of
10 respondents had fed commercially prepared treats or
snacks (BH&G, 1991). A second survey concluded that about
Figure 8-5. Dried animal tissues are popular pet treats. Examples
60% of dogs received treats in some form and 30% were also
shown here include bovine penis, porcine penis, porcine tail, ovine
given meat or meat juice (Slater et al, 1995). Market research
lung, beef kidney, porcine ear, bovine liver, porcine nose, bovine
indicates that more than 90% of dog owners who purchase
trachea, turkey feet, bovine chin tissue and whole fish.
a
specialty dog food brands give their dogs treats. Sixty-five
percent purchase biscuits, 45% buy “bones” and 40% buy