Digestible Bites of Short and Snappy Facts

L'il Bite of the Day - Sometimes Chicken Isn't Exactly Chicken

9/21/2013

In our house, rabbit means rabbit. No tricks.

It's useful to sharpen your translation skills in understanding what the NAME on the label of a cat food product actually means. You might be surprised to know that:

AAFCO rules dictate that a product labeled "chicken food" must have at least 95 percent chicken on a dry matter basis (DMB). If the food is named "chicken dinner" or "chicken feast," then the requirement drops down to 25 percent.

If you see the word "with" in the name - "Cat Food With Rabbit" then the food only has to have 3 percent of the ingredient derived from rabbit.

There is no requirement that manufacturers label all sources of animal protein in the name - it's possible, for example, that fish is in a cat food but that nothing on the front of the label reflects that. "Cat Food With Rabbit" could be mostly fish so long as 3 percent of the food came from rabbit.

The FDA and AAFCO give pet food manufacturers very wide berth, time-wise, when it comes to adjusting ingredient labels to reflect changed formulations. You really have no guarantee that the food in the can or bag precisely matches the ingredients listed on the label.

LIKE us on Facebook to get these Bites in your news feed.

5 Comments

Missy

4/24/2014 10:32:38 pm

I have learned so much from your site. My question is about using the whole rabbit from hare today. I use their whole rabbit ( I regrind because there are still larger pieces of bone) and add chunk rabbit to dilute like recommended ( I chopped this into small bites) by 20%. The whole ground rabbit from hare today is in 5# tubes and I add 2# of chunk rabbit. Do I still add the additional hearts(chicken) and liver(chicken) and do I add the gland supplement since ther is a thyroid in the whole rabbit as well as heart and liver? If so, how much? I apologize for the rambling questions, but I question myself every time I prepare rabbits for my cats ( they love it).

Anne link

4/24/2014 10:41:32 pm

Hi Missy - so glad you find the site helpful. If you're using whole rabbit from Hare Today, it already has liver, so there is no need to add any more to it. As for the gland supplement - it's optional. For what it's worth, I still always add it myself when I make rabbit. As for heart - yes, I'd still add the chicken heart. I use the 5-pound "whole rabbit" tubes from Hare Today myself - I add the heart to it and then all the other ingredients MINUS the liver from the recipe that's on the site. Hope that helps!

4/24/2014 10:47:31 pm

Thank you for answering so promptly. How much heart for the 5# of whole rabbit with the additional 2 # of rabbit muscle meat chunks? Do you still add the omegas too? I have been as well as the heart and liver, but read somewhere that it isn't needed?

4/24/2014 10:52:21 pm

Hi Missy - for every five pounds of rabbit, add about 1.5 pounds of chicken heart. Alternatively, you could leave the chicken hearts WHOLE and just use that as the larger "chunks" in the food.

4/24/2014 10:52:52 pm

And yes - I still add the salmon oil when I make rabbit for the Omegas.

Your comment will be posted after it is approved.

L'il Bite of the Day - Sometimes Chicken Isn't Exactly Chicken

Leave a Reply.

L'il Bite Tags