>From:    "Church, Robert Ray
> 7. "Natural" foods are more nutritious than processed foods.  FALSE....
>BUT, the truth is, if a processed diet contained the same nutrients in
>the same proportions as a natural diet, it would be just as good for the
>ferret.
 
##I am going to disagree with ya Bob!  You make no mention of the
bioavailibility of these nutrients once they are processed.  I could take
raw food, 100% nutritionally complete, whirl it up in a blender, then
process it, and the ferret is not going to get from that food what he
would of unprocessed.  Then let's toss in some preservatives to keep the
food "fresher" and that may also affect the animals health.  You have
already touched on the grain issue so we won't go there, I agree they are
useless to a ferret (or cat or dog, for that matter).  What about EFA's
that are denatured in the heating process?  The digestibility of these
proteins,vitamins, minerals, EFA's is affected by the processing.  No
processed food will ever be better than a raw, natural one.  Could a
better kibble be made?  Sure, leave out the grains and that would be
one heck of a step in the right direction!  But still wouldn't compare
to a natural diet.  And it is probably not feasible to make a grain free
kibble, the grains are added as filler and to bind everything together.
 
Soooo.... to make the processed food you would need to add nutrients
back in that are destroyed in the heating process (and lets hope they
are not synthetic and missing the cofactors that are lost as compared
to natural-in the laboratory, chemists can duplicate sea water that is
chemically identical to natural sea water, but if you put fish in this
synthetic water they will die.  I don't believe a molecule is a molecule
is a molecule!), add grains as a filler and a binder for the extruding
process, and then still not be sure how much is actually bioavailable to
the animal.  Might as well just feed raw and leave out the preservatives
and grains and know what they are getting.  But if ever a kibble is made
that can compare to a natural diet, it would make millions!
 
Here are a few links that touch on the processing of our pet foods
(sorry-they are geared towards cats and dogs but still apply)
 
http://www.barfworld.com/html/learn_more/processed.shtml
 
http://www.b-naturals.com/win00.htm
 
  ~Amy~
[Posted in FML issue 3943]