8 Ways Healthy Pet Food Can Change Your Dog or Cat

Everyone loves food. Our pets, most of all! The food your pets eat can impact their life drastically. We’ve listed out 8 ways healthy pet food can change your dog or cat.

Just like your children, your pets need good food, a safe place to live in, and unconditional love and support to grow into the beautiful beings they are. Good nutrition is as important for your dog or cat, as it is for any other member of your family. The quality of the food you feed your pet makes a great difference in your pet’s health and happiness. “You become what you eat” applies to pets, better than it does to most humans.

Healthy food shows on our body and mind. A burger or pizza may seem more tempting than a bowl of salad, but they surely have their toll on the body. When you eat a bowl of salad or a healthy sandwich, you feel light even right after your meal; you’re energetic all day and your mood is naturally uplifted.

It’s the same for your pet! When your dog or cat eats a healthy, species-appropriate meat-based diet, they feel healthy from the inside and tend to excel at all life activities. Let’s look at some of the ways a balanced and healthy diet can help your pet dog or cat:

Gives Energy

Our bodies are made quite differently from those of our pets. While we humans have evolved over hundreds of centuries to digest a variety of foods, our pets are quite far behind the curve. Therefore, what may be staple food for you, may not be the best fit for your dog or cat. A species appropriate diet could mean that your pet is able to digest it more easily. A balanced diet will provide all essential nutrients to your pet dog or cat, without putting stress on their body. It also means they’ll be able to assimilate the food into energy more quickly, and without compromise. Your dog will be more active, energetic and playful.

Keeps Away Obesity

Obesity is a major issue with Indian Urban pets. A processed food regime and a lifestyle with little or no exercise put every 3 out of 4 urban pets into the bracket of ‘overweight animals’. Sometimes, over-humanization could also be the reason behind your pet gaining weight rapidly. We obviously want the best for our dog or cat, but sometimes we tend to go overboard with the love. This love is often accumulated as excess fat on your pet’s body and makes way for a wide array of lifestyle disorders, including but not limited to bone and joint issues (hip dysplasias, rheumatoid arthritis, etc.), respiratory & pulmonary diseases, diabetes, and heart diseases, etc.

Healthy Skin & Coat

A diet with all nutrients in balance, particularly Zinc, Iodine, and Selenium keep your pet’s skin and coat healthy. The food you feed must be rich in vitamins A, B-complex, E and Omega fatty acids for your baby’s hair to be smooth and silky. Antioxidants are the most important component of food that’s essential for a healthy skin and coat. Processed diets such as kibble and canned food provide no antioxidants to your darling. A deficiency of these essential nutrients can lead to dry, itchy or patchy skin, rashes, boils, unusual redness, dandruff, hair fall and bald patches on the skin.

Better Oral Hygiene

A biologically appropriate diet will ensure a perfect oral hygiene for your pet. Your dog or cat’s teeth and gums are designed to tear flesh and meat. Their saliva contains enzymes to begin digesting meat, even before it reaches their stomach. Their mouth is designed to self-cleanse itself while they consume a species-appropriate diet. You wouldn’t see any animal in the wild taking a dentist’s appointment. That’s because the food they eat takes care of the plaque that’s accumulated on their teeth. Mouth odor or bad breath is a byproduct of bad food. A dog or cat that’s feeding on a correct and balanced diet seldom has foul breath or weakening teeth.

Stronger Immunity

If you eat healthily, you fall sick less often. The nutrients & antioxidants in the food enable our body’s defense system – the Immune system to fight off the disease-causing pathogens more efficiently. Think of it as an army that’s armed well. This is exactly how it works for your pet dog or cat. When your pet eats a healthy, species-appropriate meat-based diet, their immune system functions at an enhanced rate, keeping them safe from most infections that hit them in their daily routine.

Lowered Medical Expense

Most of the infections are handled by the body’s immune system. So your pet is less likely to fall sick to the point where you have to rush him to the vet. That’s your hard earned money saved! Not only vet visits cost a lot of money, they’re also a traumatizing experience for your pet. Nobody wants to see the face of a hospital, and a balanced and nutritionally complete diet keeps you and your pet away from one.

Increased Longevity

Healthy food can add up to a year or two to your pet’s life. Similarly, bad food, processed kibble, and canned preparations could take away a couple of years. For an animal whose average lifespan is about 8 to 12 years, that’s a lot of time! Pets who feed on a biologically correct and nutritionally balanced diet often live longer and healthier than their friends who survive on packaged food.

Conditioned Behavior

Our pets can’t communicate with us verbally. Unlike our human babies, they cannot convey when they’re in pain or irritated. However, it almost always shows up in their behavior. A dog or cat that’s suffering from a pain is often irritated and snappy. We often ignore such behavior as occasional bouts of aggression or a random mood swing, while it could just be an indication that your baby is hurting. A pet who feeds on a healthy diet is usually free from such anxiety, aggression and hence, lives a happy and disease-free life.

The best food for your dog or cat is real food. Therefore, avoid feeding packaged food like kibble or canned preparations for your dog or cat. If you’re unable to feed a balanced diet at home, seek help from a pet nutritionist and subscribe to a health food service like ours for your pet. Nothing can match the goodness of real meat, veggies, fruits and seeds for your furry darling. If you wouldn’t want to eat something that comes out of a packet every day, so why feed the same to your pet?

Does your dog or cat love to eat? Share their stories in the comments below.