Most dogs and cats have been fed sterile (cooked) foods most of their lives, so we recommend Pet Patties be introduced slowly over the first week or so. Small pinches increased daily allow your animal's digestive system to adjust to the new food. Pet Patties can be steadily increased to 1% of body weight if used as a supplement or 2% of body weight for a total fitness diet. This relates to one 8-ounce patty (per day) for a 25-pound dog or ½ patty (per day) for an average cat.

Most Pet Patty customers did experience the health promoting diet as being slightly more costly - initially. Animals will often consume up to twice the recommended amount of Pet Patties during transitional periods, until nutritional deficiencies are satisfied. Once nutritionally saturated, usually in the first 30 days, most pets will automatically cut their food intake to normal levels, resulting in costs per day just slightly higher than premium dry or canned foods. Most customers' analysis of this cost report health promoting Pet Patties as the least expensive way to raise animals, especially when considering money saved on health care costs and supplementation.

Traveling with frozen Pet Patties can be a challenge. That's why AFS developed the freeze-dried version. Freeze-drying is the only way to preserve the nutritional integrity of the health promoting Pet Patties while offering the convenience of a shelf stable product needing no refrigeration. Simply re-hydrate Pet Patties with water and bingo - fresh raw meat with all its benefits. Freeze-dried Pet Patties can be broken into small pieces and fed dry. Pet Patties make wonderful treats!

Unfortunately, most veterinary schools provide grossly inadequate education on basic canine and feline nutrition. Few veterinarians know that AFS has provided these same raw meat diets to zoos, circuses, wildlife parks, and professional dog and cat breeders for nearly three decades. AFS raw meat diets were developed under the scrutiny of, and consultation with the most discriminating veterinarians and animal nutritionists. Ask any Pet Patty customer, and you will discover health benefits from a raw meat diet that far outweighs any risk factors.

The answer is very simple - undamaged enzymes and amino acids! A raw meat diet contains cellular enzymes and complete amino acid profile (the protein building blocks) totally undamaged by heat processing. Temperatures in excess of 120 degrees F destroy many of the important amino acids and all cellular enzymes. Most processed and canned pet foods are cooked at temperatures in excess of 120 degrees F. Animals often suffer from the same degenerative diseases humans do when consuming highly processed foods. Raw foods, complete with their own cellular enzymes, improve the quality and quantity of nutrient assimilation. This allows your favorite pet to conserve its own enzyme energy for other important life enriching health benefits. Wouldn't we all like our four-legged companions to live long, healthy, and happy lives? Animal Food Services raw meat diets will help your pet reach its genetic potential.

The transporting of unprocessed meat items for pet food is regulated by the compliance division of the USDA. As a means of denaturing these products, i.e. distinguishing from human foods, it is mandatory to mix something harmless, but easy to identify, into the mix. The use of charcoal, an inert totally harmless organic substance and often used as a digestive aid for animals, is the most widely used and accepted of the options available.

Bacteria such as Salmonella and E-coli are becoming more difficult to control in today's meat because of the concentration of animals living in close proximity. AFS diets are not made from feedlot cattle, but from more free-ranging cattle. This factor, along with 40 years experience in handling, chilling, and flash freezing raw meat diets, greatly reduces the chances for bacterial contamination. In addition, dogs and cats have a natural deterrent to ingested bacteria due to their highly acidic stomach environment. However, it is important to introduce any raw meat diet slowly to their present food and gradually increase daily for 7-10 days to recommended levels. This gradual increase allows your companion pets the opportunity to adjust to, and take full advantage of their ancestor's food of choice - nutritionally rich raw meat with minimum risk!

AFS Meat Eater Diet, though predominately a meat diet, and targeted primarily for dogs, has a small percentage of cereal food fines included. Because some dogs are very active, they consume increased quantities of food and extract and burn more calories from their food. AFS has included this carbohydrate source to satisfy this demand. Also, the extreme digestibility factor of this food demands the extra fiber for stool formation. AFS Carnivore Diet, targeted for cats, does not need the added carbohydrate due to the sedentary life-styles of most cats. Cats and dogs that consume cooked grains as their predominate pet food, too often manifest very apparent nutritional deficiencies, i.e. weight, skin, and odor problems. Vegetables, though not most carnivores preferred choice of food, can be successfully added to meat diets, but should be emulsified and fed raw to protect their natural digestive enzymes for better assimilation

When comparing diets, one must always compare on a dry matter basis to get equivalent values. When compared on a dry weight basis AFS diets are not low at all, 44-50% protein and 29-35% fat. The more important aspect of protein is the quality of protein, or the biological value (the measurement of how much of the protein is actually turned into body tissue). AFS diets are at the "top of the food chain" when it comes to digestibility and biological value.

There are so few truly organic beef processors that it is impossible to build a market from such small quantities. AFS does the next best thing. Instead of using feedlot beef in our diets (which have been raised in large numbers and in close proximity, loaded with growth hormones and antibiotics), we procure our meat source from packing plants that process retired dairy cows or free ranging beef cows.

The term "meat by-products" has gained an undeserving negative connotation due to some careless advertising by some pet food companies, not knowing the true definition of the term. The official AAFCO (Association of American Feed Control Officials) definition: Meat by-products - the non-rendered, clean parts, other than meat (meaning muscle tissue) derived from slaughtered mammals. It includes, but is not limited to lungs, spleen, kidneys, brain, liver, blood, bone, partially defatted low temperature fatty tissue, and stomachs and intestines freed of their contents. It does not include hair, horns, teeth and hooves. AFS uses some of the products in the definition, all being organ meats procured from the government inspected meat plants. We do not divulge the exact organs or percentages used, due to the proprietary nature of our formulas. We DO NOT include hair, brain matter, spinal cords, horns, teeth, intestines and hooves. What we DO include makes a well-fortified, balanced, nutritious meat diet. It also produces the proper calcium and phosphorus ratio, complete amino acid profile, and a rich vitamin and mineral diet undamaged by heat processing.

AFS adds no artificial colors or preservatives to our meat diets. We preserve our products through freezing (at -40 degrees F) or freeze-drying which are the only methods of protecting the natural nutrition in Mother Nature's most complete and balanced food - a raw meat diet.

Freeze-drying is a process that removes the moisture from the meat in a vacuum chamber, while still frozen. By bringing the temperature to the triple point 32 degrees F (where moisture can exist as an ice crystal, water or gas), the moisture is evacuated from an ice crystal to a gas without entering the liquid stage. The minimum amount of added heat to accomplish this is insufficient to destroy the amino acids or digestive enzymes. Freeze-drying, though considerably higher in cost, is the only way to preserve meat without chemicals, irradiation, or heat damage to nutrition. It is yet another example of Animal Food Services' commitment to nutritional excellence.

Meat that is cooked above 120 degrees F loses its natural digestive enzymes as well as some of the important fragile amino acids such as Taurine. The preventative health benefits of an uncooked, balanced, raw meat diet can be seen in the testimonials of AFS customers. Meat eaters, from small pet ferrets, through all sizes of domestic dogs and cats, to the Carnivora Magnificent lions and tigers build strong immune defense mechanisms on AFS diets, protecting them from infection and affording them the healthiest diet prescribed by Mother Nature - raw meat!

Defrosting AFS raw meat diets should always be done slowly in the refrigerator. Remove the plastic wrapper from the frozen roll, place in a covered container and place in refrigerator. Each day the outer layer of meat will be thawed enough for feeding. Another technique: place 5-pound roll in refrigerator overnight, then cut with large or electric knife into desired daily portions for individual defrosting. Wrap and replace unused cut portions in the freezer immediately.

Some dogs, especially when they are young, have an amazing ability to digest just about anything that looks like food and do well on it. However, even they have a tendency to degenerate as they grow older, usually at 4-5 years of age. When the organs of the body, especially the all-important digestive machine, the pancreas, start to age, it is much easier on the animal's system to be eating a diet with the digestive enzymes still intact and undamaged by heat processing. Raw foods provide this. Numerous people from European countries who feed raw meat diets confirm the health benefits and longevity of large breed dogs, i.e. Great Danes, Rottweilers, Mastiffs, etc. to ages of 15 years or longer. This reality is nearly unheard of in our country, except those companion pets on raw meat diets.

Human beings, being omnivorous (feeding upon animal and vegetable food), do not have the digestive tools our ancient ancestors had, and dogs still have, in order to handle raw meat. Even though we would digest our meat better if eaten raw, we no longer possess the tools to handle the bacteria as well as carnivores do when eating or feeding on raw meat.

Meat that is uneaten, even if mixed with other foods, should be returned to the refrigerator as soon as possible. Any time meat temperature rises in excess of 40 degrees F the bacteria multiply. This can lead to a sick animal if left out too long. We recommend thawed or re-hydrated freeze-dried meat be returned to the refrigerator within 20 minutes.

Raw meat diets do not produce tartar on teeth for one reason - enzymes. Raw meat left between teeth or along the gum line will self-digest because of the undestroyed natural digestive enzymes. On the other hand, cooked food particles can remain on the gum line, setting up the perfect host for bacteria to proliferate, causing tartar and bad breath. Excessive tartar can cause periodontal disease.

There are various probable causes of bloat, but Animal Food Services has never known of a dog bloating on meat. Just the opposite seems true. Our raw meat diets have a high digestion and rapid absorption rate, which reduces the chance for gases to form. Many of our customers have reported bloat and flatulence disappearing after their dogs were fed on raw meat diets.

The concept of feeding dogs and cats on raw meat goes back into history. Unfortunately, when the domestic pet trade grew so rapidly the past few decades, most pet food manufacturers opted to go with the convenient methods of manufacturing, transportation and storage. Their emphasis was obviously more on satisfying their own interests and their customers' convenience and less on the nutritional needs of the animals. AFS takes the opposite approach and commits to nutritional excellence, and accepts the challenge to manufacture, distribute, and store a raw meat diet.

The high biological value of the protein in AFS Diets will result in a large reduction in the amount and frequency of stool elimination. Digestion studies done on our diets showed protein absorption in the 90% range. Most commercial pet foods are filled with undigestible (however palatable) ingredients that cause dogs and cats to overeat which creates the need to eliminate several times a day. Animals on AFS Diets generally eliminate just once a day or even every other day. In addition, this kind of digestibility greatly reduces stool odor.

Many of our customers reportedly feed this way successfully. However, the quality of the kibble should be considered. Many of them have so much poorly digestible cooked grains and other ingredients that you are simply adding volumes of fertilizer to your yard. In addition, the meat that goes into most kibble is "meat and bone meal" this ingredient has been cooked once to extreme temperatures only to be added then to cereals and grains and cooked again. How much nutrition can be left after that? Check labels and use kibbles that are predominately meat based - not cereal, meat and bone meal or chicken by-product meal.

If fresh table meat (using common in-home processing procedures) is fed without cooking, processing, or freezing, diseases such as toxoplasmosis and intermediate stages of parasites such as tapeworms could be transmitted.

The word "natural" when applied to some of today's pet foods, is a real stretch of Mr. Webster's primary definition, of or arising from nature: in accordance with what is found or expected in nature. How many commercial pet foods have corn, wheat, soy, or barley as prominent ingredients? These are all natural products for herbivores (feeding chiefly on grass or other plants i.e. cattle, horses, buffalo, goat, deer), but how many carnivores (dog, cat, wolf, lion, tiger) have you observed in nature (the wild) feasting on these products? They are not "natural" for dogs and cats. Fresh raw meat diets are!

Those who have a vested interest in feeding dogs grain have referred to canines as omnivores; biologists have not reclassified them.