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Germany dioxin contamination mess - could it affect pet food?
The German dioxin contamination story has been in the news a lot lately,
at least here in Europe. It seems that chickens at thousands of farms have been fed dioxin-contaminated feed since March of last year. Here's a link to a BBC story about this: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-12134225 I am worried how this affects pet food made in Germany. I buy Kotyo and Sweety's food online from zooplus, which is a German online pet store, and the food I order from there is shipped from Germany. I checked the cans that I have - the Hill's doesn't say where the can was made. The other food they eat, called Porta21, is made by a German company but it says "product of Thailand" on the can. I am concerned whether the food I have been feeding them for the last year was safe or not. Nowhere in the news articles that I have found online do they mention whether the contaminated chicken meat has ended up in pet food. Has anyone heard anything about pet food being affected by this? Nadia, Kotyo and Sweety -- Little Monster pictures: http://picasaweb.google.com/nnakova/Kotyo Sweety pictures: http://picasaweb.google.com/nnakova/Sweety Kotyo and Sweety together: http://picasaweb.google.com/nnakova/KotyoAndSweety |
#2
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Germany dioxin contamination mess - could it affect pet food?
"Nadia N." wrote in message ... The German dioxin contamination story has been in the news a lot lately, at least here in Europe. It seems that chickens at thousands of farms have been fed dioxin-contaminated feed since March of last year. Here's a link to a BBC story about this: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-12134225 I am worried how this affects pet food made in Germany. I buy Kotyo and Sweety's food online from zooplus, which is a German online pet store, and the food I order from there is shipped from Germany. I checked the cans that I have - the Hill's doesn't say where the can was made. The other food they eat, called Porta21, is made by a German company but it says "product of Thailand" on the can. I am concerned whether the food I have been feeding them for the last year was safe or not. Nowhere in the news articles that I have found online do they mention whether the contaminated chicken meat has ended up in pet food. Has anyone heard anything about pet food being affected by this? No, but why not get in touch with them? I did email my cat food people a while ago to ask about Chinese ingredients. I got a positive response from the firm that is not far from me - who produce Whiskas etc. From Bob Martin (I had some treaties for Boyfie they'd made) they could not assure me that nothing from China was in there so they went into the bin. They were all honest, I think. So why not ask them? I would and did. Nothing harmful will touch my beloved boy's mouth if I can help it. Bob Martin could have said after the USA scandal "Oh, no, nothing from China is in our food", but to give them credit they did not deny it when I asked even though they knew it would mean I would never buy their products again. I like them for that. Tweed |
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Germany dioxin contamination mess - could it affect pet food?
Christina Websell wrote:
"Nadia N." wrote in message ... I am concerned whether the food I have been feeding them for the last year was safe or not. Nowhere in the news articles that I have found online do they mention whether the contaminated chicken meat has ended up in pet food. Has anyone heard anything about pet food being affected by this? No, but why not get in touch with them? I did email my cat food people a while ago to ask about Chinese ingredients. That's a great idea, thanks. I have already emailed zooplus (the online pet store) to ask if they have been informed of any problems by the company that makes the Porta21 food, but I didn't think to email Hill's as well. Nothing harmful will touch my beloved boy's mouth if I can help it. That's exactly how I feel. Kotyo has early stage CRF and I am especially careful with what I feed him. He's only 9, and I plan to have him around for a long time yet. Nadia, Kotyo and Sweety -- Little Monster pictures: http://picasaweb.google.com/nnakova/Kotyo Sweety pictures: http://picasaweb.google.com/nnakova/Sweety Kotyo and Sweety together: http://picasaweb.google.com/nnakova/KotyoAndSweety |
#4
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Germany dioxin contamination mess - could it affect pet food?
Jack Campin - bogus address wrote:
I am concerned whether the food I have been feeding them for the last year was safe or not. Nowhere in the news articles that I have found online do they mention whether the contaminated chicken meat has ended up in pet food. Has anyone heard anything about pet food being affected by this? The contaminant was in eggs, which are not a standard ingredient of catfood. The only kinds of catfood where I've seen egg listed as an ingredient were the Hills "c/d" food for cats susceptible to FUS and their "anti-struvite" food designed to disintegrate the crystals that cause it. So maybe it might be worth worrying for this sort of food. But if the chickens have been fed contaminated feed since March, wouldn't their bodies also contain high levels of dioxin? From what I've read online, both meat and eggs are affected - http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-12135747 From the link: "German authorities have blocked meat and eggs sales from some 4,700 farms across the country after it was revealed that chickens and pigs had eaten feed contaminated with dangerous levels of dioxins." Kotyo eats Hill's k/d for his CRF. The list of ingredients for k/d includes chicken and pork liver. Sweety eats Hill's Chicken and Liver where the main ingredient is chicken. I'll definitely be emailing Hill's in the morning. Nadia, Kotyo and Sweety -- Little Monster pictures: http://picasaweb.google.com/nnakova/Kotyo Sweety pictures: http://picasaweb.google.com/nnakova/Sweety Kotyo and Sweety together: http://picasaweb.google.com/nnakova/KotyoAndSweety |
#5
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Germany dioxin contamination mess - could it affect pet food?
"Jack Campin - bogus address" wrote in message ... But you didn't ask the right question and didn't interpret the answer right. Whiskas (the company you were dealing with) makes catfood in factories in China, for domestic Chinese consumption; there haven't been any problems with that product, but they have catfood factories elsewhere in the Far East which exported contaminated product *to* China and poisoned pets there. (Not with melamine, but just as bad). So what you are saying is that they lied to me when I asked them about food sources? Tweed |
#6
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Germany dioxin contamination mess - could it affect pet food?
Jack Campin - bogus address wrote:
Once the catfood is formulated and in the tin, there is some chance of tracing it, since the manufacturer prints a batch number on each tin, which will encode the time and place it was made. I have a Whiskas tin in front of me that says 023401GB208E294 01 11 12 MU and I'd guess the GB means it was canned in a plant in Britain. But before then - how do you label the origin of a lump of steam-cooked meat in a mass of jelly? Genetic barcodes? You'd have to get that info from whoever transported the content to the canning facility. They will have a record of where the content came from. However, the content itself is made up of ingredients, each of which could have come from different places. So then you'd have to find out where each ingredient came from. Then you'd have to ask the places where each ingredient was manufactured, to see where the ingredients for each ingredient came from. It's exponential. Of course, eventually, each line of inquiry would end up with a something that can't be further broken down, and once you'd exhausted all the paths of the import/export/ transport tree, you would know where everything came from. EXCEPT... often times, when a plant buys ingredients/parts to manufacture an item, there might be several possible vendors they use, depending on availability, current price, phase of the moon, etc. It might not always be clear which company provided ingredient X in this particular batch of compound Q. If you're just trying to eliminate certain manufacturers or countries, then you'd have to check every potential source, at each stage of manufacture, to see if your blacklisted place(s) pop up. This, at least, is theoretically possible. But you'll never get a definitive answer about where every ingredient in a specific can of cat food came from. Also, record-keeping for transport isn't always reliable, so there might be missing or plain wrong information somewhere along the line. As I've said before, I think you'd need to hire a private detective to get your answers. I also think that, in some part of every manufactured item, something's going to come from China, and I just don't think it's possible to avoid it. But as you pointed out, China is not the only country that cuts corners, with potentially disastrous consequences. It's just the most visible one at the moment. You'd have to live on an isolated island, and get everything you use from your own work or that of your fellow strandees on the island, in order to be sure where everyhing comes from. Joyce |
#7
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Germany dioxin contamination mess - could it affect pet food?
hopitus wrote:
I woold make a bet the OP lives elsewhere, with a name like that one, an email addy like that, and importing pet food from Europe, but who knows? She could live in Chi-town for all I know. Spain, actually :-) The choices for decent quality pet food are very limited in the stores here, which is why I order online. You can't really guess where someone lives from their name, though. Until 4 years ago I was living in Canada, and I still had the same name and email address :-) Nadia, Kotyo and Sweety -- Little Monster pictures: http://picasaweb.google.com/nnakova/Kotyo Sweety pictures: http://picasaweb.google.com/nnakova/Sweety Kotyo and Sweety together: http://picasaweb.google.com/nnakova/KotyoAndSweety |
#8
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Germany dioxin contamination mess - could it affect pet food?
hopitus wrote:
You have some beautiful cats I see. No wonder you pamper and care for them so diligently. Long may they make you happy, no matter where you are. Thanks. I'm glad you liked them. I've told them they have a new admirer, and Sweety started purring contentedly. She's a ragdoll like your Snaggly, and she is a bit vain. Kotyo... well, he is a lone wolf from the wilds of Whistler, and he does not care about the opinion of mere hoomins. Unless they are carrying anything edible, that is. Nadia, Kotyo and Sweety -- Little Monster pictures: http://picasaweb.google.com/nnakova/Kotyo Sweety pictures: http://picasaweb.google.com/nnakova/Sweety Kotyo and Sweety together: http://picasaweb.google.com/nnakova/KotyoAndSweety |
#9
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Germany dioxin contamination mess - could it affect pet food?
Jack Campin - bogus address wrote:
I woold make a bet the OP lives elsewhere, with a name like that one, an email addy like that, and importing pet food from Europe, but who knows? She could live in Chi-town for all I know. Spain, actually :-) The choices for decent quality pet food are very limited in the stores here, which is why I order online. That may be because we in Scotland get to buy catfood made in Spain from a local branch of a German supermarket chain (Lidl's "Coshida" brand). There's none left for you. Maybe you're getting Scottish-fish-based catfood processed in Italy to compensate. Hehe, that's possible. But mostly I think it is because Spain is a country of d*g lovers. There are tons of d*gs everywhere, and lots of different kinds of food and toys for d*gs in the stores. But cat stuff, not so much. Makes me miss Canada - even the smaller pet stores there had a pretty good selection of wet food and cat litter. Here they have a hundred varieties of Royal Canin dry food, a couple of cans of Hill's, and that's it. Nadia, Kotyo and Sweety -- Little Monster pictures: http://picasaweb.google.com/nnakova/Kotyo Sweety pictures: http://picasaweb.google.com/nnakova/Sweety Kotyo and Sweety together: http://picasaweb.google.com/nnakova/KotyoAndSweety |
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