Wow! lefty, what a find!

I heard on a newscast there are many pigs in the United States that can't be sold for human food, but they didn't say why. I wonder if this melamine laced food has anything to do with it?

People all over the world aparently are used to eating food from diseased animals?

All this makes no sense. Why would such crap be allowed here or be shipped here? Such stuff or stories of it, just seems to be getting worse. The another day a lady told me she read something about arsenic in chicken. I haven't bothered to try and look it, but like I said above, these stories just keep getting worse and worse. Pretty soon it will be mad cow, chicken flues and all that again. Something stinks about all this. I never heard much about this stuff growing up. As far as I know, it never happened or they never told us anything. Like when something like this "might" have happened. None of this stuff happened in Dad's time either. (As far as he knows.) Something is very wrong and I suppose it will come down to the saving of $$$$. Isn't that usual case, cutting corners to save money?

A friend of mine said "If you've lost your dog, get two dogs. Get two big dogs. Feed them meals made from table scraps / left overs, until the danger is over."

He always has a couple or three big dogs, which tends to make people not want to visit him and that includes friends. I find it very intimidating when I visit. I never go there unless I'm very very sure "he" is home. He likes it that way and says - "no one will be snooping around here".

SI--

I have heard of arsenic being used to fatten chickens. Don't know if it is true or not, never looked into it. Don't eat much meat anyway.

Your friend has a good idea if he really doesn't want company. Not many people want to deal with BIG dogs--even little yappy ones annoy people.

The biggest problem with table scraps as I understand it, is they generally are not nutritionally balanced for dogs or cats. Catherine has some sites on this thread that tell people how to make food at home using ingredients for human food.

I am not too sure about human food in this day and age, unfortunately.

New York Times

Filler in Animal Feed Is Open Secret in China



So that is why pigs have been taken off the market--the same melamine in pet foods was in some farm food as well.

Wouldn't it be nice if this were to step up food safety rules in this country?

Oh, yeah, I forgot. This is Bush's America...

If it is really true, it is certainly bad. (Pigs) Yeah .. I wonder about the smoke & Mirrors on some things, as they might be false distractions. Either way, it isn't good. I'm not big on meat eater. My cousin has a big garden and some animals, so I get some really good food that isn't sprayed or anything. He has a few cows, so no need for fertilizers. Once in a great while, he gets and adds half rotten seaweed to the soil, as he is near the coast. I just visit him and he loads me up with stuff. All very good food. Hopefully things will get better. What the Country needs is the old time farmers / farms and to hell with those factory farms. The good farmer has been and still is being run out of town by the Cartel Crooks. Might have been used to fatten up Chickens .. I would not be surprised. How would it not kill them .. very low dosage maybe?

Thanks! Dori.

Chicken and fish are the only meats I eat. I haven't eaten beef in years...not since Mad Cow came on the scene. Veggie burgers are great, as are the veggie hot dogs. There's a company called Seafood America that makes fantastic crab cakes, too.

With China becoming our main source of so many consumables up to and including food for both animal and human, I believe these kinds of food castrophes will continue to escalate. China has very few values when it comes to living things.

SI, my old neighbor, who owned and ran his single family farm when I moved here, taught me many things about the land and especially the 'old times' when farmers had to work together to plant and harvest. Single room schools then, areas had to stick together to exist.

He also taught me how the banks came in when things got more modern, and drove out so many small farmers. He hated people using the term 'farmer' as a negative, as though farmers were stupid people. The amount of paper work alone would choke less involved persons.

Our nation's problems came in no small part from people getting away from the soil. If you are not in touch with the earth, your values become more self-involved.

That old farmer had more knowledge about life than any of our highly educated dunces that have never considered us to be just another part of nature.

Catherine, I, too, eat more soy product than meat. Just the way factory farms are run, and our food supply is handled turns me off. Haven't had beef for years now. A little chicken, a little fish, and a lot of (genetically altered) soy. Oh well, can't have everything...

I am told someone found a deadly mixture in the pet food--but have not found a link yet. Still looking.

The old time farmer is / was the good guy. Especially those who stuck to the old and learned ways. We'll all be dead if China ends up as the main food supplier. China is a dirty smog choked slave labor nation. Nothing comes out of there except crap.

My dad's (small) dog has all of a sudden developed what they think is kidney trouble. I wondered about the food they are feeding him, so I asked. They said Alpo I think? This would be from a Canadian value foods store. I'll have to call them again in order to get more details. I'm not sure if it is the cause or not, but you never know?

SI--

[url=http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/24790209/]Pet owners, makers of tainted food reach deal
Companies agree to pay $24 million after animals were poisoned[/url]

MOUNT LAUREL, N.J. - Companies that were sued over contaminated pet food linked to the deaths of perhaps thousands of dogs and cats have agreed to pay $24 million to pet owners in the United States and Canada.

The settlement is detailed in papers filed late Thursday in U.S. District Court in Camden. It still needs a judge's approval.

"The settlement attempts to reimburse pet owners for all of their economic damages," said Russell Paul, a lawyer for plaintiffs in the lawsuit.

The deal would affect people who incurred expenses directly related to the illness or death of a pet linked to the food, which was at the center of the biggest-ever U.S. pet food recall in 2007.

Nearly 300 people sued about 30 companies in state and federal courts. They and perhaps thousands of other pet owners would be eligible for payments under the deal.

Ontario-based Menu Foods Income Fund, which makes dog and cat food under about 90 brand names, and other firms that make or sell pet food announced April 1 that they were settling lawsuits with pet owners.

The pet food was discovered to contain wheat gluten imported from China that was contaminated with melamine, a chemical used to make plastics. Though Menu was the first company to issue recalls, four other companies eventually recalled pet foods, too.

Some of the companies have already paid out more than $8 million to people whose pets were sickened or killed after eating the contaminated food.

I'm glad there will be repercussions for the companies, but I don't think money is going to be the answer. The pets are still gone. I know that I love my animals like my family and would be distraught if they were to die because of negligence like that!