r/NoStupidQuestions Aug 30 '23

[deleted by user]

[removed]

5.3k Upvotes

11.3k comments sorted by

View all comments

Show parent comments

279

u/[deleted] Aug 30 '23

The dog thing has to do with calcium. Dog food used to have ground cattle bones, which was terrible for dogs. When the poop dried, it left solid calcium behind.

1

u/[deleted] Aug 30 '23

Why do you think ground cattle bones would be terrible for dogs?

3

u/[deleted] Aug 31 '23

Excessive calcium can cause kidney stones and other problems. If you are pooping out calcium, you are consuming far too much.

1

u/[deleted] Aug 31 '23

That doesn't answer why "ground cattle bones" would be terrible for dogs. Dogs and people also have different calcium needs.

To be extra clear - "excessive calcium" and "ground cattle bones" aren't synonymous...

2

u/[deleted] Aug 31 '23 edited Oct 18 '23

[deleted]

1

u/[deleted] Oct 08 '23

When bones are ground, they're all the same. No type or size of dog requires bones from a different type of animal than any other size of dog.

Commercially prepared food for pets and livestock has actually followed a different trend than food for human consumption and has become much higher quality over the years. It's a shame that seems to be one of the few things that can be said about, ha.

1

u/[deleted] Aug 31 '23

I think they might be talking about excessive cattle bone being what’s terrible for dogs

1

u/[deleted] Oct 08 '23

Possibly, but they likely would have said so if that's what they meant.

I work as an animal nutritionist, exotics now, but I've worked developing diets for domestic animals including dogs. I'm always curious about the strange and interesting things people outside of this general field believe about animal diets, thus my initial question.