Are Dogs Carnivores… or Omnivores?

by Mike Sagman
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Are dogs carnivores… or omnivores? And so The Great Debate goes on.
question mark
You know, when it comes to choosing a top dog food, you simply have to know the answer to that question.

And you need to know the truth.

So, if you’ve already been told dogs are indifferent omnivores with no natural preferences…

Or that they’re strict carnivores with a built-in aversion to eating fruits and vegetables…

All scientific evidence clearly points to the fact that…

Dogs Have a Natural
and Undeniable Carnivorous Bias

From DNA studies, we know dogs evolved directly from the timber wolf somewhere around 15,000 years ago1.

And, of course, it should come as no surprise… wolves are clearly carnivores.

So, by their very genetic pedigree, dogs also demonstrate similar and noticeable carnivorous traits. Their teeth, their digestive systems and their behavior clearly confirm this fact.

Yet dogs must also be recognized for their significant omnivorous ability.

After all, they do have the ability to eat a remarkably diverse diet.  But it’s inappropriate to ignore the fact their bodies are optimized for eating meat.

Dogs Don’t Grind… They Chop

For comparison, think about a typical herbivore. A dairy cow. Now, picture the way they “chew their cud”.

Cows chew widely from side-to-side. And they have broad, flat back teeth. And flat teeth are ideal for grinding grains and plant material into finer particles.

True omnivores (like humans) share this same combination of boxy back teeth and sideways grinding motion common to herbivores. Think of your own mouth and how you chew.

Dogs, on the other hand, don’t have flat teeth. Like all carnivores, they have narrow pointy back teeth.

Plus dogs can’t chew from side-to-side. Their jaws can only move in an up-and-down, chop-chop motion. It’s the perfect combination for cutting meat into smaller chunks.

Why Dogs Don’t Do Carbohydrates Very Well

Now, herbivores and omnivores usually have one powerful digestive weapon carnivores usually lack…

Salivary amylase.

Amylase is a special enzyme plant-eating animals produce in their saliva. It’s a critical enzyme needed to initiate the break down of starchy carbohydrates.

Before they enter the stomach.

Now, meat-eating animals also produce amylase. But the enzyme is produced further down the digestive tract (in the small intestine).

Without amylase, a carnivore’s carbohydrate digestion is decidedly more difficult.

Digestive Anatomy Reveals the Truth

Since they consume fewer but larger meals, carnivores have bigger stomachs than their grazing, plant-eating counterparts.

What’s more, meat-eating animals exhibit a higher concentration of stomach acid. This allows faster digestion of animal protein.

And the stronger acid kills the disease-causing bacteria abundant in decaying meat.

Plus…

Herbivores have a gastrointestinal tract that’s unusually long… sometimes exceeding ten times the animal’s body length. Longer systems like this are needed for consuming a plant-based diet.

Today’s Confusing Dog Food Marketplace
Welcome to the Age of Choice

Yet in spite of this natural carnivorous design, dogs have still managed to evolve over thousands of years… even surviving on the meat and non-meat scraps and leftovers of human existence.

So, over time, dogs have proven to be fully capable of thriving on a variety of foods.

Today, the dog food marketplace has become a living, breathing witness to the animal’s adaptive ability… and is abounding with an astonishing array of product designs.

Some favor meat. Some feature vegetables. And others are made almost entirely of cereal grains and beans.

So, how do you choose the right one for your pet?

The Bottom Line

Just knowing dogs are naturally optimized for eating meat can make it much easier to spot better dog foods.

Even though vegetarian dog foods have been proven to work, it’s important to always give preference to meat-based products. That’s because…

Whether you believe they’re carnivores or omnivores, dog’s possess an undeniable carnivorous bias

Meat-based dog foods are closer to a dog’s natural ancestral diet. They’re more like the real thing.

That’s why meat ingredients should always be the first thing you should look for on any dog food’s ingredients list.

  1. Lindblad-Toh K, Wade CM, Mikkelsen TS, et al, “Genome sequence, comparative analysis and haplotype structure of the domestic dog”, December 2005, Nature 438 (7069): 803–19 ↩
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  • http://www.adodis.com/Ecommerce-Shopping-Cart.php Ecommerce Shopping Cart

     dogs should be kept as pets……..

  • Dayron

    You know, what you said sounds nice, but it’s not factual. Foret about what you’ve been told and how you’ve been brain washed about your pet dogs. I just got off of the feild and had to come home because of the Canadian wheather. Wolves are very active right now.It will be that way unil may. None the less, it is black and white. Did you know wild and farrel cats eat vegitation in the wild too?  What say you on that?

  • http://DogFoodAdvisor.com Mike Sagman

    Hi LabsRawesome,

    Oops. Sorry that one got by me.

    Spammers like the one identified here as “Monika” are experts at tricking moderators.

    Spammers know we don’t have the time to read every article in its entirety. So, they deceptively place the tree frog at the top of the post and then hide the inappropriate garbage “below the fold”.

    Flagging a comment for moderation is a great new feature that allows readers to call spam posts to my attention. But I’m just now learning how to follow up on flagged comments.

    Thanks for alerting me about this one.

  • Mike P

    Mike S wait till I see it before you remove it!!Hahaha

  • LabsRawesome

    Dr. Mike, when you click on Monika Mehra’s name in the post that is like 10 posts down from this one. It starts with info on Red eyed tree frogs, but as you scroll further down the page their are a bunch of topless pics of women. FYI, thought you might want to remove that post.

  • LabsRawesome

    Dr. Mike, when you click on Monika Mehra’s name, a very inappropriate site comes up. I thought you might want to delete her comment, because of this.

  • Tera

    *cooking is fine but BONES shall NEVER BE COOKED! :) Just wanted to add that in case anybody gets confused. Cooked bones can scrape, puncture, or block the intestines. Dogs are supposed to eat RAW meats. I have been feeding my two girls RAW meats (variety like you listed above) and I NEVER cook anything. I do give them a good rinse though and my dogs quit shedding, no more dry skin, ect. Regardless of what some people choose to believe, dogs do NOT become aggressive from RAW feeding.

  • David

    Feeding dogs a diet in line with what the wolves ate is great. They are strict carnivores so just feed them meat. The problem is people end up just feeding their dogs muscles meat only. This creates a problem and can lead to malnutrition. You need to feed the liver, skin, bones, bone marrow, intestines, kidneys and heart. Those are where the nutrients are.

    In these days meat bought in stores is contaminated with salmonella and E. Coli. Unless it is a fresh kill, cooking it is the best thing to do.

  • Charles

    It really astounds me. I so enjoy these posts talking of wild animals eating greens and plants. How that then translates into dogs being omnivores. Simply because they can survive on it does NOT mean its part of a natural diet. I think maybe education and study (I wonder where the money trail for funding leads.) are getting in the way of using some simple critical thinking tactics.

    I think you know what cattle in feedlots survive on. Grain…fecal matter…hormones…ground chicken feathers…ect. Very little grass. They do survive…but do you really think they should be eating that?

    Have you also noticed how many fat dogs there are these days? How many fat wild dogs do you see?

    Also..to follow that line of thought…think of biology. Starches and sugars contain heaps of calories…energy. An animal does not have the ability to investigate the source of this energy…but their instinct is to devour it in times of need…then they realize that food gives them lots of energy (unfortunately it also gives them medical conditions and overweight frames). How many potatoes do you think wild animals can find let alone consume? remember…Dogs are domesticated wolves…their digestive systems have been forced to adjust to the unhealthy manner in which we feed them..and still food sensitives are on the incline. Why do you think the grain free and all natural foods are being purchased more than ever? People don’t want to spend more money…they simply realize as good stewards they should.

    Even human beings fall into this pit. McDonalds would not be so profitable or popular if we did not have the biological urge to gorge on massive calories when it is available.

    grains, starches and unnecessary food items are put into dog food to make it cheaper. I worked on a farm for a year…the guard dog was fed only raw meat…nothing else. The dog was around eight years old and still as active as a puppy. It was alert and watchful…a beautiful coat and strong healthy teeth.

    so to sum this all up. I can take a heap of money…toss it at a laboratory and ask them to find me results I can use to prove my point. True neutral investigative studies are quickly becoming extinct due to profitable interests. Use your head…watch nature and realize that human civilization has a habit of following biological urges blindly, using technology and then trying to pretend its “scientific”.

  • Gordon

    The above experience/comment I’d posted just prior, under the ‘Suggested Raw Dog Food’ thread, of which again, indicates, 277 comments posted, but is not showing at all. Dr. Mike Sagman’s website must have something against that thread, lol.

  • Gordon

    Well if anyone’s interested, I thought I’d share that I attempted to give my dogs a fresh raw whole fish (snapper, head and all) each yesterday night and they were uncertain of eating it or how to eat it. After 5 minutes (As I knew that the ’15 minute take the bowl away’ method was useless in this case) I removed the fish and placed in a clean bag and back in the fridge. I then decided as a tactic, to fast them (Even though their weekly fasting routine I imposed on them had already been done last weekend), over the next 24 hours and then re-issue them the fish.

    This was now last night (A few hours ago) after their walk, and this time, they appeared more interested in the fish and gave same, a tentative try. They had sniffed it and appeared as though they were seizing exactly how to go about eating them. I then gave each a little encouragement by putting my thumb in between the fish stomach slit and peeling it a little back to expose the internal fish flesh for extra enticing. This worked a little and my JRT started dragging her snapper away and getting a better grasp of it to eat it more efficiently at a slower pace. As for my TT, he kept looking at his snapper and couldn’t get the hint with the peeling back tactic. He just kept circling the fish as if being so unsure as to how he’ll go about eating it.

    During at which time, my JRT had finished about a quarter of her snapper including half of the head (Which is fantastically extra nutritious and DHA potent) which was an encouraging sign.

    I became frustrated at my TT’s inability to work out how to eat his fish, that I removed it and placed it back in the fridge. I then noticed after a few minutes that he went for the 3 quarter remains of the JRT’s unfinished fish, and began to actually eat it. I then decided to place the other fish I’d put back in the fridge, outside again and do some further observing.

    After a few more minutes, both dogs had another go at eating the fish, and played turns at each others. Then their pack mentality kicked in and both had a tussle over one of them for a short time. Some more of the fish was eaten and I decided that it wasn’t worth putting any of the remains back in the fridge. So I left the the fish remains out, in case they want to go back and eat some more. Unlike not leaving a bowl of food out after 15 minutes, I figured it may take more time in their opportunistic sight and smell range, for the fish to be left out for quite a while, and especially since this new raw item was now going to be a weekly feeding event, as suggested in Dr. Tom Lonsdale’s books.

    Thanks to Dr. Tom Lonsdale’s books, I would not have thought about introducing a whole fresh and complete fish to my dogs’ dietary rotation to add to their already range of raw meaty bones and raw meaty parts, offal and etc of various animal sources.

    It’s worth noting a peculiar anomaly in my TT’s natural eating habit/method….Unlike my JRT and most dogs, and their ancestors, the wolf, my TT doesn’t seem to like to place a grasp of any of his raw animal prey model offerings, with his paws, for greater ease of keeping the food still so that he can more easily tear pieces off. It’s almost like he feels the ‘yuck factor’ of the wetness/moisture on his paws if he does this. I also notice that he takes extra care than normal not to trample on old stools and muddy ground/soil, especially after rain fall. Perhaps he was a human being in his previous life? lol

  • Gordon

    Quote from Dr. Tom Lonsdale’s book, ‘Work Wonders’, chapter 2, page 18.

    “Our pet dogs, modified wolves, deserve the best available – whole carcasses of other animals. That, after all, is what responsible zoo keepers feed their captive wolves and wild dogs.
    At feeding time the zoo keeper fills the food cart with chilled carcasses of chicken, rabbits, whole fish and large pieces of raw meaty bones. Carcasses likely have the entrails still intact and the fur, feathers and scales just as Nature intended. Wolves, living in the wild, hunt deer, elk, and other large prey. Some zoos can obtain deer, but often, when feeding packs of wolves zoo keepers drag the carcasses of farm animals – cattle, sheep, goats – into the wolf pen.
    ‘Feeding frenzy’ describes what happens next and at the end there isn’t much left – perhaps some hooves or large leg bones or the contents of the rumen (fore-stomach) and colon of a goat. Wolves and wild dogs, when free to choose, distingush between what’s good and what’s not good to eat.
    When the prey is small, for instance chickens and rabbits, …….[Perhaps not from China. My input, lol]……..then the entrails may be eaten together with all contents – mostly part digested grasses, and perhaps a few fruits and seeds. Wolves may eat berries and ripe fallen fruit when in season. However, for free living wolves and wild dogs vegetable matter forms a minor part of the diet.
    Completing the picture of what wolves and wild dogs consider to be ‘quality’ food we should note that they eat the feces of their prey and, since their dining table is often bare earth, they digest soil and debris adhering to the fresh carcass.”

  • Gordon

    Below is pasted a copy of my recent comment under the ‘Suggested Raw Dog Food’ thread, as it seems like a hit and miss for it to appear under that thread at the moment, for some reason.

    ” Well, I just want to say that yesterday, I had the honour of meeting Dr. Tom Lonsdale in person for the first time, as I dropped by his vet clinic to buy his 2 books, ‘Raw Meaty Bones’, and ‘Work Wonders’. A lot of great reading ahead!

    We talked for over a half an hour as I dropped by about 40 minutes before he closed for the day. We chatted about his history in brief and of his battles against the pet food industry establishment. I brought up Dr. Billinghurst and told him of my recent unpleasant encounter, and that I am reading his books and believe in the BARF philosophy.

    He told me of how they used to talk and that Dr. Billinghurst was really influenced by him and Pitcairn and that Dr. B, stole some of his ideas, and that Dr. B wanted to use the term, raw meaty bones as a trade mark but couldn’t because it was Tom’s. And so he came up with BARF of which Tom had some unpleasantries to disclose on the history behind that.

    Anyway, I could go on, but he explained to me his thoughts and beliefs that dogs don’t need carbs (Something I agree with but that I think they could do with as per the BARF carb amount principle). He went on to say that wild dogs will eat tripe from larger animals but agrees that based on scientific studies he references in his books, that they don’t necessarily eat the contents, but do with smaller prey, etc.

    He said that when he and Dr. B talked, that Dr. B wanted to break away and just make money etc.

    I think there’s 2 sides to a story and I can tell their bitterness remains.

    Dr. Lonsdale affirms that dogs can eat raw meaty bones and carcasses, and offal, once a day as their sole diet, as their truly sufficient, medicinal and natural diet.

    There’s a little more to it, and I find that despite their bitterness they are both right with differences of opinion.

    I mentioned how I bought Dr. Barbara Fougere’s book but discovered later, that she used to be a Mars representative and filed complaints against and criticised Dr. Lonsdale officially during her Mars days back in 1994.

    Anyway, I could go on, but I’ll stop here, and just conclude that our meeting was interesting and I find the whole thing fascinating!

  • http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ninja Dog Food Ninja

    What? I mean… What?

    Monika, what purpose did coming up here and posting that serve? If you don’t like dogs, why are you reading about dog food?

    Oh, and nice punctuation. lol

  • http://fashion-intheworld.blogspot.com Monika Mehra

    I don,t like dogs,

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