Aimee, I would guess your husband has an intolerance, or even an allergy to garlic? I know some folks with those. I’m sure dogs can easily be the same.
Hehe, I admit, the first thing that came to mind was grapes, when you agreed with USA. But I wasn’t thinking whether you or your family ate them. I just thought it was ironic how you could defend a companies’ use, (who was it Hill’s or Purina?) of grape pomace in a dog food, but feel any and all garlic is unacceptable.
No, I just thought I’d ask, because virtually all mammals, including cats, dogs, rats, primates, humans, even ungulates and birds, have the same susceptibilities to the toxicities from over consumption of garlic, onions, etc. Granted humans have built more tolerance from the long history of consuming them, but they still can and do get all the side effects up to, and including oxidative stress and anemia. Yet vast numbers of people around the world still chose to consume them anyway over the ages for their medicinal properties.
Ever wonder why vampires have an intense fear of garlic? Vampires were thought to be those who have anemia, or other blood disorders- the pale skin, photosensitivity, yellow eyes, etc. They required the blood of healthy others in order to “sustain” them. A big dose of garlic would not be good news at all for the anemic vampire. Some sects and religions even weeded out the vampires amongst them, by those who would not partake.
Anyway, my stance is that dog food companies probably shouldn’t include garlic in their foods. I don’t really appreciate garlic or many other “medicinal botanicals” in many of the “higher” end foods such as sage extract, juniper berry extract. ginseng, gingko, licorice root, anjelica root, marigold, chamomile, etc. Many or all of them can cause allergic reactions for thing. They just don’t belong in dog foods, especially where someone might be feeding them 100% everyday for long periods, IMO. And one with grape pomace in it, well I would automatically reject it as completely unacceptable.
That said, I don’t take any issue with a person adding garlic to their dog’s food, as long they understand the possible allergic reactions, intolerances, or in larger quantities, toxicities, and they treat it as a controlled dosage rather than a food item. I’ve been adding potent crushed whole raw garlic to Turbo’s food at the rate of about 1 and 1/2 extra large cloves or about 6 grams/week, for probably 4 or 5 months now, and intend to keep doing so. For us, the probable benefits exceed what I perceive to be very small risk.
