Irvin tang / Daily Nexus
As humans, we love our pets and treat them as members of the family. With such an undying love for our pets, it’s only natural that our love is reflected in the food we feed them. While sometimes that means feeding them what we would eat ourselves, other times it simply means feeding them things that closely resemble our own food.
The truth of the matter is our pets’ food is beginning to resemble our food more and more every day. It isn’t only cookies that are being made for our pets, it’s pretzels, bagels, bacon; the possibilities are endless. There are even a few brands of canned cat food that could very easily pass off as tuna.
In my family, pets are very much a given; my aunts all had dogs when I was growing up. So many dogs in the family meant treats, which were usually divided up amongst the dogs. On one occasion, my aunt bought treats for the dogs that perfectly resembled cookies, with no real distinction evident between the two.
Only four years old at the time, my younger cousin spotted the cookies and proceeded to eat a handful of them. The funny thing was that it took us all a while to notice what she was doing. When we finally stopped her and explained that what she was eating was in fact dog cookies, she just shrugged her shoulders and said, “Cookies are cookies.”
With so many foods looking like the real deal, it makes one wonder how we’ll be able to tell the difference. After all, while our pets may be able to eat human food, we can’t very well eat animal food.
Simply put, the food our pets consume doesn’t have to be subjected to the same health regulations. Not only that, but our pet’s diet is completely different from our own, and their food omits any ingredients that may be harmful to them.
While our pets may be happy to consume whatever food we place in front of them, humans aren’t likely to do the same. Our taste pallets are very obviously more refined than those of our beloved four-legged friends.
Next time you see some cookies lying around on the counter, you may want to take a second look and make sure you know what it is you’re eating.
