Prebiotics & Probiotics in Dog and Cat Foods

Beneficial Bacterias Improve the Health of Your Pet

Oct 28, 2009

Prebiotics and probiotic bacterias are essential to the digestive and immune systems of dogs and cats. Here we'll look at what they are, and how they work.

The new trend in pet foods (and food for people as well) is for manufacturers to add prebiotics and probiotic bacteria to their products. Prebiotics and probiotics, though, are much more than trendy additives. Probiotic beneficial bacterias provide a functionality to the diet of your pets that will help keep them strong and healthy.

What are Prebiotics?

Prebiotics are carbohydrates that provide a food source to probiotics. These carbohydrates feed probiotic bacterial flora so that they can spread throughout the intestinal tract. It usually takes about 28 days after feeding a pet food containing prebiotics for your cat or dog to have a strong culture of probiotics populating their digestive system.

Prebiotics are usually added to pet foods in the form of FOS, or fructooligosaccerides. FOS are found naturally in plants such as beets (beet pulp), soy hulls, psyllium (a cereal), and hydrolyzed chicory root. Pet food companies purposely add these ingredients to dog and cat foods to introduce the prebiotic FOS into the digestive tract of your pet.

What are Probiotics?

Probiotics are the beneficial bacterias (bifidus and lactobacillus) that live in the intestinal tract of both animals and humans. Probiotics aid in keeping the digestive tract healthy, help with the absorption of nutrients, and keep the immune system strong. As any pet owner who has had a cat who constantly vomits, or a dog that is prone to diarrhea, digestive health in animals is very important.

Since up to 70% of the immune system is contained within the digestive tract of animals, probiotics not only aid in the digestive health of the animal, but the whole immune system of your pet. It is very difficult to add live bacteria into pet food kibble, as many of these beneficial bacterias will die as soon as the bag is opened. This is why it is important for a food to contain prebiotics, so that they can support the development of probiotic bacteria flora.

Why are Probiotics Important?

There are many harmful bacterias that can populate the intestinal tract of your cat or dog. These bacterias can build up within the digestive tract, and hinder the ability of your pet's body to absorb the nutrients that they need to stay healthy.

When healthy cultures of probiotic bacteria populate the intestinal tract of a cat or dog, they inhabit the space that could otherwise be taken up by harmful bacterias. An abundance of probiotics in the digestive system, therefor, helps the body of your pet to pass harmful bacterias out of their systems. An abundance of probiotics in the digestive system of animals helps them to be more resistant to disease and illness.

The digestive system of a cat or dog is an important part of the immune system of the animal, and therefor, an essential component to the health and well-being of your pet. A bag of pet food should have natural sources of prebotics in order for probiotic bacteria to flourish within the digestive tract of the animal. Probiotics will boost the immune system and stop health problems before they start.

The copyright of the article Prebiotics & Probiotics in Dog and Cat Foods in Pet Care is owned by Ian Shoust. Permission to republish Prebiotics & Probiotics in Dog and Cat Foods in print or online must be granted by the author in writing.