Some brands may list a guarantee for ash in pet food. And if you’ve read any of our pet food reviews, you know that every food we talk about is analyzed for ash content. But what is ash?
Ok, let’s get the elephant in the room out of the way. No, your dog isn’t being fed ash like you find under a burning log in your fireplace. And pet brands aren’t adding some sort of strange ash from proteins, fruits or vegetables.
To understand what ash is, we need to go visit a lab.
No, not that kind of lab!
Ash is a laboratory method that measures the inorganic minerals in a food. Food is burned in the laboratory at over 1100° F for two hours. This burns away any fat, protein, water, fiber, starch, sugar and vitamins. What’s left are minerals like calcium, phosphorus, magnesium, sodium, iron, zinc, etc. Minerals are the inorganic compounds found in food.
We could run the same lab test with an orange for example. What would be left is calcium, potassium, sodium, etc. The ash test won’t give us the exact amounts of each mineral, but it’s still a valuable tool.
Why Does Mo Knows Run Tests for Ash?
Our third-party laboratory runs ash for us so we can calculate calories and then check the calorie statement on each package. In order to do this, we need five pieces of information:
- Crude Protein
- Crude Fat
- Crude Fiber
- Moisture
- Ash
Knowing the ash in pet food also gives us a rough idea on how digestible and palatable a food might be to your dog. In general, the higher the ash, the lower the digestibility and the lower the palatability.
Is There A Thing as Too Much Ash?
Yes, we believe there is. Ash typically comes from two main sources in pet food: mineral supplementation and meat sources. Both are necessary to make a great food, but pet food manufacturers must be careful how they balance ingredients. This is especially true if they use a lot of meat proteins.
Meats and meat meals supply quality well-balanced proteins along with collagen and minerals like calcium, phosphorus and magnesium. Lower quality sources will have high bone content making balancing the nutrition in the food more difficult.
In simple terms, anything over 10% in a food starts to cause some concern unless the food has been formulated by an experienced nutritionist. We would consider an average food’s Ash levels to be between 5% – 8%. Levels over 10% suggest that many minerals are over-formulated and potentially imbalanced. It could also suggest that the meat protein sources are of lower quality with more bone content.
High levels of ash in pet food could suggest that the meat protein sources are of lower quality with more bone content.
What Happens When My Dog Eats Foods High in Ash?
The nutrition in our pet foods must be properly balanced with proper fortification. Allowing the ash content to increase can lead to these concerns:
- Poor absorption of nutrients. High ash with high calcium levels can reduce the digestibility of nutrients reducing the availability of nutrients to the health of your pet. If nutrients are not absorbed well, the size of your dog’s stool can also increase. And if you’re like us, picking up more poop is something we’d like to avoid.
- Poor taste. Ash components don’t taste great. Some can be bitter. While you can cover these negative tastes with good tasting fats and flavors, the higher ash content just indicates a less yummy food.
- Poor nutritional balance. Higher levels of ash indicate high levels of bone, typically coming from meat sources. Bone is especially high in calcium. When calcium gets too high, absorption of other key minerals like zinc can be reduced. Zinc is necessary to support skin and hair coat growth. Dogs who do not get enough zinc will often experience skin issues which are mis-identified as an allergic reaction to other ingredients.
Dogs who do not get enough zinc will often experience skin issues which are mis-identified as an allergic reaction to other ingredients.
Ash In Mo Knows “S.N.I.F.F Test” Reviews
We test for ash to understand calories, digestion, taste, quality and balance. As we do our reviews, we’ll be sharing the laboratory results for ash of each food. Brands will share this information with you too if you call or email them. It’s a great question to ask before making a switch to a new food.
Curious about your pet’s food and we haven’t reviewed it yet? Email the brand and they should have analytical data to share about the Ash in your pet’s food. Or drop us a line and let us know which food you’d like us to review next.
Hello frens! Mo knows a little ash, good for the tummy. Big time ash, no good.
