# Can people eat dog-food without ill effects? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [July 10, 2009, 11:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-people-eat-dog-food-without-ill-effects/502541 "2009-07-10T11:16:13Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Tamex](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/ccd318/32.png) [@Tamex](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tamex)\ **Post date:** [July 11, 2009, 2:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-people-eat-dog-food-without-ill-effects/502541/21 "2009-07-11T14:39:40Z")
Face it, if dog or cat food was that dangerous, most kids would never have survived. The dry stuff is like meaty cereal. My husband has admitted to me that he liked the green Milkbones best. ---
**Author:** ![norinew](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/eb9ed0/32.png) [@norinew](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/norinew)\ **Post date:** [July 11, 2009, 2:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-people-eat-dog-food-without-ill-effects/502541/22 "2009-07-11T14:48:02Z")
> [@Tamex](#): > > Face it, if dog or cat food was that dangerous, most kids would never have survived. Heh. So true. I have a niece (who is now grown and married with kids of her own), and when she was a little kid (three? four?) we’d be in the living room, and the dog would be in the living room with us, and yet we’d hear the distinctive crunch of dry doggie kibble from the kitchen. Someone would announce “Someone go get Tracy out of the dog food”. The kid loved it and would scarf it down every chance she got. ---
**Author:** ![Pyper](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/5f9b8f/32.png) [@Pyper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pyper)\ **Post date:** [July 11, 2009, 10:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-people-eat-dog-food-without-ill-effects/502541/23 "2009-07-11T22:40:28Z")
It seems that the consensus is that dog food tastes pretty good. Cat food, on the other hand, I know is awful from personal experience. When I got my kitten from the SPCA, he came with all sorts of free offers and food samples. He wouldn’t touch any of the kitty treats I offered him. Finally, I popped one in my mouth to see what was so horrible. Augh! Worst taste ever! I never offered him another treat and he doesn’t seem to mind. ---
**Author:** ![Johnny\_L.A](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnny_l.a/32/1084_2.png) [@Johnny\_L.A](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johnny_L.A)\ **Post date:** [July 11, 2009, 11:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-people-eat-dog-food-without-ill-effects/502541/24 "2009-07-11T23:04:23Z")
A long time ago on _Second City TV_ there was a ‘Lorne Greene’ (Eugene Levy) episode where they parodied Greene’s ALPO commercials. Here’s the gist of it: ‘Hello, I’m Lorne Greene. My friend Jack, here, is 78 years old. That’s 546 in dog years. \ Maybe Jack’s been around so long because ALPO’s been around so long.’ \*\*Context:\*\*When the episode aired there was a ‘scandalous situation’ wherein senior citizens in the U.S. (and possibly Canada) could not afford food, so many resorted to eating dog food. At the same time, Lorne Greene was hawking ALPO dog food. The commercials were folksy, with Greene introducing an old dog who is still sprightly due to it’s diet of ALPO. The commercials ended with Greene saying 'Maybe [dog’s name] has been around so long because ALPO’s been around so long. The SCTV sketch loses something if you have to explain it, but it was funny if you were around at the time. ---
**Author:** ![GuanoLad](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guanolad/32/42_2.png) [@GuanoLad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GuanoLad)\ **Post date:** [July 12, 2009, 12:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-people-eat-dog-food-without-ill-effects/502541/25 "2009-07-12T00:56:46Z")
> [@PoorYorick](#): > > I’m not sure he did it out of scientific curiosity, though. I think he was just being an asshole. Hmm. Was he wearing a lab coat? If not, you may have assumed correctly. ---
**Author:** ![BACI](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/ce73a5/32.png) [@BACI](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BACI)\ **Post date:** [July 12, 2009, 1:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-people-eat-dog-food-without-ill-effects/502541/26 "2009-07-12T01:33:13Z")
**Old Goat** you just made me laugh like a drain. Thank you. ---
**Author:** ![Aelita\_Daystar](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e480ec/32.png) [@Aelita\_Daystar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Aelita_Daystar)\ **Post date:** [July 12, 2009, 4:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-people-eat-dog-food-without-ill-effects/502541/27 "2009-07-12T04:59:00Z")
> [@Pyper](#): > > It seems that the consensus is that dog food tastes pretty good. Cat food, on the other hand, I know is awful from personal experience. When I got my kitten from the SPCA, he came with all sorts of free offers and food samples. He wouldn’t touch any of the kitty treats I offered him. Finally, I popped one in my mouth to see what was so horrible. Augh! Worst taste ever! I never offered him another treat and he doesn’t seem to mind. hmm… I woulda thought that food for cats would taste better. (Also, thanks to everyone for the answers) ---
**Author:** ![thirdname](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/d07c76/32.png) [@thirdname](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/thirdname)\ **Post date:** [July 12, 2009, 9:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-people-eat-dog-food-without-ill-effects/502541/28 "2009-07-12T09:24:03Z")
A Russian fighter pilot who defected found American cat food to be delicious: [Viktor Belenko](http://web.archive.org/web/20010111004300/http://fullcontext.org/people/belenko.htm) > [@](#): > > First of all American super-market, my first visit was under CIA supervision, and I thought it was set-up; I did not believe super-market was real one. I thought well I was unusual guest; they probably kicked everyone out. It’s such a nice, big place with incredible amount of produce, and no long lines! You’re accustomed to long lines in Russia. But later, when I discovered super-market was real one, I had real fun exploring new products. I would buy, everyday, a new thing and try to figure out its function. In Russia at that time (and even today) it’s hard to find canned food, good one. But everyday I would buy new cans with different food. Once I bought a can which said “dinner.” I cooked it with potatoes, onions, and garlic-it was delicious. Next morning my friends ask me, “Viktor, did you buy a cat?” It was a can of chicken-based cat food. But it was delicious! It was better than canned food for people in Russia today. And I did test it. Last year I brought four people from Russia for commercial project, and I set them up. I bought nibble sized human food. I installed a pâté, and it was cat food. I put it on crackers. And they did consume it, and they liked it. So the taste has not changed. By the way, for those who are not familiar with American cat food. It’s very safe; it’s delicious, and sometimes it’s better than human food, because of the Humane Society. ---
**Author:** ![madrabbitwoman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/c37758/32.png) [@madrabbitwoman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/madrabbitwoman)\ **Post date:** [July 12, 2009, 10:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-people-eat-dog-food-without-ill-effects/502541/29 "2009-07-12T10:52:08Z")
> [@Hari\_Seldon](#): > > I read somewhere that 10% of dog food is consumed by humans and was regulated as such. As long as you avoid melamine, of course. > > The only thing I can think of that would be missing is vitamin C since most mammals, aside from primates, can synthesize it. So we need sources of it, mostly vegetable, but dogs don’t. Simply for the sake of well… whatever… guinea pigs need a dietry source of vit C too. ---
**Author:** ![Raguleader](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/258eb7/32.png) [@Raguleader](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Raguleader)\ **Post date:** [July 12, 2009, 3:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-people-eat-dog-food-without-ill-effects/502541/30 "2009-07-12T15:12:06Z")
The thing that occurs to me when someone is concerned about getting food poisoning from pet food: If someone gets sick and dies from tainted tomatoes or peanut butter, well, what a shame. If Fluffy gets sick and dies from tainted cat food, suddenly we’ve all been _betrayed_. This might just be a side effect of the fact that a cat has never cut any of us off on the Turnpike though. 😃 Oh, and someone on the bus convinced me to eat a dog biscuit when I was in elementary school. I recall that it didn’t taste half bad, but I still prefer the little vanilla cookies from the grocery store. ---
**Author:** ![Hazle\_Weatherfield](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/e9bcb4/32.png) [@Hazle\_Weatherfield](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hazle_Weatherfield)\ **Post date:** [July 12, 2009, 8:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-people-eat-dog-food-without-ill-effects/502541/31 "2009-07-12T20:45:09Z")
> [@SmashTheState](#): > > Beggin’ Strips are awesome. They taste very much like vegan jerky, which I love, and are cheaper. And back when I ate dead animals, I used to use dog food in place of corned beef or hamburger in recipes like meat loaf or stroganoff or casseroles where it’s well-cooked and mixed with other strong-tasting foods like garlic, tomatoes, and onions. I couldn’t tell the difference in taste, and it was about a quarter the cost. And it kept my coat glossy! :eek:☹ ---
**Author:** ![Dallas\_Jones](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dallas_jones/32/3277_2.png) [@Dallas\_Jones](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dallas_Jones)\ **Post date:** [July 12, 2009, 9:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-people-eat-dog-food-without-ill-effects/502541/32 "2009-07-12T21:14:41Z")
> [@Shamozzle](#): > > When I was a kid working in a restaurant we kept our used deep fryer grease in open 45-gallon drums out back. All kinds of stuff would collect in there, including garbage as it fell out of the adjacent, overflowing dumpsters. Occasionally, some guy would come and pick them up. “What do you do with that stuff?”. “Dog Food”, was his answer. Recovered oil is traded on the commodities market as Yellow Grease. A large part of that may go to Bio-diesel now, I have been away from the biz for a few years. There are also various grades of tallow, fish oil, canola, mixed vegetable oils traded. Here is a link to with an explanation of the uses of some of these products. [http://www.bakercommodities.com/feeding-fats.asp](http://www.bakercommodities.com/feeding-fats.asp) ---
**Author:** ![Pedro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/919ad9/32.png) [@Pedro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pedro)\ **Post date:** [July 12, 2009, 9:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-people-eat-dog-food-without-ill-effects/502541/33 "2009-07-12T21:41:50Z")
Wet food for cats tastes terrible but why would it be harmful unless contaminated with pathogens? I’m sure that if I was starving and malnourished I’d think it tasted like caviar. ---
**Author:** ![Sparky812](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/eb9ed0/32.png) [@Sparky812](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sparky812)\ **Post date:** [July 12, 2009, 10:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-people-eat-dog-food-without-ill-effects/502541/34 "2009-07-12T22:11:27Z")
> [@Aelita\_Daystar](#): > > Reading the thread about Iams got me wondering about this. Can people eat dog food without suffering any ill effects? Basically I’m asking “is it bad for you health”. I was always under the impression that it was, but now I’m second guessing. I’m sure it would be utterly repulsive to eat though. I’m curious though, is it that unhealthy for people? As a teenager, I worked in a grocery store and there was an old homeless guy who was a regular customer. He would come in and buy two cans of Dr. Ballard’s dog food, then he’d go sit on the bench outside, produce a can opener and a spoon and proceed to eat it straight out of the can. I don’t know what ever happened to him but he seemed to enjoy it. IMHO, he probably believed the myth that it was highly nutritious at a low cost and supplemented it into his diet. I’m certain he was a drunk and he didn’t have any teeth that I could see which would suggest maybe he did have a vitamin deficiency. The soft food was probably easier for him to eat as well. ---
**Author:** ![Apollyon](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/apollyon/32/4238_2.png) [@Apollyon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Apollyon)\ **Post date:** [July 12, 2009, 11:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-people-eat-dog-food-without-ill-effects/502541/35 "2009-07-12T23:51:32Z")
> [@Pyper](#): > > It seems that the consensus is that dog food tastes pretty good. Cat food, on the other hand, I know is awful from personal experience. Seems to vary. 🙂 Back when my lad was a bit younger he got into sneaking into the pantry and scarfing down the dry cat-food (to the point where we had to relocate the cat biscuits to the kiddy locked cupboards along with the detergents). In the interests of being a good parent I tried the store bought brand he was eating… meh… tasted a lot like dry mix in instant soup packets. Later my wife got some fancy cat biscuits from the Vet (apparently good for helping to clean the cat’s teeth), and those… _blecch_ :eek: ---
**Author:** ![Animal\_Planet\_Researcher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ba8739/32.png) [@Animal\_Planet\_Researcher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Animal_Planet_Researcher)\ **Post date:** [September 16, 2011, 5:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-people-eat-dog-food-without-ill-effects/502541/36 "2011-09-16T17:52:43Z")
We’re doing a new show on Animal Planet and are looking people with animal behaviors. One of the topics is eating pet food or eating like a pet. Please email [elisa@petfamily.org](mailto:elisa@petfamily.org) if you’d like to talk about it! ---
**Author:** ![Sailboat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sailboat/32/461_2.png) [@Sailboat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sailboat)\ **Post date:** [September 16, 2011, 6:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-people-eat-dog-food-without-ill-effects/502541/37 "2011-09-16T18:09:57Z")
> [@SmackFu](#): > > Clearly the dog food isn’t actually poisonous and doesn’t make the dogs sick, so how bad can it be? That’s [not always](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2007_pet_food_recalls) the case. ---
**Author:** ![thelabdude](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/dc4da7/32.png) [@thelabdude](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/thelabdude)\ **Post date:** [September 16, 2011, 9:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-people-eat-dog-food-without-ill-effects/502541/38 "2011-09-16T21:07:59Z")
Ah, how about the human recall on ground turkey now? The FDA regulates both animal food and human food to strict standards. Never the less there are recall problems. ---
**Author:** ![DeptfordX](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e68b1a/32.png) [@DeptfordX](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DeptfordX)\ **Post date:** [September 16, 2011, 10:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-people-eat-dog-food-without-ill-effects/502541/39 "2011-09-16T22:19:06Z")
> [@Oredigger77](#): > > I had a friend growing up that liked to eat a Milkbone every day after school. I never got around to joining him but he didn’t die and liked the flavor. Plus he always had a shiny healthy coat! ---
**Author:** ![alphaboi867](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alphaboi867/32/3898_2.png) [@alphaboi867](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/alphaboi867)\ **Post date:** [September 16, 2011, 11:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-people-eat-dog-food-without-ill-effects/502541/40 "2011-09-16T23:01:30Z")
My mother once accidently ate homemade dog treats (that I made). I was home from college and had recently gotten a cookbook of homemade pet food. I baked peanut butter cookies for my dachshund (like most dogs he loved peanut butter). I left them out on the cooling racks while I went into the living room to watch TV. Mom came home and assumed I’d just baked normal cookies for people. So she tried one. They tasted terrible, but naturally she told me they were delicious. Then I mentioned who they were for and she told me the truth (after gagging a bit). Something similiar happened a few years later with a coworker’s 11 yr old son. They’d just gotten a god and I gave her some liver brownies I’d baked. SHe told her son not to eat them, but he later overheard her joking about a “special indgrediant” and thought they were pot brownies. Having no idea what pot brownies actually taste like he ate one, then two trying to get high. And he shared it with a friend (who also though that’s how they were supposed to taste). She thought the whole think was too hilarious to bother punishing him (well other than telling him what was in the brownies). [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-people-eat-dog-food-without-ill-effects/502541.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-people-eat-dog-food-without-ill-effects/502541.md?page=3)