Ash in raw pet food

[jlaack]

I recently posted about my dog gaining weight in the vets corner and I was trying to find the caloric intake he gets from the raw meat only food he eats as part of one meal. I didn't find the calorie count but I noticed that the food contains a percentage of ash. I can't figure out how there is ash present in a raw diet that is 100% meat, internal organs and bone. I thought that ash is the mineral residue leftover from the cooking process... Are they adding this to the raw food? Am I missing something? I am refering to Bravo! and just looked up a few other raw meat only diets and didn't see ash listed.

[brutus'mother]

I would think ash is the ground bone that is added to most commercially prepared raw dog foods.

[moondog]

The “ash content” is a measure of the total amount of minerals present within a food, whereas the “mineral content” is a measure of the amount of specific inorganic components present within a food, such as Ca, Na, K and Cl.

Fresh and raw foods do contain minerals (aka ash). They do have to use heat on a sample of raw food to determine the ash content of a food....the ash is the inorganic residue that remains after all moisture and organic content of a food has been burned away....and this is what that is referring to.

Determining the ash content is the first step in analyzing the amount of individual minerals that are found in a food, but most nutritionists put more value in the mineral content because it identifies specific minerals rather than just a total value of the inorganic residue.

[jlaack]

Thanks Moondog for the information! I very much appreciate knowledge such as this.