The Herb-Diet Connection
FERNDALE, WA: Just like us, animals need raw, unprocessed foods that are rich in a diversity of live enzymes and nutrients.
- The Key to a Happy, Healthy Pet
Learn to feed your animals a natural diet, supplemented if necessary with a good quality pet food. Good nutrition is the first step in achieving a state of healthy balance. Without it, the body is already diseased.
The body required fuel and building materials in order to function as Nature designed it, and proper, natural function is exactly what the herbalist wishes to maintain. Herbs help bridge the gap between what the body needs to function properly from diet and exercise, and what it needs to receive from time to time, in extra support of natural body functions. In nature, wild animals have an instinctive ability to use herbs in a manner that allows them to receive the nutrition and specialized support their bodies need. Even domesticated animals retain part of this ability — dogs eat grass; cats nibble aloe on occasion. But in domestication, animals have neither the botanical diversity, or enough intact instinct to selectively choose the herbs they need. Instead they must rely on us.
Herbs work to support body functions in circumstances where proper nutrition alone cannot regain or maintain a state of balance. With this in mind, it is very important to realize that herbs cannot replace the body’s requirement of good diet; that the medicinal activities of herbs in the body work in concert with the quality of food that goes into it. Without quality nutrition, herbs are holistically useless in therapeutic applications.
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Reprinted from: Herbal Remedies for Dogs and Cats – A Pocket Guide to Selection and Use
by Mary Wulff-Tilford and Gregory L. Tilford. (C) Copyright: All Rights Reserved.
