Lapis
Lazuli Light World Magazine August 1998 issue
Timely
Vegetarian Diet Saves Dogs
Written by
Chiang Chun (Originally in Chinese)
First,
let me explain why this article is revolutionary. From the scientific
standpoint, by common knowledge or even by its dictionary definition,
a dog is a carnivorous mammal, a domestic canine that is kept to guard
premises. Its teeth and gastric acid (whose level is eight to twelve
times that of humans) are designed for quick meat digestion to avoid
decay in the alimentary canal. These facts seem to contradict the
concept that a dog can improve its health through a purely vegetarian
diet. Thus, had I not personally conducted a lengthy experiment and
observation on the subject, it would have been difficult for me to
erase the great doubts in my mind about a purely vegetarian diet for
dogs. I hope that our readers will be able to sweep aside their longstanding
preconceived ideas as well.
I love dogs, so I researched
with great effort and my experiments have been successful. My dogs
can testify to the value of vegetarianism for dogs; they are my proof.
I even saved the life of someone's dog -- a huge animal affected by
skin disease for more than four years - by changing it to a vegetarian
diet. His condition was ten times worse than that of my own dogs,
and no veterinarians or medications could help him. In the beginning,
the dog's owner scoffed at my suggestion to feed the dog vegetarian
food, and refused to give it a thought. I had foreseen this obstacle,
so I devoted more love, patience, and perseverance to try to convince
him. Finally, he agreed to let his dog follow a vegetarian diet on
a trial basis, and more than one month later, the dog was completely
healed! I was delighted to see him relieved of his prolonged suffering.
This is why I am writing this article, for I want all the dogs in
the world to be sound and healthy, without suffering from their long-standing
illness.
I call on all dog lovers to abandon
their preconceptions and try the effective cure I developed through
painstaking experimentation, so they can save many medical fees and
much time. But most important of all, they will not have to watch
helplessly as their beloved dogs suffer from disease. At such times,
pet owners are often manipulated and exploited by veterinarians. For
example, I have a friend who had an old dog that suffered from a serious
skin disease. Although she spent twenty-six hundred US dollars on
its treatment, she failed to save its life. The doctor pronounced
the animal's disease incurable.
At that time, three of my older
dogs had the same disorder. The oldest one even had many tumors on
his skin. Fortunately, our veterinarian was more conscientious and
moral, saying that it would be futile and too dangerous to perform
surgery on such an old dog. As for my other two dogs, the small patches
on their bodies grew larger. This continued for two years, and from
my friends' experience, I knew that the vets could not help much,
and the dogs would suffer a great deal. I racked my brain trying to
find a good way to save the dogs. Finally, it dawned on me that, whether
it is a dog or human that is sick, the best treatment is to have it
follow a vegetarian diet.
In the beginning, I fed my dogs
what I ate. Each day I would cook a large pot of food to be shared
with my grandchildren. (That's what I call them.) Two weeks later,
the affected areas on the dogs' bodies became dry, and they stopped
licking them. Another two weeks went by, and new hair began to grow
on their bodies. Their disease was completely healed within a month.
For the oldest dog, the one that the doctor refused to operate on,
the tumors became smaller and no new ones appeared. Today, all my
dogs are healthy and lively.