Samon Recipe

⚪ Transparency signal: 'natural flavor' in pet food is most often animal digest — hydrolysed animal tissue sprayed on the outside of the kibble to make it palatable. It is not required to name the species. The concern is not toxicity, it is that a bag can list an unnamed animal product and disclose nothing about what it was.

Cholecalciferol is vitamin D3 — the standard, AAFCO-required form of vitamin D in complete dog food, and its presence on a label is expected rather than alarming. Dogs cannot make meaningful vitamin D in their skin from sunlight the way people do, so it has to come from the diet. Two things are worth knowing. D3 is more potent than D2 (ergocalciferol) and has a narrower safety margin — it is the form used in rodenticides. And the real-world risk is manufacturing error, not the ingredient: FDA recalls in 2018–19 found dog foods containing up to 70x the intended vitamin D, causing hypercalcemia, kidney failure and deaths across brands including Hill's, Nutrisca, Sunshine Mills, Kroger and ELM. An ingredient label cannot tell you the amount, only that it is present — so this is flagged for awareness, not as a mark against the food.