Wheat Germ, Sea Kelp Find Their Way Into Fido’s Dish : Pets: Special foods and organic remedies reflect a growing concern with animals’ health. But some veterinarians question their value.

NEW YORK —  This country’s health consciousness is rapidly finding its way into the dishes and bowls of America’s cats and dogs. As people turn to healthier eating and living habits, many are altering their pets’ habits as well.

“People are transposing their interest in human health onto their pets,” said Dr. Phillips Brown, vice president and director of veterinary services for Lick Your Chops, a South Norwalk, Conn., manufacturer of natural pet food with chain stores along the East Coast. “It is the new trend.”

Evidence of the move toward healthier pets sits on the shelves of stores such as Whiskers, a health food store for pets located in Manhattan’s Greenwich Village. There, liver-and-wheat germ combo dinners are stacked in cans beside dog cookies made with sea kelp, millet flour and organic carrots. These snacks, called “K-9 cookies,” are baked fresh daily, and like most edible goods in the store, contain no preservatives, salt, artificial flavorings, colorings or sweeteners.

“We recommend the holistic approach,” said Monique van Dooren, the store manager. Bottles of vitamins, organic shampoos, digestive enzymes, and natural remedies for motion sickness and fur balls crowd another corner of the store. Whiskers also sells herbs. Pointing to half-filled herb bins, Van Dooren explained how each helps pets. Alfalfa is good for digestion and nervousness, she said. Flax seed works as a laxative, and peppermint eases nausea. Chamomile flowers help a tense animal relax.

Though natural pet food currently accounts for only about $100 million of the national pet food industry’s approximately $7.5 billion in annual sales, it seems poised for rapid growth.

Supermarket chains are introducing natural pet foods to their shelves, health food stores are adding pet sections, and major pet food manufacturers are moving toward healthier dining. Ralston Purina Co. recently unleashed a $40-million advertising campaign to promote its latest venture--Nature’s Course, an organic dry dog food.

But as natural pet foods become more widespread, some veterinarians question their value. Many say that if a pet food meets the minimum standards set by the National Research Council, it is good enough to nourish an animal from birth until death.

And the current economic squeeze may send consumers from the higher-priced natural foods back to less expensive supermarket varieties. “Natural foods are expensive,” said Dr. Dianne DiLorenzo of the Washington Square Pet Hospital in Manhattan. “If people can get four cans of Alpo or Friskies for $1 as opposed to one can of a natural food for the same price, then they probably will buy the Alpo or Friskies,” she said.

Dr. Michael Garvey, a veterinary specialist in internal medicine and critical care at the Animal Medical Center in Manhattan, stresses the importance of pet nutrition, but scoffs at some of the ingredients used in natural pet foods. “Water passed through botanicals? What does that mean?” he asked, referring to the label of a natural pet food product.

“ ‘Natural pet foods’ are usually made by companies nobody has ever heard of,” Garvey said. “They have not been fed to generations of pets, so there is not the evidence to support them. That doesn’t mean that they’re bad. It just means that they could be bad.”

Just because a product is new does not mean it should be taken less seriously, countered Brown of Lick Your Chops. He lectures nationwide on the nutritional and chemical components of pet products. Brown pointed out that many well-known, generation-old brands of pet food are high in fat content and contain animal by-products--recycled feathers, feet, beaks, fish tails and intestines.

Some use potentially harmful chemical preservatives and others are deficient in important vitamins and minerals, he said, adding that cats recently developed heart problems from eating a mainstream cat food lacking an amino acid essential to felines.

Veterinarians agree that heightened awareness of pet nutrition is important, but caution that feeding them according to human standards can be dangerous. “I’ve seen people who are vegetarians put their cats on a vegetarian diet and the cats get very sick,” said Garvey. “Cats are the ultimate carnivores. They don’t do well on a vegetarian diet.”

On that point, Brown agrees. “Just because something is good for us doesn’t mean it’s good for animals,” he said.