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Cat food. Dog Food. Wet or dry. Cheapo stuff and well-known brand names. Now comes word that fish food has been tainted.

When we buy certain brands, especially from our vet's office or upon his or her recommendation, we believe we are supplying our beloved family pet quality nutrition. Interestingly, very little time is spent educating veterinary students about nutrition. When asked about specific foods, many of today's vets admit they cannot keep up with the pace new foods are being produced and placed out on the shelves.

Do you know what ingredients make up your pet's store-bought food?

It could be my friend's horse.

After her horse died of a long illness, she called a rendering company to haul him away, and was told the carcass would be sold to a dog food manufacturer. Yum.

More than ever, we consumers read our food product labels to determine fat content, calorie intake, trans fats and whole-grain percentages. Medical experts tell us that proper nutrition will allow for a healthier, longer and lighter life.

The same logic holds true for our pets. So isn't it time to decipher the ingredients label on four-legged family members food?

If you log on to www.naturapet.com and go to the Ingredient Wizard, you will receive a world-class education on good ingredients versus bad ingredients for your pet.

You may be feeding your baby Science Diet, Purina or Ole Roy. You might think you're buying the best, but how do you know if you have never been advised on reading pet food labels?

While Natura Pet Products would love you to buy their products, Innova, Evo, California Naturals and Healthwise, they also are committed to educating the pet parenting public on the possible differences of ingredients as defined by the Association of American Feed Control Officials.

Example: "Chicken fat" is obtained from the tissues of chicken and, at 23 percent, has a high percentage of linoleic fatty acid, which is extremely important for your pet's skin and coat.

Yet animal, poultry or lamb fat has only 3 percent and 2 percent respectively, so you want to avoid seeing these on your pet food label.

Ground rice is a high quality source of carbohydrates, is easily digested and considered to be hypoallergenic. However, ground corn and ground wheat, while good sources of carbs, are considered to aggravate an animals' allergies. Plus, corn gives many animals gas. If you don't want Fifi passing heinie hiccups all night long, look for a "no corn" label.

"Chicken meal" is a fine ingredient described by the Association of American Feed Control Officials as "the dry product of flesh and skin, with or without accompanying bone, derived from whole carcasses of chicken exclusive of feathers, heads, feet and entrails," although I wouldn't feed any "meal" to my critters.

"Poultry byproducts" is what you do not want to see on the label, since it consists of ground, rendered parts of slaughtered poultry, such as necks, feet, undeveloped eggs and intestines. Oh, and some feathers are acceptable.

If you see meat meal, meat and bone meal listed, watch out. These ingredients are less digestible than chicken meal and cheaper to mass-produce. They could be rendered products from beef, goats, pigs, horses or roadkill. It can also come from 4-D animals: dead, dying, diseased or disabled.

I have found that feeding a more expensive pet food to my four- (and three-) legged creatures actually saves me money due to less frequent visits to the vet for minor issues. Teeth are strong, eyes sharp. With glucosamine in many of today's dog foods, joints work better and are less painful, coats are shinier and you will see smaller and less foul smelling stools.

Grocery stores, club warehouses and mammoth pet food chains offer a wide variety of food for our pets.

The smaller pet stores, like Clark's Pet Emporium and others in town, offer a variety of brands that might be less familiar, such as Natura, Wellness, Solid Gold and gazillions of others, with personnel knowledgeable about the "human grades" of ingredients, which you could eat out of the can, or share with man's best friend.