The science of nutrition has taken a beating. Just when everyone is convinced that coffee gives a person headaches, a new study proves coffee won’t hurt you – but the person who brewed it might.
Maybe I should take part of the blame. Every time someone comes out with a nutritional study, the papers report it as if it’s the gospel truth. Then when the whole thing is proven false, I like to repeat the story and try to make folks laugh about it.

Everyone knows nutritionists are like kids: If you laugh at them, they act a fool more than ever. I ran into a good one at a publishers’ meeting. This fellow wrote a book on nutrition for dogs and claims to have spent more than $1 million on research for his book.

The guy sitting next to me said, “That’s one heck of a bunch of dog food!”

I was talking with the author after the meeting when he said, “Dogs can’t have vitamin C. Vitamin C will kill your dog. It destroys their liver and kidneys.”

Just as I was about to ask how much vitamin C we were talking about, the conversation turned to the need for different foods for different types of dogs. This author says breeds of dogs developed in China need lots of rice in their food, while those from the Middle East prefer lamb.

This makes sense when you think about it. Everyone knows you can’t feed a Chihuahua the same thing you would give a Labrador. The Lab could easily eat a chicken, for example, whereas a meal like that could kill a Chihuahua. You’d have to kill the chicken before you gave it to a little dog like that.

The vitamin C story rings true, also. I can recall several dogs we had on the farm when I was a kid, and I can see that vitamin C may have done them in.

We could take old Brownie, for example. Brownie died when he was about 14. He ate an orange when he was a pup, and it finally got him.

Then, there was Blackie. I always thought Blackie died because we couldn’t come up with more creative names for our dogs, but it was probably the vitamin C.

Blackie was a short dog and never ate much fruit, but he consumed lots of chicken liver. That wouldn’t have been so bad if he only ate livers from chickens we had slaughtered; unfortunately, Blackie got to the point where he was getting them for himself. He may have eaten one too many.

Then there was Gus, probably my favorite dog. Gus was the only beagle I’ve seen who could outrun three teenage boys for half a mile and still flush pheasants 60 yards out.

But while Gus was fast, he wasn’t very smart. He liked to chase the milk truck. One day Gus’ feet slipped and the silver beast got him.
Was it caused by vitamin C? No question about it. Milk is an excellent source of vitamin C.

Readers with questions or comments for Roger Pond may write to him in care of this publication.

Published on Sept. 30, 2009