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You have a simple question - what Wysong companion animal product should you feed your pet? You have gone to the Wysong website and found the information overwhelming and confusing. Or maybe you went to a pet store and discovered that the clerk did not understand Wysong's feeding philosophy and couldn't help either. Perhaps you called customer service and didn't get the answer you were looking for. Why does Wysong have to be so complicated?

Let me turn the tables and ask you what I, a human, should eat? Would you tell me to just go buy a box, can or package of something – like you are hoping Wysong will tell you to do for your pet? Would you give me that kind of a "simple" answer? If not, then why are you expecting Wysong to provide such a simple answer with regard to your pet? Sheesh!

Feeding humans involves a vast array of foods, not just a package of a food. You might tell me to have cereal at breakfast, but not the same cereal all the time. Then you say I should add milk and fruit to it. You might also suggest some fruit, toast, coffee and orange juice. (Hey now...that's not simple.) Then you go on to say for lunch I could have a burger and fries, a sandwich, a cookie, a shake, a salad. (You're starting to overwhelm me.) For supper you suggest some chicken, mashed potatoes, steamed asparagus with butter and salt and some apple pie. You even list some snacks for in between and tell me that everything you have just described could vary meal to meal and day to day. (Now you've lost me...) If you are concerned about my health you even tell me to take some vitamin, mineral or herbal supplements. Is all that "simple"? Where is my one-food-in-a-package in all this complexity?...

But wait...there is no one who really finds this to be a dilemma or confusing. We all eat a variety of foods – numbering in the hundreds of options – with barely a thought given to it. In fact it's fun. Nobody runs to the doctor or nutritionist (almost nobody anyway) to find out what to eat at their next meal. They also don't go to Kelloggs, Pillsbury, Tyson or Land O' Lakes to ask them what to feed their family.

So why on earth are so many people confused about what to feed their pets? Why do people latch onto myth, fable and lore propagated by breeders, a neighbor, a clerk at a pet store or pet food manufacturers, or feel they need the advice of a nutritionist or a veterinarian? Can feeding a pet really be any more mysterious than feeding yourself? Certainly not.

Your pet does not need "a" food. It also doesn't need a certain % of protein, calcium, taurine or any other nutrient guaranteed on a package. He or she needs a variety of foods and different meals, and those meals should be fresh, natural and healthy as much as possible. That is why Wysong offers such a wide variety of pet foods and supplements. You can virtually start with any Wysong food, then cycle through the dozens of other Wysong options. (As absurd as it may sound on the surface, you can even feed cat food to dogs and vice versa, or Senior™ to puppies and Growth™ to seniors with great benefit.)

You should offer some table scraps (good ones) and some fresh meats, veggies and fruits and use Wysong cat and dog supplements as their labels and Wysong pet health literature suggests. Cycle everything - even the supplements. Fast your pet once in awhile for a meal or two, or a day. Feed only fresh meat at a meal once in awhile. Offer some yogurt, some cottage cheese, and tidbits of real cheese or some sliced apple or carrots. Be as creative with your pet's food bowl as you are with your own - your companion will be very grateful!

Read the Wysong literature and learn all the options. (See The Truth About Pet Foods and How To Apologize To Your Pet.) You do not have to feed every nutrient at every meal. Your pet has reserve capacity. Take it easy; apply the same simple logic to pet feeding that you do to yourself. Change your definition of "simple," from one specific food fed at every meal, to the "simple" logic of feeding pets like you feed yourself.

Pet food marketers may try to make pet feeding sound too complicated for you to do all by your lonesome, or appeal to your desire for convenience and simplicity. I agree – how wonderful it would be if some experts somewhere bundled up ideal health in an easy-open package, and all we had to do was pour it in a bowl day after day. So yes, you can go to a store and find a diet specific for your pet's breed, or your pet's age, or its size, or with a certain % of whatever, or its health condition or with some fancy ingredient, or some demon ingredient left out. But that is not where good nutrition and good health will be found.

Let me put it this way. You can have simplicity by feeding a certain diet to your pet day in and day out, but you will trade that simplicity for a whole lot of complexity dealing with the illness and disease that will likely eventually result. And just from a fairness to your pet, even humane aspect, would you want to eat one food 24-7-365?

Health is not something somebody else (a doctor, food manufacturer, pharmacist) does to you. It is something you do for yourself … and your pet.

So relax a little. You don't need a nuclear physicist to help you feed your pet. Just use the same common sense you use for yourself and your family everyday. After all, pets are people too.