Roudybush Statement
The following statement was provided www.foryourbird.com
by a Roudybush representative.
Reference to Ethoxyquin will be removed from
Roudybush packaging ASAP.
New, All Natural Preservative
Unless a food is kept frozen until it is consumed, it undergoes changes over
time that decrease its vitamin levels and oxidize fats. Excessive oxidation of
fats leads to rancidity. To prevent rancidity and loss of necessary nutrients,
preservatives are added to foods. These preservatives are primarily
antioxidants. Until recently, the most safe and effective preservative available
has been ethoxyquin. Ethoxyquin became the target of a tremendous amount of
adverse publicity due to a poorly designed study of its safety in rats performed
many years ago. Since that study, many more tests were conducted in rats, mice,
and dogs, showing the preservative was very safe. Unfortunately, these studies
did nothing to stop the already building misinformation about ethoxyquin.
Roudybush has included ethoxyquin in our formulations in the past. The quality
of the food we produced was our utmost concern and until an equally safe and
effective preservative was developed, we were unwilling to switch to one of the
other inferior or less safe preservatives available just because people were
afraid of ethoxyquin. Recently a new, all natural preservative with excellent
safety and efficacy was introduced. We have replaced ethoxyquin with this new
preservative in our Low-fat Maintenance, Maintenance, Breeder and High-energy
Breeder pellets.
The new preservative is a combination of d-tocopherol
(a close relative of vitamin E), rosemary, and citric acid. Vitamin E (a-tocopherol)
has antioxidant properties, but it is also biologically active and larger
concentrations needed as a preservative have not been tested for safety in
birds. The advantage of d-tocopherol is that it has antioxidant properties but
it has very little biological activity, so risk of toxicity is eliminated.
Rosemary has natural antioxidant properties. Citric acid binds to certain
minerals responsible for starting oxidation reactions, preventing those
reactions from occuring.
Roudybush is committed to providing your birds with
the best possible food. Any changes we make to our formulations are thoroughly
researched and only made when the data shows us there is a clear advantage.
