Helping Your Pet Have a Healthy Life
By Jhoane Robinson
Cedar Bear® Co-Founder and Herbalist
How can we help our pets have the best health? It’s a good idea to take a moment to make sure we aren’t missing some of the important basics that help give them the lifestyle and health support that they deserve. Let’s look at what they need to be tail waggingly healthy.
- Nutrition & Supplements
- Exercise
- Veterinary Care
- Dental Care
- Grooming
- Mental Stimulation
- Stress Management
- Herbal Support
Nutrition
A healthy diet with the nutrients your pet needs is essential for great health. While we as pet owners have been led to believe that dry kibbled food has everything our pets need because they’re formulated and fortified and filled full of whatever fillers they are filled with, eating the same food day after day, year after year contributes to many health issues. The fresher the food, the better the nutrition, and it’s best to feed a variety of proteins and vegetables. Full disclosure: I do use a high-quality kibbled food for my dogs, but add veggies, flax seed, yogurt, and water. And our Cedar Bear® herbs!
Supplements
Just like us, our pets need probiotics (especially after antibiotics) and digestive enzymes, especially as they get older. These are vital for gastrointestinal health and improved digestion. Unsweetened yogurt or kefir give valuable probiotics.
Essential fatty acids are vital for digestive health and help reduce inflammation and are in fish oils and flaxseeds.
Herbs can help! Straight from nature, herbs have nutrients that support your pet’s health. We’ll go into herbs in greater detail in a bit.
Exercise
Our pets need exercise just like we do. How much they need depends on age, breed, temperament, weight, and their living quarters. Dogs and cats both need exercise, so make sure they get out and about (dogs) or up and about (cats) daily.
Veterinary Care
Regular vet exams are very important, especially as your pet gets older. While you may choose to keep vaccinations to a minimum, don’t skip puppy and kitten vaccines or rabies vaccines.
Dental Care
One of the most important things to keep in good order are your pet’s teeth. Dental problems lead to illnesses caused by infections. Taking care of your pet’s teeth takes commitment. Daily tooth brushing and vet checks with professional cleaning is very important.
Grooming
Regular combing and brushing clears out dead hair helps keep skin and coats healthy. Nail trimming is really important to not let claws become too long.
Mental Stimulation
Both physical and behavioral problems crop up when our pet’s minds aren’t stimulated enough. Cats need play time, too, especially when they are primarily indoor pets. That’s why climbing trees and scratching posts are so helpful.
Working and herding breed dogs have to have a ‘job’. I know. I have a border collie. Even at 9 years of age, if we don’t give her a job, she’ll give herself one. One job she has is to be the ‘official greeter’ when anyone comes to the property, and ‘official helper’ for our farm workers. This last summer, she decided she was the ‘official chicken watcher,’ and spent hours every day just watching the chickens and letting them know when they got out of line!
Stress Management
Believe it or not, but our pets experience stress very much like we do! Dogs often experience separation anxiety when we, the head of their pack, are gone a lot, and cats cooped up inside, often in multiple cat homes, become stressed, too. Stress not only causes pets to act out in ways that can make us very unhappy (damage to furniture, dependent and noisy behavior…), but suppresses their digestive and immune systems and can manifest in health problems. Pet stress can be reduced with interactive play, exercise, toys that keep them busy, and cat furniture for climbing and scratching. Herbs can help, too!
HERBS, NATURE’S HEALTH SUPPORT
Now, lets talk about how herbs can help. At Cedar Bear Naturales, we make herbal combinations for people and pets.
Whatever their age, if your favorite critter is overactive, excessively nervous, and stresses out over every little thing Calm Down! is your answer! With herbs that help relax heart rate, muscles, and nerves, Calm Down! helps calm pets when they are too bouncy, high-strung, tense, stressed, or anxious. Stress also negatively affects digestion, so this herbal formula also benefits the digestive system. Helps dogs, kitties, and exotic pets and birds, too!
Coat Care helps your fur kid have amazing coat and skin health by helping the digestive system work at its best. It has a gentle liver and blood cleansing action and helps build your pet’s digestive health. Coat Care helps stimulate the production of digestive juices, helps build tissue strength in the digestive tract, and also supports good immune function. The result is a healthier pet and slicker, glossier skin and fur. And who wouldn’t want that?
All pets, whatever kind they are and whatever their age, need lots of nutrients to build and maintain strong, healthy bones, teeth, fur and skin throughout their lives, but many of our pets don’t get enough of the nutrients they need, especially if their diet is mainly in kibbled form. Daily Needs helps build maximum health for your pets on all levels. Not only great for your four-footed furry pets, it’s also excellent for other mammals, reptiles, and your feathered friends, as well!
(original name Parasite Cleanse)
Because our four-footed family members have their noses in the grass and everything around them, picking up parasites happen, especially if your pet goes outside, lives outside, or if your cat is a mouser. Many of our pets’ health issues, such as digestive distress, irritability, restlessness, dry skin, dull coat, and anal itching may be related to these unwelcome intruders.
Many of our beloved fur kids have issues with their joints. Joyful Joints helps build healthy, happy joints no matter what age or size your pet is. Supports optimal joint health and proper fluid dynamics in and around the joints to help reduce pain levels and help your pet to be able to jump, run, climb stairs like a happy youngster again!
If your fur kid has an extra sensitive tummy, there are times you need a quick helper on hand for that queasy tummy! Fortunately, Queasy Ease can come to the rescue and helps settle down those terrible tummy times before you have to clean up the floor or the car. Helps pets’ tummies settle down, improves digestion and appetite, and calms travel and motion-related queasy tummies!
OTHER CEDAR BEAR® HERBAL COMBINATION FORMULAS THAT ARE EXCELLENT FOR PETS:
Strengthens your pet’s body’s ability to handle stress with adaptogen herbs which help rejuvenate your pet’s overall health and vitality and calms the nervous system. If your pet tends to be nervous, travels to shows or kennels, is a hard-working agility or herding dog, or is under stress of any kind, Adrenal Balance will help your pet’s endocrine system and overall health be in happy and healthy balance!
EC Blend
This great tasting, gentle, and effective herbal formula is based on the original Essiac formula with herbs that have been used for centuries for blood cleansing, digestive, lymphatic, cellular, and immune support, and is especially helpful for dogs.
When toxins and heavy metals settle deep inside tissues, they can continue to negatively affect your pets’ health, and maybe even their behavior. Helps clear out environmental toxins from deep inside body tissues and gently helps condition the blood and protect the liver. When your pet’s health just isn’t what it should be, maybe it’s time for a deep Herbal Detox.
When kidney issues begin to crop up, especially as your pet gets older, it’s important to give their kidneys a little extra support as soon as possible with this formula that helps soothe and tone the kidneys and bladder. If your pet has trouble with piddle dribbles in the house, Kidney & Bladder can help, and is soothing and gentle, even for elderly pets.
Immune Blast Off! (For Kids, but great for Pets, too)
Immune response activator with herbs that stimulate white blood cell activity in the immune system.
As a pet parent, protecting your pet’s liver helps protect your pet’s entire health and well-being. Liver Build has milk thistle, which protects the liver, and other herbs that help soothe, strengthen, and tone liver tissues, and is an effective daily use liver tonic that is gentle enough for both elderly and young pets.
Helps soothe dry, ‘barky’ coughs and helps the immune system kick in and do its job better. This formula hydrates dry, irritated tissues, strengthens tissues throughout the respiratory system, and stimulates the immune system.
Low functioning thyroid issues are increasing in our pets, especially our dogs. Every cell in your pet’s body depends on thyroid hormones for healthy metabolism function. Thyro Boost has important herb-based nutrients to support the health and function of your pet’s thyroid, support iodine reserves, and help balance endocrine function.
Overactive thyroid issues can happen at any age and is very common in older cats. When the thyroid gland begins to overproduce thyroid hormones, it throws metabolism into high gear and causes abnormally active behavior. The good news is, overactive thyroids often respond very favorably to Cedar Bear’s Thyro Calm, formulated to soothe and calm the thyroid and nervous system, support the heart and liver, and help the metabolism to get back to normal.
A daily use iodine supplement that gently supports iodine levels. Iodine is essential for the thyroid and benefits endocrine and immune function, metabolism, cardiovascular health, and healthy DNA integrity, not only for people, but for pets, too! Just a drop or two a day, depending on your pet’s size and weight, is all that’s needed.
About Cedar Bear Naturales® and our Pet Formulas
In the 1980’s, Founder and Clinical & Formulary Herbalist Carl Robinson developed his revolutionary TincTract® method for creating a totally alcohol-free liquid herbal product with just the herbs, glycerin, and water. Most of his first formulas were for children. (Young kids can’t swallow pills and don’t like yucky tasting things. His herbal TincTract® formulas are liquid and taste great!) In early 2000’s, we noticed that veterinarians were using our Cedar Bear® children’s formulas because they were so effective for animals. We got to work, and with the support of a holistic veterinarian, developed our herbal formulas for pets, the first in the industry and marketplace, and have been doing them for over 20 years, longer than anyone else! We’ve seen amazing results with our own pets, and are confident that you will, too! So don’t delay, give your four-footed fur kids, and even other pets, the gift of better health with Cedar Bear® herbs!
About Alcohol and Pets:
Alcohol is not good for pets. Period! With Cedar Bear’s totally alcohol-free TincTract® herbs, you can be confident you are giving your pets the best in herbal health support. And being liquid, they go to work immediately!
