Other ingredients: Cellulose capsule. May contain one or more of the following hypoallergenic ingredients to fill space-Leucine, Silicon Dioxide.

90 capsules

Discussion:

Calcium in the most abundant mineral in the body. Calcium can be very hard to absorb through the intestinal tract. Because of this, many animals are marginally deficient in calcium.

Calcium Citramate™ (Citrate-Malate) has demonstrated superb solubility and superior absorption when compared to other calcium salts. It has approximately six times the solubility of either calcium citrate or calcium malate individually.

The most common form of calcium, calcium carbonate has very poor absorbability and alters the body's acid/base balance.

We believe that, for many animals, Calcium Citramate™ is the most cost effective and useful calcium supplement available.

A reasonably optimal diet should contain a calcium to phosphorus ration of roughly 2 parts calcium to one part phosphorus. Meats are very high in phosphorus and very low in calcium. Since many home cooking recipes recommend fairly high amounts of meat (in general, a good idea for carnivores), there is no reason to supplement phosphorus. Many of these recipes recommend bone meal, which fails to take in to account the high phosphorus in the diet. The result is excess phosphorus in comparison to calcium. The solution is to simply feed a calcium supplement.

Birds

Birds often have low or marginal blood levels of calcium. Vitamin supplements for birds often have Vitamin D added to the product. Birds are very sensitive to Vitamin D and can easily develop excessive levels of Vitamin D when supplemented in the diet. The result is that birds often are diagnosed with Vitamin D toxicity. Since it is uncommon for birds to have Vitamin D deficiencies, it is much safer and more appropriate to supplement birds with a calcium supplement without any Vitamin D added.

Some veterinarians recommend providing calcium by placing calcium gluconate in the water. We do not recommend this because the amount of calcium in this product is very low and birds don't absorb enough calcium from this water based supplementation. To highlight the small amount of elemental calcium in calcium gluconate lets look at an example. Calcium gluconate comes in a 10% solution, which is diluted and placed into the water bowl. A 10% calcium gluconate solution means that there is 100 mg of calcium in one milliliter (one milliliter is roughly equivalent to 1 or 2 capsules or tablets of calcium. But, since elemental calcium only makes up one tenth of the entire milliliter of calcium gluconate, there is actually only 10 mg of calcium in that milliliter of calcium gluconate! After its dilution in the water and then following the poor systemic absorption (a common problem with all calcium supplements), it is likely that the average bird is receiving far less than 1 mg of calcium daily! This is an insignificant amount when compared to the amount of calcium naturally availble in the foods a bird eats each day.

Calcium citramate is a far superior calcium supplement for birds.

Which Animals Need Calcium Supplementation:

1. Animals that are on a muscle meat and organ meat based diet (see our information on how to easily feed a well balanced fresh food diet to your dog (Feeding Your Dog) or your cat (Feeding Your Cat)
2. Animals that are on home cooking diets; especially when the animal is a finicky eater that refuses to eat the entire diet (these animals often end up eating primarily muscle meats
3. Animals on food trials for allergies
4. Animals fed a limited diet, especially when the diet is almost entirely meats. These animals should also be fed Canine Basic Nutrients, olive oil and Super EPA
5. Animals on limited antigen or hypoallergenic home cooked diets
6. BIRDS: Most birds do not receive enough calcium in their diets
7. Lactating mammals

Dosage:

Cats

1/4 daily, mixed into the food

Dogs

1 capsule for each 25 lbs daily, mixed into the food

Birds:

Sprinkle 1/4 capsule on soft foods (foods that the calcium powder will adhere to), once or twice daily... this dosage assumes a fair amount of wastage as the foods are rarely completely consumed.

Reptiles:

Feed by mixing into there foods, 1/8 to 1/4 capsule on the food twice daily. Snakes that are eating dead mice, rats or rabbits, can have the calcium capsule placed into the dead animal and then feeding that animal to the snake.