Cats and dogs, just like their owners, require a balanced lifestyle in order to remain healthy and happy. Exercise, water intake, sleep, minimizing stress levels, and eating well are all factors that support a healthful lifestyle. Pet food must be properly prepared, preserved and stored to maintain optimum freshness and nutrition. The preservation process typically involves monitoring of heat treatment, water content, and pH. These factors become even more essential if the food is designed to comply with a certain style of diet or to treat a specific ailment.
Foods stored at room temperature are at risk for the growth of harmful bacteria and fungi, particularly C. botulinum, the bacteria that causes botulism. Even trace exposure to C. botulinum can cause a pet to fall ill. To prevent harmful bacterial growth, manufacturers utilize a variety of sterilization practices in their canning processes, such as chemical sanitizing and heat sterilization. Additionally, it has been found that the growth of C. botulinum is greatly inhibited in acidic environments below pH 4.6, so pet food may be acidified below this pH for greater shelf life stability and microbial control.
Hazard Analysis Critical Control Points (HACCP) plans are put in place by manufacturers to maintain food safety and ensure good manufacturing processes. The specifics of each HACCP vary from manufacturer to manufacturer depending on their specific processes. HACCP plans include critical control points that encompass a wide variety of aspects of production, from chemical hazards, to raw material acquisition, to product handling and consumption. Quality control parameters, such as pH, along with the proper technique for these measurements are often outlined in these HACCP plans.
The owner of a specialty pet food company contacted Hanna Instruments looking for an instrument to measure the pH of canned pet foods. The customer was looking to expand production, and wished to comply with a new HACCP plan. The niche market pet food company specialized in canned pet foods that are tailored towards dogs and cats with specific dietary needs; mainly the prevention and treatment of urinary infections.
These types of infections are often linked to a pH imbalance in urine, which is directly related to the amount of water the pet drinks and the pH, acidity, and alkalinity of the food consumed. Per their HACCP plan, the customer required a meter that reported electrode offset and slope and could be calibrated to at least three points. The customer was also working with a limited budget.
During the discussion, the customer mentioned they used iPads® on the factory floor to catalogue inventory. Hanna Instruments recommended the HALO PVDF Body Foodcare pH Electrode with Bluetooth® - FC2022. The Bluetooth probe was able to be used in conjunction with their existing iPads; they simply needed to download the free Hanna Lab App.
The FC2022 features a conical tip and open junction design, ideal for the semi-solid consistency of the pet food. Because the FC2022 has low temperature glass for fast response time in refrigerated samples, Hanna Instruments made sure the customer was completely cooling their samples before measurement in order to prolong electrode life.
The customer appreciated the ability to calibrate up to five points and the option to constantly display GLP data, including electrode slope, electrode offset, and the date and time of the last calibration. The customer was also pleased with the ability to tag a reading, make an annotation with the batch number, and then easily export the data in .csv format. This saved them the trouble of manually recording the data and gave them enhanced traceability in their production process. The ability to share data with multiple users via email was also a huge plus for them. The versatile and easy to use Hanna Lab App in conjunction with the FC2022, provided a complete solution for their pH measurement requirements.
