Health Benefits of Mushrooms for Your Pets
Are Functional Mushrooms Good for Animals? Learn About the Health Benefits of Mushrooms for Pets
Functional mushrooms are not only good for people, but also for pets. Improve the health of your animals with natural, medicinal mushrooms, grown and cultivated on USDA-certified organic farms. Find out the health benefits of mushrooms for pets at Eversio Wellness!
Healthy Benefits of Mushrooms for Pets: What Is Best for Them?
Just like in humans, not all functional mushrooms work for every pet. You need to find the right healthy mushrooms that work for your pets. Contact your veterinarian to learn more:
- Cordyceps: Cordyceps benefits include protecting liver and kidney functions, increasing energy, and strengthening the immune system
- Tremella: Tremella mushroom benefits include improving brain function, supporting the cardiovascular system, and lowering cholesterol levels
- Turkey Tail: Turkey tail mushroom benefits include protecting your pets against infections and supporting healthy cellular activities in pets with various cancers
- Lion’s Mane: Lion's mane benefits include supporting the digestive health and cognitive function of senior pets
- Reishi: Reishi mushroom benefits include optimizing immune system function, supporting stress, and improving blood and oxygen circulation
- Chaga: Chaga mushroom benefits include anti-inflammatory, anti-oxidant, and anti-viral effects in addition to supporting a balanced immune system
Therapeutic Health Benefits of Mushrooms for Your Pets
Functional mushrooms are rich in antioxidants, beta-d-glucans, terpenoids, and sterols. They have anti-inflammatory, anti-viral, anti-bacterial, and even anti-tumor capabilities, which are beneficial for pets of all ages and that’s why many holistic veterinarians use medicinal mushrooms to improve the health of their furry patients.
Adding mushroom supplements to your pets' daily diet can strengthen their immune and digestive systems, promote cell health, enhance joint and respiratory health, and protect them from environmental stresses.
There are several ways to administer medicinal mushrooms to your pets. You can serve mushroom extract powders sprinkled onto or stirred into their food or offer mushroom extract capsules if your pet will take them.
Remember, not all mushrooms are beneficial for pets. Offering fresh mushrooms isn't recommended. Before introducing any functional mushrooms into your pet's diet, always consult a holistic veterinarian.
Immune Health
Functional mushrooms are rich in beta-glucans and polyphenols, which are essential in strengthening the immune system and preventing any viral infections. Reishi mushrooms are useful for this. Other reishi health benefits of mushrooms for pets include maintaining the normal inflammatory response, restricting antihistamine release, relieving pain, and improving their endurance. Turkey tail, cordyceps, maitake, and Chaga are all useful mushrooms for boosting the immune system as well.
Joint Health
Health benefits of mushrooms to pets include improved joint health. Essential fatty acids and natural vegetarian glucosamine are found in functional mushrooms. These beneficial compounds support and promote your pet’s joint health. Joint health is very important for dogs to keep their active lifestyle. Cordyceps, maitake, reishi, and lion's mane are high in fatty acids and glucosamine making them ideal for strengthening the joints of your pets.
Digestion
Just like in humans, functional mushrooms can support and improve your pet’s gut health and digestive functions. Medicinal mushrooms are high in fungal enzymes. These beneficial compounds will help your pets have regular bowel movements and avoid constipation. Lion's mane and turkey tail functional mushrooms are rich in these enzymes and can help to support your pet's gut health and digestive tract health.
Nutritional Health
Beta-glucans, antioxidants, and amino acids are all abundant in functional mushroom extracts. These beneficial compounds can help improve your pet's overall health and well-being, including liver, kidneys, and heart. Medicinal mushrooms are especially helpful for weak, immunodeficient, diabetic, or older pets. Functional mushrooms like cordyceps, lion's mane, maitake, reishi, and turkey tail are great for overall mushroom wellness and health.
Skin and Coat
Medicinal mushrooms are rich in polysaccharides, antioxidants, and beta-glucans. These can produce stunning and lustrous coats for pets and their overall health. There are numerous causes of shedding or skin dryness in pets such as poor nutrition, health conditions, allergies, bathing products, and environmental stressors. By offering medicinal mushrooms for your pets, they can have beautiful, healthy, and lustrous coats and skin.
Longevity
Free radicals are harmful not only to humans but also to pets. They can cause or expedite premature aging and health problems in pets. Free radicals attack the nervous and immune systems of animals. Functional mushrooms, such as Chaga and reishi, are high in antioxidants which are responsible for fighting against free radicals. Antioxidants greatly reduce oxidative stress and protect your pets from premature aging.
Respiratory and Cardiovascular Health
Medicinal mushrooms help to increase blood circulation and oxygen production. Functional mushrooms such as reishi act as vasodilators that open the blood vessels of your pets, allowing for better blood and oxygen flow. Reishi is also beneficial for enhancing cardiovascular health. Medicinal mushrooms such as cordyceps and shiitake can help support and improve blood and oxygen circulation in your pets' bodies.
Detoxification
Because of the numerous beneficial compounds of functional mushrooms, adding them to your pets' daily diet has the ability to improve their natural detoxifying processes. Antioxidants can help detoxify, strengthen, protect, and improve your pets' liver cells. Medicinal mushrooms like reishi, shiitake, and maitake are rich in antioxidants. There are many health benefits of mushrooms on your pets, of all ages.
The Health Benefits of Offering the Correct Dose
Mushroom extracts are more potent and effective than products that contain a lot of grain and aren’t extracted. A little goes a long way with a concentrated extract. They are easy to add to your pets' food. Just sprinkle some of our mushroom extracts on top of their food, and mix well. For dry pet food, add water to ensure the mushroom extract is mixed and incorporated into the pet food properly.
Holistic vets recommend sprinkling mushroom extract powder onto a pet’s food up to two times daily according to their approximate weight in the following serving sizes, but we always recommend starting small, making careful observations and consulting your own vet if you have any concerns:
- Small: 1 – 30 lbs = 1/8 tsp (250mg)
- Medium: 31 – 75 lbs = 1/4 tsp (500mg)
- Large: 76+ lbs = 1/2 tsp (1000mg)
Although there is an abundance of research demonstrating the natural health benefits of prolonged medicinal mushroom use for human beings, we often have animals to thank for being the original subjects of most of these scientific studies. Thank you, animals. For decades animals have been used as test subjects so that we can benefit from the findings of their trials. We were very happy to learn about this study completed at Penn State University that demonstrated significant effects of a medicinal mushroom extract on dogs with a cancer called hemangiosarcoma. You’ve got to love animal research on animals to benefit animals. Dogs with this cancer that were treated only with a compound derived from a mushroom had the longest survival times ever reported for dogs with the disease. That’s pretty exciting for researchers, vets and pups!
Healthy Benefits of Mushrooms for Pets: Turkey Tail, the Best Functional Mushroom for Cats and Dogs
Immune-Boosting Effects of Turkey Tail Functional Mushrooms
Pets, especially dogs, are very curious creatures. They tend to lick, drink, and eat anything that piques their interests, including dirty and unsanitary items. We can't always keep an eye on our pets and make sure they don't eat something dangerous.
Boosting your pet's immune system is essential to preventing health problems. Support and strengthen your pet's immune system by offering turkey tail functional mushroom extract. This contains high levels of beta-glucans which are necessary for activating the immune system and protecting against viral and bacterial infections.
Turkey Tail Medicinal Mushrooms as an Adaptogen
Adaptogen mushrooms are medicinal mushrooms that can reduce the negative effects of stress on your pets' bodies. Adaptogens, such as turkey tail medicinal mushrooms, can help protect your pets from environmental stressors. Environmental stresses can be caused by a variety of factors, including
■ Loud noises
■ Unfamiliar scents
■ New places
■ Separation
■ Meeting new people
■ Physical discomfort
■ Confusion or memory loss (common in older pets)
Turkey tail will act as a "positive" stress to your pets' bodies. As a result, your pets can adapt to the environmental stressors without becoming aggressive, restless, or anxious.
Anti-Cancer Properties of Turkey Tail Healthy Mushrooms
Turkey tail mushroom benefits also include its anticancer properties. Clinical studies show that turkey tail medicinal mushrooms contain polysaccharide Krestin (PSK), and polysaccharide peptide (PSP). These two types of polysaccharides can help fight cancer, improve the immune system, and support healthy cellular activities.
Adding turkey tail functional mushrooms to your pet's daily food can improve their immune system, which is essential when undergoing chemotherapy or fighting against cancer, such as gastric and colorectal cancers. The Veterinary School at the University of Penn State has done studies with functional mushrooms that have significantly increased the survival rate of dogs with hemangiosarcoma.