Latest / Back In The Closet - Two Crazy Cat Ladies / The Data Around Cognitive Health in Cats with Carter Easler

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The Data Around Cognitive Health in Cats with Carter Easler · Back In The Closet - Two Crazy Cat Ladies

• 0:00
  Before we start this awesome episode, we got to give a shout
• 0:02
  out to our friends and sponsors at Pet Greens.
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  Yeah, and honestly, it's really an important part of their
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• 0:37
  OK, so now let's get to the podcast.
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  With wine. Always with wine.
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  I'm Jay. I'm Adrian.
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  And together we are. There's two crazy cat ladies I'm
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  gonna cut. You.
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  I think I just peed. Buckle up.
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  We're back in the closet. Welcome to another episode of a
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  back in the closet with the 2 crazy cat ladies.
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  We are super excited today to be joined by none other than
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  Carter. The sexy science junkie is what
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  we're we're going to call you for community for community cat
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  health mushrooms for dogs mushrooms for cats you, you, you
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  do so many things and you also are the supplier of our
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  mushrooms for the Michael cat mushrooms for for kitties.
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  So welcome, our thank you so much for joining us.
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  What? A warm welcome.
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  Thank you so much for having me. We love you and we miss you and
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  I know there may be some people here that do not know who you
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  are and what you do. Would you mind to give a quick
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  intro about where you come from, why you love what you do, why
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  you're, how you're changing the world?
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  Absolutely. So I am a clinical researcher
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  and educator or writer on sort of a host of different topics
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  around holistic pet health. My specialization and really my
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  passion is right now looking at how mushrooms, adaptogens, and
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  different herbs can really impact the longevity and the
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  quality of life of our senior animals.
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  So we just launched this study. It peer reviewed and published
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  in the Journal of Clinical Medical Research looking into
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  cognitive decline in dogs specifically.
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  But we we talk a lot about cats as well in there because cats
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  often go kind of unnoticed. But cognitive decline is a huge
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  problem that a lot of pet parents really kind of attribute
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  to just normal signs of aging in cats.
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  But between the ages of 10 and 14, something like 28% of cats
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  will show signs of cognitive decline.
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  And then above 15, it goes up to 50%.
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  So this is a really pervasive issue.
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  It's something that a lot of people are dealing with and just
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  go on like, oh, my cat's just getting old.
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  So we're trying to, we're trying to get some information out
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  there so people can see that there are options.
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  Right. Like with humans, you know, when
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  we start having short term memory loss and all that kind of
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  stuff, it's like, oh, we got to take Ginkgo or we got.
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  A. We need the ginkgo.
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  We. Need we need lines made right?
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  What are what does that look like though?
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  Because I think you're right that most people do think like
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  that's just getting old. You know, they're, they're,
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  they're acting a little bit off. What kinds of things should
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  people be watching for when they know that their little one is
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  getting up there in age and maybe dealing with cognitive
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  decor? Yeah.
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  So in, in our study, we worked with a really incredible group
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  of veterinarians at the Veterinary Health Research
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  Centers. Our, our lead investigator, his
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  name is Doctor Joel Ehrensweig and he's worked studying
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  cognitive decline in animals for 20 years now, but he's never,
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  he's, he's only really worked on the pharmaceutical side and,
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  and, but as his career progressed, has become sort of
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  more attuned to more holistic, more natural modalities.
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  And he, so we, we designed this study together.
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  And in our conversations, as we were, we were working on it, he
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  was trying to temper my expectations.
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  He's like, well, you know, there's the most we can hope for
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  is that we don't see any changes.
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  And I'm like, OK, well, that's, that's not been our experience
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  in, in seeing how this works. But the way that we designed
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  this study was around the structure of behaviors that it's
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  called DISHA and that stands for disorientation, interaction,
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  sleep, house soiling and activity.
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  Those are kind of, those are 5 main ways that we look at
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  cognitive decline, particularly in dogs.
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  And then we add on for cats, vocalization, extra, extra
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  vocalization and kind of forgetting to clean themselves
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  so that they're like the the grooming behaviors starting to
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  go off because in those cats that show signs of cognitive
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  decline, 40% of them are expressing more vocalizations
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  than it's normal. Yeah, that's a.
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  Big one. The yowling is what is what we
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  call it. It's, it was our first
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  indicator. In fact, we learned, we learned
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  about cognitive decline with personal experience because our
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  18 year old, he was a, he was a singer.
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  So like his whole life he had like a certain time of day that
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  he would like, you know, sing and just to get our attention.
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  So we would come to him. But then when he when he got up
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  there in age, he was 18 years old and he just started
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  vocalizing yowling and it was a different, it wasn't a saying.
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  It was a different kind of yow in middle of the night.
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  And we were like, OK, we need to get him to the vet.
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  Like we need to check everything.
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  And we checked everything. His health was perfectly like,
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  like clear, like no, no problems with his organs or, or, you
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  know, inflammation in the body or anything like that.
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  And so the, the vet actually said the one thing this could be
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  at his age is, you know, I don't think she called it dementia,
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  but she's, she said like Kitty dementia, right?
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  Like we're cognitive. FCD, three line cognitive
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  dysfunction. Yes, yes.
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  And we? Noticed and it kind of, it kind
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  of not escalated, but it went from that yowling to you.
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  You would see him kind of be disoriented.
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  And that yelling was like, mournful, like it felt like
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  something was wrong. Well, like he was crying.
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  He was. Crying he would go into certain
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  rooms and he would just like look around and if we called his
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  name it was it was it was definitely thing that we
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  noticed. And so we started treating it as
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  cognitive climb with B12 and it really, it really improved for
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  him. Yeah, but that's all we had at
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  this time. Yeah, that's all we that's all
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  we knew. At the time.
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  Yeah, right. What?
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  What did you guys look at? Like what's going on in like in
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  the brain as they age, You know, is it something that we should
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  be watching for? What is it?
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  What does it look? Like so it when we get older,
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  this process in our bodies called neurogenesis, the
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  creation of these new neurons in the brain, it, it slows down
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  naturally. We, we have this first as we, as
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  we grow up and then beyond kind of like the, the middle age
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  years for our cats. So like 5-6, it just slowly
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  starts to decline. And then as we consider our cats
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  seniors around say like 10 years old, then then we really see
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  this progressive decline. There are also, you know, of
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  course, genetic factors that that are part of this, but then
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  so many lifestyle parts can contribute to cognitive decline.
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  The food that they're eating, the interaction that they have,
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  the stimulation that that is around them, the amount of
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  activity. I mean, even you think of
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  something like cats that have arthritis, a lot of senior cats
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  get arthritis them just sit, not being able to exercise, not have
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  the heart pumping, not have the blood flowing that can
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  contribute to cognitive decline. That makes sense.
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  See, I was going to ask, would does would diet have anything to
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  do if they're on the, if they're on, you know, a really good
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  diet, would that help with slowing down cognitive decline?
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  A lot, a lot of researchers suspect that that is a big part
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  of it. I mean, antioxidants are
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  something that people talk about a lot to do with the the build
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  up of beta amyloid plaques and, and these things in the brain,
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  these proteins that can then cause oxidative stress and and
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  slow down cognition. So that's one of the reasons
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  that mushrooms are so fantastic and, and have such
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  multifactorial effects as to do with cognitive function, brain
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  health, the antioxidant effects, although the, the vitamins and
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  minerals that are in mushrooms that are so fantastic for as a
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  nutritional source. But then these compounds that
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  can actually induce neurogenesis that can, that can force the
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  body to be in this regenerative phase where it's actually
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  creating new neurons, new new of these communicator cells in the
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  brain and central nervous system.
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  They're they're just amazing. So.
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  I have a question because my own personal situation right now I'm
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  working with someone because I went through two rounds of
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  antibiotics two years ago and big things doctor I'm working
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  with recommends is more mushrooms.
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  Yes, it's also the the gut brain axis right?
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  Like yes, like that is a. Hugely important.
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  Mushrooms are like mushrooms are such an unsung hero of the
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  digestive system especially. We talked to a lot of people who
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  are coming off of antibiotics or their pets are coming off
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  antibiotics. And one of the really incredible
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  properties of mushrooms is their ability to, to encourage a more
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  diverse gut microbiome. So when you, if you've taken any
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  biologists, you've wiped everything out, you're kind of,
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  you have this open field where invasive bacteria can jump in.
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  And mushrooms like Turkey tail, chaga, shitaki, maitaki, they've
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  been shown to be able to suppress those invasive bacteria
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  while encouraging the diversity to flourish.
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  So like you said, that gut brain axis, I mean 70% of the body's
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  serotonin is manufactured in the gut that directly impacts the
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  brain through the vagus nerve. And then that, that helps with
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  sleep, that helps with behavior that everybody, we've all seen
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  what a depressed cat looks like, you know, and that's.
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  I wonder how much, how many mushrooms or how how much
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  mushrooms we should be taking for perimenopause.
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  I wonder if there's a I wonder if there's a a study on that.
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  The limit does not exist, so. Here's a question when it comes
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  to cognitive climb for our cat, is it inevitable or have you
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  seen any studies that it is? Is it reversible?
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  Is it something that you can proactively, you know, what
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  kinds of things? What did you let's talk about
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  the clinical study first. What did you see?
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  I know that your lead scientist said you don't expect much.
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  The best we can hope for is, you know, no change.
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  What were the object results? So they were, they're pretty
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  shocking. Of our cohort, 81% showed either
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  a stabilization or an improvement in their cognitive
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  scoring. And so it was an overwhelming
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  majority that showed major shifts and that that's backed up
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  by really solid data looking at a a monitoring device that is a
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  collar mounted gyroscopic measuring device that looks at
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  sleep, rest interruptions, respiratory rates, activity
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  during the day. So we can really just get a
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  picture of how are they living, how are they moving around,
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  what's their sleep like? And we showed, we showed a 12%
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  increase in sleep time, a 45% reduction in night time rest
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  interruptions. So indicating more consolidated
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  sleep, longer rest periods and then during the day, more
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  vigorous activity, more, more wakeful time, more time spent
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  with the heart rate up moving around, which is exactly what we
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  want. We don't just want sedation, we
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  want them to be awake and vibrant during the day so that
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  by the time they get to sleep, they're ready to rest.
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  And, and the importance of that time for dealing with
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  inflammation, immune reset, helping consolidate memory and,
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  and, and thoughts and, and helping for emotional balance.
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  Sleep is so huge and that was one of the main outcomes that we
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  found there. Wow, So what?
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  So tell us, what mushrooms specifically were you working
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  with in this study? So powerhouse mushrooms like
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  lion's mane, the brain mushroom, people, people have heard of
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  this one. It's it's so incredible, really
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  protective for the brain, but also studied a lot for its
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  ability to induce neurogenesis to create new neurons in the
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  brain. That paired with another
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  adaptogenic herb called bacopomonieri.
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  These two are Bacopomonieri is kind of the other one that's
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  really known for helping with sleep memory neurogenesis.
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  So those are kind of like the neurogenesis pairs.
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  Those are like boost new cells. Then we look at kind of the the
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  calming side. How do we reduce stress?
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  How do we how do we bring down inflammation?
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  How do we allow for rest at night?
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  Reishi, super calming, anti-inflammatory, fantastic for
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  the nervous system to calm it down.
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  And Ashwagandha, one that's been studied a lot actually in cats.
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  This is one of the areas where we actually have research on
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  herbs for cats. Ashwagandha is fantastic for
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  cats to help control cortisol, to just bring down that stress,
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  allow them to rest better. And then kind of the final piece
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  that is sort of on the other side of the coin is energy.
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  We want them to to be active. And so we get we use Cordyceps.
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  Cordyceps helps on a on a cellular level for the
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  mitochondria to create more energy and increases blood
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  oxygenation, more oxygen in the blood, more oxygen to the brain.
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  So it's this really cool multifactorial formulation that
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  supports a lot of different parts that go into cognitive
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  decline. Wow.
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  And you guys formulated it all together into.
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  This is this is Angela Ardolino's formula.
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  And she, I mean, she's, she's seen so many different animals
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  on her rescue farm. And you'll notice on any CBD dog
• 14:54
  health micro dog product, there's a picture of a cat or a
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  dog on there that is in most cases somebody that she's worked
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  with that she was like, I don't have anything for this animal.
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  What can I make that is going to be right for them?
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  Yeah. So all credit to her.
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  I love it so much, I love her. So this isn't is it?
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  Is it? Did she formulate everything
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  into like 1 product? That's yes.
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  Oh yes, so this formula is called clarity.
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  This is really clarity is what we're looking at as the primary
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  tool to help cats with cognitive decline.
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  Just getting older and and kind of losing focus or any sort of
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  behavioral, any fear anxiety. This is another one that's
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  really great for those cases as well.
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  Yeah, I'll give a shout out to clarity because the first time I
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  tried, I literally like when we when she had first made this,
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  she sent us some and I in in a tincture, in the tincture form,
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  you know, for our cats. But we try everything ourselves
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  first, of course. And, and so I had put it in my
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  coffee the very first day. I put it in my coffee that
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  morning and, and I have always had like a 3:00 roadblock or
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  like a wall. Yeah.
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  And, and usually at that time, this is a few years ago, but at
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  that time, I would, I would have some kind of an energy drink or,
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  you know, another, another coffee or something, right?
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  Something to put up. And I took it that morning and I
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  realized it was like 7:00 at night and I was still going.
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  I was like, I had not taken anything.
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  And I was like cleaning the house and doing some like.
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  And I was like, what is what is up with me today?
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  Like I have, I am like feeling really good and Oh my God, I
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  took clarity this morning. I cannot like first day, first
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  day. Yeah, it for a lot of these,
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  these clients like their cats are responding in a matter of
• 16:56
  days. There are and, and, and to
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  answer your question in that way, you're like, what, what
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  are, what do we see? What are, what are the signs?
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  Can we reverse this? Can we, there's, there's so much
• 17:08
  that we can do. And the way that these mushrooms
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  work is there are some effects that are short term that you're
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  going to get immediately that you're going to find more, more
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  relaxation, reducing inflammation, better sleep and
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  those things. You can see those in a couple
• 17:23
  days. That makes a huge difference in
• 17:24
  a couple days when we're talking about structural reconstruction
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  of neurons and synapses in the brain.
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  That's something that we need a little bit more time for.
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  And so you know that that's why this consistency part of it is
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  really important and how we can help these cats that are more
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  moderate and late stages of cognitive decline where we we
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  really do want to take an aggressive approach to this and,
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  and we can have some really great effects.
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  Some of the some of the blood biomarkers that we studied in
• 17:59
  the test in the study, rather we looked at CRP, which is a
• 18:04
  generalized inflammation marker and BDNF, which stands for brain
• 18:09
  derived neurotrophic factor. It's an indicator of
• 18:13
  neurogenesis in the blood. So when BDNF is high,
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  neurogenesis is active and we saw a 36% increase in BDNF.
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  So huge like like huge increase in BDNF.
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  And at the same time we saw CRP, this inflammation marker go down
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  by 18%. So inflammation down,
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  neurogenesis up. And over time, like if we think
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  about this as something that we can we can work in our cats
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  bodies over time, that has huge impact not only on their
• 18:44
  longevity down the road, but how their body right now can start
• 18:47
  repairing and rebuilding what potentially has already been
• 18:51
  lost or saving what might have been lost otherwise.
• 18:54
  Yeah, Well, let, let me ask about proactive care then.
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  You were thinking too. So so say our cats are, you
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  know, they're they've reached the senior year of 10.
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  I hate it that they call it seniors of 10, but they do.
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  So they've reached the senior year of 10 and they're not
• 19:14
  showing any cognitive decline. They're you're, they, you don't
• 19:17
  really think that they have anything going on.
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  Is it safe for them to still take the mushrooms and will?
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  Could it potentially help? Stave.
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  Off, yeah, stave off the cognitive decline as they as
• 19:32
  they age, if we're doing it consistently.
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  I, I'm a big fan of proactive care and, and with these
• 19:38
  mushrooms, it's, there's, there's no risks to, to giving
• 19:43
  it to them early. Mushrooms are part of this class
• 19:47
  of natural medicines called adaptogens.
• 19:49
  And So what that basically means is you, you use these herbs,
• 19:53
  these fungi, and based on what the needs of the body are these
• 19:58
  herbs and fungi, these adaptogens will have different
• 20:01
  effects. So if the cat's body doesn't
• 20:03
  really need the the neurogenesis effects of it, then it will just
• 20:08
  be more neuroprotective. And, and, and sort of vice
• 20:12
  versa, you know, there, but what, what cat doesn't benefit
• 20:17
  from helping to control inflammation, to boost blood
• 20:20
  oxygenation, to support the kidneys?
• 20:23
  Cordyceps, one of those that's fantastic for kidney support.
• 20:26
  A lot of our senior cats are, are dealing with kidney issues.
• 20:30
  So absolutely we're starting if, if we're going to say cats are
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  getting old at 10, I would start working with my cats on
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  something for kind of like practicing your care maybe at
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  like 7, maybe a few years earlier.
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  Because there there's so much that we can do to definitely
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  stave off those kinds of declines that that shouldn't
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  just be accepted as part of getting old.
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  And it offers, I mean, so many other health benefits in the in
• 20:57
  the long term also like they're going to get all those other
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  benefits, not just, you know, staving off the cognitive
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  decline, but also all the other. But if it's, and then you can't
• 21:10
  overdose on mushrooms. It's my favorite food.
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  By the way, mushrooms are fascinating.
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  I I have loved mushrooms for like ever Like I I've they're.
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  Incredible. Maybe not when I was a kid, but
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  since I became an adult. I absolutely love mushrooms.
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  But it's just been recently, over the past few years that
• 21:29
  we've learned about mushrooms themselves.
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  Like they are. It's like they're not a plant
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  and they're not a human, but they're like in between, right?
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  Right. Right.
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  We share more DNA with mushrooms than we do with plants.
• 21:41
  They're actually closer to that's on the phylogenetic tree
• 21:44
  than than plants are. They're incredibly intelligent
• 21:48
  and, and have such diverse effects.
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  And, and we are, we're our, our lives are so intricately
• 21:55
  interwoven with fungi. I mean, just, I, it's so off
• 21:59
  topic, but the way that mycelium are an integral part of the
• 22:04
  forest floor like that, that trees roots are connected
• 22:08
  through these mycelial networks and sharing nutrients between
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  them. Like trees don't grow in forests
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  without mycelium like we are, we are supposed to be using
• 22:18
  mushrooms. Our cats are supposed to be
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  eating mushrooms. So this is just a return to how
• 22:23
  things are supposed to be. Yeah, and also like in the
• 22:26
  planet, like it it does like they.
• 22:28
  So many things, yeah. I have a question though, since
• 22:31
  mushrooms obviously a very natural supplement, if you will,
• 22:36
  right? Is this if, if, if we did want
• 22:39
  to start out, I hope a lot of people here are thinking about
• 22:41
  doing this proactive. You know, that's an 8 year old
• 22:45
  and they're, they're perfectly healthy.
• 22:47
  But this would be a great proactive thing to start adding
• 22:50
  in. Is it something that you would
• 22:52
  pulse like is it? And I know a lot of natural
• 22:56
  supplements will say I'm. Sorry, we'll say pulse them
• 22:59
  because the body gets used to it after a while and it doesn't use
• 23:02
  and that's. Really increase the dose you
• 23:04
  know or how does how does that work?
• 23:06
  What have you seen as far as like, is it always one
• 23:09
  milliliter a day for the rest of your life or are we gonna have
• 23:13
  to increase that dose over time or is it better to pulse?
• 23:15
  What are your. So really I look at it kind of
• 23:19
  based on the severity of the condition that we're dealing
• 23:22
  with is going to determine kind of how much you're giving to
• 23:26
  them as well as what kind of a formulation you're going to be
• 23:29
  using. What, what mushrooms are we
• 23:30
  going to specialize with depending on what this cat is
• 23:33
  dealing with. So if we've just got a healthy
• 23:37
  cat, middle young, young, middle age and nothing really going
• 23:42
  wrong with it, but you want to give them some proactive
• 23:44
  support, I would maybe you can, you can do that kind of pulse
• 23:49
  method. But a way that you could do that
• 23:51
  is same way as how I work with my dog. 2 year old cattle dog
• 23:56
  healthy. Otherwise from being kind of a
• 23:59
  brat. Sometimes I, I'll make my way
• 24:01
  through a bottle of vitality, giving him the MIL a day and
• 24:06
  then once I finish that, I'll, I'll switch to digest and, and
• 24:11
  just kind of work it that way. So, so he'll be getting
• 24:13
  different mushrooms that have minerals and nutrients and
• 24:18
  different beta glucans, different modulatory effects,
• 24:21
  all of them beneficial and, and synergistic with one another.
• 24:26
  So I think that is a way to kind of pulse them, but still to be
• 24:29
  consistent and offer kind of a varied, varied way for the body
• 24:34
  to accept these different benefits.
• 24:37
  Yeah, it's kind of like probiotics, you know, it's like
• 24:39
  there's probiotics in the market, then rotate through
• 24:43
  them, you know? Because you can.
• 24:45
  That's one. Brand right?
• 24:47
  Like you can rotate through different kinds, you can rotate
• 24:49
  through different formulations of mushrooms.
• 24:51
  I love that, yeah. Can we cover quickly just
• 24:56
  because I think, you know, a lot of us are like we, I know
• 24:59
  especially in the cat community, we wait until there's something
• 25:01
  wrong and then we want to do something right.
• 25:05
  Can you help us think about some of the things that you've seen
• 25:08
  that do actively contribute to cognitive decline?
• 25:12
  Right. But I know that they're probably
• 25:14
  like you were mentioning earlier, different lifestyles,
• 25:17
  different food even see where 1 cat that's you know they're the
• 25:21
  same age but one is showing how you define it gold and the other
• 25:25
  one is acting like a kid. Yeah, you.
• 25:30
  Found that contribute to it. Yeah, so stress is a big one.
• 25:36
  It it often is triggered when people move and or, or if a a
• 25:43
  cat is in a multi cat family and one of the one of the cats dies,
• 25:48
  that kind of that emotional change makes a huge change in
• 25:53
  their in their cognitive function of their rest changes
• 25:58
  to sleep. You move things around in their
• 26:02
  in the home and they get stressed out.
• 26:05
  That can be really rough on them.
• 26:08
  It's it's diet and inflammation, inflammation throughout the body
• 26:12
  that, that kind of those statistics about that we that we
• 26:15
  found in our research where neurogenesis went up when
• 26:19
  inflammation went down. Constant low grade inflammation
• 26:24
  is a huge predictive factor of cognitive decline in cats.
• 26:30
  So being able to control that inflammatory load earlier on
• 26:36
  really stops that knock on effect that can lead to not only
• 26:39
  cognitive decline, but all sorts of different issues.
• 26:42
  Yeah. Well, let me, let me say a
• 26:44
  couple things here because I think you know, when it comes to
• 26:46
  stress and food, right, those are two, I think they're also
• 26:49
  hand in hand, right. So if you're feeding the body
• 26:51
  inflammation, which, which if you're listening and you don't
• 26:55
  know what type of food would feed inflammation, we're talking
• 26:58
  foods that are high in starches and carbs, right?
• 27:01
  Just like with us, if we eat a bunch of starches and carbs,
• 27:04
  we're going to be more inflamed. Our bodies are going to be more
• 27:07
  inflamed. So, so the cats, unfortunately,
• 27:10
  it's like 90. It's, it's 9697% of cats are fed
• 27:15
  a kibble diet, a kibble only diet.
• 27:17
  And yeah, and they're, we're not going in the same direction as
• 27:22
  dogs right now, unfortunately, but we're, we, we're, we want to
• 27:25
  get more voices out there as much as possible.
• 27:26
  But yeah, so if we're feeding a kibble diet, if we're feeding a
• 27:30
  dry food diet, we are feeding more of that inflammation.
• 27:33
  And we know that the inflammation also is directly
• 27:37
  correlated with stress. So again, like with us, if we go
• 27:40
  to the doctor, they will our, our doctor, a good doctor at
• 27:43
  least will look at your diet. And if the issue is anxiety and
• 27:48
  stress, they'll look at your diet and they will say you
• 27:51
  probably need to eat a little bit healthier in order to bring
• 27:55
  down inflammation and bring down that stress.
• 27:57
  And then on top of that is the stress of, you know, the
• 28:01
  majority of our cats live indoors.
• 28:02
  And we do that because they, because we want to keep them
• 28:05
  safe, right? Like the the show, the cats that
• 28:08
  live outside live like like Max of five years and cats that are
• 28:12
  inside are, you know, at about 1513 to 15 years old.
• 28:18
  But we're taking away one big thing that they don't when we
• 28:23
  bring them inside, we're taking away one big thing that they
• 28:26
  don't get inside. And that is an active lifestyle
• 28:29
  that is being able to, you know, I mean, we're taking away a few
• 28:32
  things. Fresh air is also another one.
• 28:33
  Grounding is another one, right? But, but we're taking them out
• 28:37
  of their natural environment and it's, it's really important that
• 28:41
  we get our cats moving and that we get them exercising.
• 28:45
  And that usually means that we have to be involved because our
• 28:49
  cats, you know, they, they just don't do a lot of play when
• 28:53
  they're kittens. They do, but they don't do a lot
• 28:55
  of playing on their own, right. They, they end up sleeping a
• 28:58
  lot. So I think that's.
• 29:01
  What are what are your like? How do you get your cats moving?
• 29:04
  What I bet it's different for each one, but like what are your
• 29:06
  what are the top toys and things that you have?
• 29:10
  Yeah, wand toys are the every cat will.
• 29:14
  But you gotta play with it a little bit 'cause you know,
• 29:16
  we've got one, it's. It's like there's the technique.
• 29:19
  Well, right, so you've got like the cats that really love flying
• 29:23
  things and then you've got the cats that love the stock, the
• 29:26
  little bug on the floor, you know, so it's really finding out
• 29:30
  what they enjoy most. And we were talking earlier
• 29:33
  about neuro neurogenesis, right? Like the making more of the good
• 29:38
  stuff up there. I know in the human world they
• 29:41
  talk about a lot about neuroplasticity as we and
• 29:46
  basically the to do some one thing out of your comfort zone
• 29:50
  every day, something that you don't usually.
• 29:52
  Do. So I have to wonder if that, you
• 29:56
  know, not that we want to like take our cats to a park or
• 29:59
  something like, but. I mean, we would all love to if
• 30:03
  they would. That wouldn't stress out.
• 30:05
  Stressful, but like getting a new toy or doing something that
• 30:10
  gets them moving or engaged in a way that they haven't had
• 30:13
  before. I'm not sure but that that I
• 30:15
  that makes. Sense.
• 30:16
  That makes sense. Absolutely, absolutely.
• 30:19
  It's that's totally part of it. And, and understanding your cat,
• 30:24
  you know, understanding like where that limit is that you can
• 30:28
  toe the line that you're not going to like freak them out and
• 30:30
  go and change everything all at once.
• 30:32
  But those little changes that just kind of keep them on their
• 30:35
  toes, keep them curious, keep them learning.
• 30:38
  That's that's exactly what we should be doing with our dogs or
• 30:41
  cats ourselves. Yes, yeah, I agree.
• 30:44
  Yeah, cats love novelty. So so you know, we always say
• 30:48
  you don't need to spend, you know, a ton of money on new toys
• 30:53
  all the time. You just like have a rotation of
• 30:55
  them, the ones that you bring out, put the other ones away,
• 30:58
  right, for a week or two and then, you know, rotate, rotate
• 31:02
  them out and bring it out. It's like a brand new toy to
• 31:04
  them and they get excited about it.
• 31:05
  Those are, yeah, those are, I think, really good ways to
• 31:09
  stimulate them mentally at home. I'm curious back to the the
• 31:12
  clinical study because I love that there is research out there
• 31:16
  now and I love that you had such stunning.
• 31:18
  Results. How long was the study period?
• 31:26
  So we studied the dogs in our cohort for 12 weeks.
• 31:31
  It's a two week period at the beginning where we monitor kind
• 31:35
  of their baseline values and then 10 weeks using clarity
• 31:38
  every day, twice a day. And during that whole period
• 31:43
  we're we're monitoring them 24/7.
• 31:45
  But it's happening in home. So there were not, it's not in a
• 31:48
  lab somewhere in a cage. This is in their homes and then
• 31:52
  going to a local vet for the blood work that we had done,
• 31:56
  which is really important, you know, to have them not
• 31:59
  experience a huge change in their lifestyle to be able to do
• 32:03
  it in home. We though we couldn't add just
• 32:08
  for the way that we were having this peer reviewed and, and, and
• 32:11
  studied, we couldn't have a kind of like 1/2 cat, half dog
• 32:14
  portion. But we, we did accept
• 32:18
  submissions from a lot of cats. So we have some unofficial cat
• 32:23
  participants in the study and we are still actually we're going
• 32:29
  to be expanding our virtual cohort for this.
• 32:31
  So if you go to seniordogstudy.com, you can
• 32:34
  submit your cats there and we will be continuing to
• 32:38
  collaborate and and bring more cats into the study, but.
• 32:42
  What is that the? Website again.
• 32:44
  Seniordogstudy.com. Seniordogstudy.com Submit your
• 32:49
  cat at Senior Dog. Submit your cat Submit your cat
• 32:51
  at seniordogstudy.com Yes. You know what's crazy is that I
• 32:55
  know that you're, you're a fabulous and as Jay said, sexy,
• 32:59
  super sexy science geek. I did not realize that when we
• 33:03
  when we booked this to talk about feeling cognitive decline,
• 33:06
  I did not realize that clarity is what was used.
• 33:10
  Yeah. Yeah, we didn't know anything
• 33:12
  about the study right now. I'm about to go drink a bottle
• 33:15
  of it. Yeah, I mean, I have my dad on
• 33:18
  clarity, and because he's got early signs of of dementia and
• 33:23
  cognitive decline, he's like, there's a cat on this bottle.
• 33:25
  And I'm like, just do you know what, Dad?
• 33:28
  I know what goes into this. I know that I can't find a
• 33:30
  better mushroom supplement on the human market, so just just
• 33:34
  take it. My parent is asking, to my
• 33:38
  surprise, yeah. Are these mushroom products?
• 33:40
  He's talking about the ones that we offer on our website and they
• 33:43
  are. So he's talking about the
• 33:44
  clarity that we actually do have on our website.
• 33:47
  You guys do have a number of you guys have Saabs, You guys have.
• 33:51
  How do you say that word? Lots of awesome mushroom, Yeah.
• 33:56
  Is it? Saabs Yeah, yeah, I I love our
• 34:00
  mushroom products. They're like I said, I I can't
• 34:03
  find a human product that I would rather give to my dad than
• 34:06
  the ones that we have for cats and dogs.
• 34:09
  They are, they're grown here in the United States, both wild
• 34:12
  foraged and naturally cultivated in Washington and Oregon.
• 34:16
  They're grown on the correct substrate.
• 34:18
  So like different mushrooms naturally grow on different
• 34:21
  substrates, whether it's hard Beechwood or oak.
• 34:25
  And a lot of mushrooms you'll find that are grown on just
• 34:28
  something cheap and fast, like like you're kind of talking
• 34:31
  about with the, the food, like our cats food can be grown on or
• 34:36
  they can use the lowest quality meat that is just laced with
• 34:40
  stress hormones and, and lived a terrible life.
• 34:43
  You can find mushrooms that were grown on kind of the most GMO
• 34:46
  corn and oats and things. And it totally changes the
• 34:49
  profile. So we grow all of our mushrooms
• 34:53
  in nature, out in the forest on the right type of wood that
• 34:57
  they're grown on and, and, and process it in a way.
• 35:00
  There's, there's no alcohol leftover, though alcohol is a
• 35:04
  really important part of the extraction of these mushrooms
• 35:07
  because it is not something we want to give our cats.
• 35:10
  We go through an extra step to take that alcohol out.
• 35:13
  It's just, it's all these little things that are so much to tell
• 35:17
  the average person, but, but really make the difference
• 35:21
  between something that has the full therapeutic potential of
• 35:25
  these incredible mushrooms and something that you might just
• 35:27
  find on Amazon that, that looks good, that has fancy marketing.
• 35:33
  So I, I really, I say thank you guys for doing the vetting that
• 35:38
  you did to, to bring us on and, and to trust in what we do.
• 35:43
  I I love that we get to work with you and that you can be our
• 35:47
  our cat leaders for that. What's crazy is that that was,
• 35:51
  you know, years before I started seeing ads for all these
• 35:55
  different medicinal mushroom products.
• 35:57
  There's so many and I think it's it.
• 35:59
  And for anyone listening, I know there's especially for humans.
• 36:03
  I mean, I'm just inundated with them all the time.
• 36:06
  There's coffees and there's powders.
• 36:08
  And. But there's this and there's
• 36:09
  that and there's all this stuff because I think people do
• 36:14
  recognize kind of like with the CBD thing, there's that it can
• 36:17
  make a big difference. But you try.
• 36:18
  You know our products, and you don't necessarily even know the
• 36:22
  questions to ask, right? You know how it's grown, Where
• 36:26
  is it grown? How is it extracted?
• 36:28
  How you know those really do matter?
• 36:31
  I love that they're grown in Oregon and Washington
• 36:33
  specifically. Just like a rain we were.
• 36:36
  Walking through, it's beautiful. We were walking through the
• 36:39
  rainforest in in the Olympia or outside of Olympia, WA and saw
• 36:45
  Lion's mane growing on. A in the wild.
• 36:48
  In you saw. Wild lion's mane.
• 36:50
  Yes. Magical it.
• 36:51
  I was like. Cool.
• 36:53
  Way it was, yeah. It was really cool.
• 36:55
  The first time I've ever seen that.
• 36:58
  Yeah, it was nice. I see Turkey tail all the time,
• 37:00
  but I've never seen Lion's mane. That's awesome.
• 37:03
  Yeah, we, yeah, we, well, we got, so we got a picture of it.
• 37:05
  I'll text it. I'll text it to you.
• 37:07
  Yeah. Cool, delicious, very delicious.
• 37:10
  Lion's mane is so good in a stir fry.
• 37:14
  Oh, oh, that's what I want for dinner now.
• 37:19
  OK, so back to cognitive climb for just a second, like to kind
• 37:23
  of what are what are some things like if you, if you were talking
• 37:27
  to anyone, your your toppings, I know obviously clarity, but I
• 37:32
  like what you said earlier about with your dog who's young and
• 37:34
  whatever, just kind of rotate through the different and what,
• 37:38
  what is your top recommendation for someone who wants to be
• 37:41
  proactive? And what's your top
• 37:43
  recommendation for someone who is starting to notice cognitive
• 37:46
  decline? They're kind of in our shoes
• 37:47
  where they went to the back and all their health markets are
• 37:50
  great, but they're noticing things and it's yelling or
• 37:53
  something like that. Not recommending.
• 37:56
  So I, I would say if we're working proactively, we just
• 38:00
  want a really nice diverse spread of different mushrooms
• 38:03
  that are going to help with inflammation, with the gut
• 38:06
  microbiome, with, with neurological function.
• 38:10
  Our vitality blend for cats, it's got 7 different mushrooms
• 38:14
  in it as well as ashwagandha. So that covers a lot of those
• 38:18
  different therapeutic factors. And, and I mean, if we look at
• 38:22
  Turkey tail and Reishi, those are some that are really known
• 38:28
  for their antiviral properties. And FIV is one of the issues
• 38:34
  with cats that has been studied a lot with its use, with the
• 38:39
  benefits of medicinal mushrooms. So if you've got, if you've got
• 38:42
  FIV positive cats, mushrooms are really amazing way that you can
• 38:46
  look into helping them naturally for cognitive decline.
• 38:51
  It's clarity for cats that are on cable diets that might be
• 38:55
  switching to something a little bit more fresh, a little bit
• 38:58
  more living digest as a way to just help with that transition
• 39:04
  of the microbiome. Is it becomes a little bit more
• 39:06
  active and diverse and then any cats with respiratory issues
• 39:11
  that whether it's seasonal or, or they've got just kind of like
• 39:15
  lung kidney dysbiosis and from kind of a, a Chinese medicinal
• 39:22
  perspective, breathe is fantastic for them as well.
• 39:26
  So there's, there's a range of different ways each of these
• 39:30
  mushrooms has its own unique therapeutic benefits.
• 39:33
  And there's, there's a way to help every cat, whether they're
• 39:37
  in a crisis point and you need something fast to help that that
• 39:41
  can kind of change the course. Or if you're looking further
• 39:44
  down the road and you've got a little space, we can also help
• 39:48
  them. Yeah, I, I have to say, Breathe
• 39:51
  flies off our shelves like it is.
• 39:53
  It is one that people see and the reviews are outstanding like
• 39:57
  that. People see such great results
• 40:00
  and are always telling us about it.
• 40:02
  We're we're. Yeah, it's.
• 40:04
  It works fast too. Yeah.
• 40:07
  I I was just like looking at my desk 'cause I was like I have
• 40:09
  been chugging breathe. I it's like pollen it the pollen
• 40:13
  is crazy here right now I can like I can hardly see the screen
• 40:16
  through the ball human in my apartment like hello, I have
• 40:20
  been chugging breathe, but. Wow, yeah, I've got my mom on
• 40:24
  that too. Oh my God.
• 40:25
  OK. Yes.
• 40:26
  Yeah, and our shipping manager has our guide on it.
• 40:29
  Yeah, so love that. All the stuff you make as human
• 40:31
  grade. Yeah.
• 40:33
  Yeah, seriously. This is not this is not a
• 40:36
  recommendation to take our products if you are human.
• 40:39
  We're kidding. Yeah.
• 40:41
  Just our own experience. We we wouldn't give our cats
• 40:43
  anything that we wouldn't take ourselves.
• 40:44
  Right. That's true.
• 40:45
  So, yeah. Important.
• 40:47
  Important for us. My God.
• 40:49
  Carter. Carter, thank you so much.
• 40:51
  This is this is awesome. Is there anything that we
• 40:53
  missed? I don't think so, no.
• 40:58
  I'm so grateful to to be here with you guys.
• 41:00
  Thank you for having me. Thank you for being the cat
• 41:04
  advocates and and sharing such amazing information.
• 41:08
  Yeah. If you have a cat out there who
• 41:10
  you suspect has symptoms of cognitive client, definitely
• 41:14
  please send them our way. Senior dogstudy.com at the
• 41:18
  bottom there. It's a bit to be part of our
• 41:21
  digital cohort. And yeah, you can find us at
• 41:25
  Mushrooms for Dogs or at CBD Dog Health on any platforms.