On Monday, Northwest Naturals issued an update on the voluntary Dec. 24 recall of its Feline Turkey Recipe sold frozen in 2-pound packages. After much back and forth between the company and the Oregon Department of Agriculture (ODA) on how it conducted testing and communicated with the public, causing confusion with retailers and pet parents alike, and after an audit by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, Northwest Naturals was able to terminate the recall. A letter to customers on its website reads:
“The FDA’s audit did not contain any findings related to H5N1 or Highly Pathogenic Avian Influenza (HPAI), and the FDA did not identify the source of the alleged contamination found in the opened bag of our product. Additionally, our product was never included in the FDA’s list of Recalls & Withdrawals, which can be found at https://www.fda.gov/animal-veterinary/safety-health/recalls-withdrawals. Upon the completion of FDA’s audit, we updated the status of our voluntary recall with ODA to ‘closed’ and the recall has since been terminated.”
Jennifer Flanagan, owner of Pacific NW Pets in Sherwood, OR, sold the Northwest Naturals food that was the source of the recall. She responded to the recall’s termination: “I was 100% confident that the initial ODA findings were false. Morasch Meats has a food USDA office on-site, and its farm sourcing is precise. The farm that the turkey came from has had zero cases. The only way bird flu could have contaminated the customer’s bag was privately in the home.” Flanagan had stated during the recall that the cat who had died was not “strictly an indoor cat,” as the ODA had reported.
Flanagan also shared how she and her team responded to concerned pet parents during the recall: “Customers were concerned, and we explained that the batch had been sold since August 2024, so for this to be the only report speaks for itself. We also let customers know that the ODA went against protocol and ONLY tested a bag from the home and released false information before testing unopened bags of the same batch from the facility.”
Northwest Naturals posted the update in a letter to customers on its website:
“Dear Customer,
We are writing to update you on the status of the voluntary recall we initiated in December 2024 on a limited production of Feline Turkey Recipe sold frozen in 2lb packages.
Our voluntary recall was instituted on December 24, 2024, following a report from the Oregon Department of Agriculture (ODA) that it had found H5N1 present in an opened bag of product. We were devastated to hear of the death of the cat that began the ODA’s investigation, and our hearts go out to the cat’s owner. Out of an abundance of caution and concern for the health and safety of our customers’ pets, we issued the voluntary recall and kept it open while regulatory agencies investigated the H5N1 contamination allegedly associated with the opened bag of our product.
We subsequently worked openly and transparently with ODA and the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA), who conducted a complete audit of our co-manufacturer’s facility. The FDA audit started in late December 2024 and concluded on February 7, 2025, when we met with representatives from FDA and ODA to review the audit’s findings.
The FDA’s audit did not contain any findings related to H5N1 or Highly Pathogenic Avian Influenza (HPAI), and the FDA did not identify the source of the alleged contamination found in the opened bag of our product. Additionally, our product was never included in the FDA’s list of Recalls & Withdrawals, which can be found at https://www.fda.gov/animal-veterinary/safety-health/recalls-withdrawals. Upon the completion of FDA’s audit, we updated the status of our voluntary recall with ODA to ‘closed’ and the recall has since been terminated.
We are deeply grateful for and appreciate the patience and support that you, your customers, and our partners have shown us during this process.
As a reminder, our products are manufactured in a United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) and FDA-regulated facility. As a USDA-approved facility, our co-manufacturer is required to meet strict hygiene, quality control, and safety regulations for processing meat and other ingredients used in pet food. USDA is onsite every day on every shift and has offices in each of the facilities. Our products are produced in facilities that comply with USDA standards, ensuring high-quality ingredients and safety for pets – even to the level for human-grade food standards. We only buy approved human-grade raw materials that we would serve to our own families. We carefully evaluate all the suppliers from whom we buy our high-quality products. We have robust quality control and quality assurance programs that include:
- Sanitation Standard Operating Procedures (SSOP);
- Good Manufacturing Practices (GMP);
- Hazard Analysis & Critical Control Points (HACCP) Program;
- Lot segregation; and
- Human-grade High Pressure Processing (“HPP,” also known as High Pressure Pasteurization) standards for our pet food processing to inactivate bacterial and viral pathogens.
Consistent with the FDA’s recent directive to raw pet food manufacturers on January 17, 2025, we now consider H5N1 to be a known or reasonably foreseeable hazard and updated our food safety plan to strengthen our supply chain by requiring enhanced guarantees from suppliers that they are not supplying contaminated products. Naturally, we will continue to enforce strict hygiene, quality control, and safety regulations for processing our products. Nothing is more important to us than the safety of our products and that of our customers’ beloved pets.
As always, should you have any questions, comments, or concerns please do not hesitate to contact us at infor@nw-naturals.net or 866-637-1872 from 7:00 AM to 3:30 PM PST, Monday through Friday.
Sincerely,
The Northwest Naturals Team”
See the company’s full FAQ on the recall.
