k & t industry pet food and supplies founded 1866 headquarters chilton wisconsin u.s. key people nicholas knauf ; william knauf ; frank tesch ; william engler sr. ; william engler jr. products bird seed pet food cages bedding feeders owner central garden & pet website kaytee.com kaytee is a company based in chilton wisconsin united states . it is an international supplier of bird seed . 1 contents 1 history 2 controversy 3 images 4 references 5 external links history edit nicholas knauf and peter juckem founded a grain elevator on east main street in chilton in 1866 . 2 3 william n. knauf and frank tesch k & t were later the owners and they took the company name from their initials . 2 they built a gristmill and general store to sell seed to farmers . 2 they used the 1872 railroad to ship barley and oats to markets ; that lead to selling barley to milwaukee breweries . 2 4 in 1920 the company became a national supplier of peas to be used for pigeon feed . 4 it expanded into making feed for birds and other small animals becoming the first commercial supplier of wild bird seed in 1955 . 4 william engler sr. long term employee and son in law of william n. knauf purchased the company in 1964 and renamed it kaytee products inc. 5 his son bill engler jr. took over the company in 1982 . bill engler jr. was named the small business person of the year in 1993 by united states president bill clinton . 3 as of 1993 kaytee had 365 employees and annual sales of about 70 million . 3 at that time it also held about 1300 exotic bird species in an aviary in chilton . 3 engler sold the company to central garden & pet in 1997 . 4 they renamed the company central avian & small animal and continued to market products under the kaytee brand . 4 controversy edit in april 2012 kaytee recalled five lots of parrot handfeeding formula due to excessive vitamin d which was causing kidney failure . this was acknowledged on the kaytee website 1 as well as through emails with some customers . 2 . over 25 000 bags of contaminated food was distributed in many countries resulting the painful deaths of many young parrots . some parrot handfeeders were compensated for losses while others were not . on may 12 2012 several types of mouse rat and hamster food was recalled for possible salmonella contamination . there are anicdotal reports on line of animals perishing . in february 2013 kaytee recalled a number of treat mixes due to reports from their parsley supplier of salmonella contamination . no salmonela was found in the actual treat mixes but to comply with fda regulations they recalled all mixes containing that parsley . 3 kaytee preferred birds branding raises and provides young birds to many pet store chains in the us such as petsmart 4 . oklahoma state places externs with kaytee preferred birds 5 . kaytee preferred birds was dismantled and closed in 2007 . images edit avian & small animal building training center references edit kaytee international locations . a b c d ronk rod march 20 2008 first published 1998 . the railroad comes to calumet county . chilton times journal . p. 8 . access date requires url help a b c d jane applegate may 30 1993 . small business owners hailed by chief . orlando sentinel . retrieved december 7 2010 . a b c d e miller neil . a legacy of innovation . pet business . retrieved 7 december 2010 . william d. engler sr. obituary . external links edit kaytee.com retrieved from https en.wikipedia.org w index.php title kaytee & oldid 729407399 categories calumet county wisconsincompanies based in wisconsinhidden categories pages using citations with accessdate and no url navigation menu personal tools not logged intalkcontributionscreate accountlog in namespaces article talk variants views read edit view history more search navigation main pagecontentsfeatured contentcurrent eventsrandom articledonate to wikipediawikipedia store interaction helpabout wikipediacommunity portalrecent changescontact page tools what links hererelated changesupload filespecial pagespermanent linkpage informationwikidata itemcite this page print export create a bookdownload as pdfprintable version languages add links this page was last modified on 12 july 2016 at 00 19 . text is available under the creative commons attribution sharealike license ; additional terms may apply . by using this site you agree to the terms of use and privacy policy . wikipedia is a registered trademark of the wikimedia foundation inc. a non profit organization . privacy policy about wikipedia disclaimers contact wikipedia developers cookie statement mobile view