Dogs - Raw Diet Update

[Gas Man]

Yeah I know. Usually he takes his time and chews on a large one for weeks. Like you said, till he bores. This last one he went at a bit different than normal. But we'll see. He's starting to eat more again. And I must remember that he has always bored fast of the "same food". We noticed before but now it's more noticeable because of the feeding time vs a bowl of kibble just sitting thr.

[OneSickPsycho]

Originally Posted by Kaneman

This is an update on the a conversation we had regarding putting your pooches on a "raw" diet.

We switched from commercial pet food (Pedigree dry, choice cuts and missing link) a few months ago to a raw meaty bone diet in an effort to ensure the health and stamina of my 90lb male Boxer and 65lb female Lab.

Initially I was using chicken necks and leg quarters as the main sources of meat but after a few raw vomiting episodes it became clear that they weren't chewing the neck bones enough and just gulping them down. I switched over to whole carcasses to force them to learn to chew and began feeding once a day instead of twice a day.

There are always good deals somewhere on whole chickens so there has not been a large cost increase compared to commercial dog food. The dogs main staple is 1/2 whole chicken, warmed to room temperature. I try to cut them in half so that the Boxer gets a bit more, but I don't weigh their food or anything to determine portion size....because they're dogs.

They get a ground beef/steak mix consisting of eggs, banana, some veggies and sardines/olive oil once or twice a week. They also get a whole raw fish (guts and all) once a week.

The results have been very positive, here are the bullet points of my experience thus far.

* Dogs thoroughly enjoy chewing and eating the food and seem very satisfied afterwards. They now have very well developed jaw and neck muscles.

* Dogs strength and stamina has improved on long runs and uphill pulls.

* Dogs have a very full and shiny coat that feels very healthy to the touch.

* Both dogs used to throw up once a week or so on the commercial diet. This is no longer a problem.

* The have completed ceased chewing on anything left out during the day and now have open access to the house while I'm gone...usually about 9 hours a day.

* They rarely fart and never have bad breath.

* And best of all, at our yearly vet exam a couple weeks ago the vet told me they were the healthiest dogs he had seen come into his office. Their muscle to fat ratio was perfect, their teeth and gums were exceedingly clean, and thorough testing revealed absolutely no bacteria or parasites in their digestive system. He was especially impressed with their muscle definition.

So far so good...we're definitely going to stick with it and keep watching them closely. My good friend came over while they were eating one day and asked a lot of quesitons. He switched his black lab over to raw and reported even better improvements than I got.

Originally Posted by Kaneman

Here is a quick update along with requested photos. We actually went to adopt a pitbull pup today from a local rescue and were denied because of the diet we feed. There was concern that salmonela poisoning was going to kill our dogs and their rescue. Our dogs obvious display of perfect health was not enough to counter their fears.

I try to find whole chickens for $.75 to $.85 a pound.

Cut it in half...I slice a little more on one side to give our larger boxer a bigger portion. This is an entire day's worth of food.

I put it in hot water to warm to near room temp. My understanding is that cold meat slows down the digestive process.

Then there is of course the mandatory sit and stare at your delicious chicken until I say differently because I'm bigger than you exercise....

Then there is only heaven.

Originally Posted by Kaneman

Well I picked up a grinder from Cabelas for $40 that clamps down and was pretty impressed. It took a while to grind down 10 lbs of chicken but it got the job done.

Here is my recipe for this weeks mix, already ground up, pre-mixed and packaged so feeding is a snap.

5lb ground beef
10lb dark chicken
3lb white chicken
2 large salmon filets
3/4 container of chicken liver
2 cups yogurt, plain
1 bell pepper pured
1/2 dozen jumbo eggs
some olive oil

They seem to be enjoying it, lol. In the couple of days that our new Pit puppy has been on this diet his coat has already started to show a glossy sheen and the spot of mange on his forehead is healed.

Originally Posted by Kaneman

They have the digestive system to take care of the things in raw chicken that would make you or me sick. You can't feed them chicken alone and I do feed raw red meats as well, depending on what is on sale that week. They also get eggs, cottage cheese, leftovers, pork and so on.

Red meat is $2+ lb vs. chicken at $.59 a lb. so chicken is the obvious choice to make up the bulk of their protein.

As the bones are part of their diet and cooked bones are dangerous to dogs feeding cooked is not an option. I do buy a big bag of quarters every week, boil that and strip the meat for a quick meal that isn't messy when I'm in a rush. Its more of a back up meal. A lot of fat is not a problem because they are not eating carbs, only fat and protein. Whole chickens have a good fat/protein ration.

In the time that I've been doing this I've seen my dogs digestive problems (throwing up, diarrhea, farts) virtually disappear. They have not been sick at all in the last 6 months.

Originally Posted by Kaneman

I fed beef heart and liver the other day, first time I've ever actually bought a cow's heart. I cut 'em up in thirds and gave them to the dogs.

Organ meat is a much richer than muscle and I guess their stomachs weren't ready for that. Nothing will clear a room faster than raw organ farts. Good sweet Jesus.

Originally Posted by HurricaneHeather

We got some beef livers because they are soft and juicy. Cats have never had to chew before and that is the problem with Triumph(the 'what the fuck is this shit?' cat). I cut tiny little pieces up for him and mixed it with wet cat food. He would pick up the liver pieces, realize he had to work to get it down and spit it back out.

Eva(the 'I love it, give me more!' cat) devoured all that we gave her then 20 minutes later we had bloody vomit to clean up on the carpet. It was disgusting.

Main point is, we have cats because they are low maintenance. We can put out a bowl of kibble and be gone for a couple of days and they'd be fine. We don't have the type of life that we can be home twice a day everyday, ya know?

Originally Posted by thirdgenlxi

Well... I've been doing alot of research on this lately as well, and decided to get Piggy off of the "poison" (as most referred to kibble as, lol), and get her headed in the right direction to a long healthy life. I always knew kibble foods weren't the greatest for dogs, but didn't know just how bad until I started digging a little deeper... YIKES!!

So today (sun), was Piggys first day on her new RAW meaty bones diet! As recommended by everything I've read, I started out very simple: plain chicken quarters. Everyone said don't add variety just yet, just pick one meat and stick with it for a couple weeks and let the dogs body get used to eating and digesting "real" food, then start adding variety, organs, etc.

I got her a 16" pizza pan too to eat off of, so there's room for her to pick stuff apart without getting it all over the kitchen floor.

Small doses to start off with until I know everything is going well. I fasted her yesterday to let everything else work it's way through first

At first she looked a little confused, like "ummm what do I do with this??" LOL. She kept looking up at me, then back down at the chicken, then up at me again, then she just started licking it, hahah

After a few minutes though, she was going to town on it. I watched her the whole time to make sure she didn't try and gulp it (she usually tends to eat pretty fast cuz of the other dogs always coming around her food bowl). But she did great... took her time and chewed everything, crunched all the bones, and all was good. Took her probably 15 mins to finish both pieces. She didn't leave so much as a crumb behind, hahah

She has hip dysplasia and very dry itchy skin in the winter time, and from what I've read, this should help out with both of those. She had a yeast infection in her right ear recently too, but that seemed to be just a one time thing and hasn't happened before that or since. A little maximum strength Vagisil took care of it no prob anyways, lol

So, we'll see how it goes! I'm cutting her feeding down to 1 meal per day and will watch her weight carefully. Hopefully it goes well! Never heard a single bad thing about a raw diet though

Originally Posted by shmike

Our dog gets mostly meat. They are naturally carnivores. A few of the meals she gets are "medleys" which have certain veggies or berries in them that aid digestion.

With a properly varied diet, supplements shouldn't be necessary except in extreme cases. The dogs get all the nutrients from the food just like their ancestors did in the wild.

We have switched from leaving dry food out for her to graze on to two feedings per day. She'll usually finish it within 10 seconds. On the rare occasion that it is not gone, we usually throw it away. We have left the raw meat out and left. It is gone by the time we get home.

It is definitely not cheaper than kibble. Our raw diet costs about 2X's what dry food would but we aren't bargain shoppers. Convenience > cost.



A raw food diet is the better, easier way. It's not cheaper though.

If you don't want to deal with the preparations that some of these guys go through, do what we do:
We have a local "Pet Deli" that prepackages all meals into individual packages. They are kept in the freezer. When the dog gets her dinner, we pull tomorrow's meals into the fridge to defrost. The next day, open the package and serve. Can't get much easier than that.

Originally Posted by defector

I can give you my answers on these, but I may not be doing it like everyone else.
1. My dogs get meat [on the bone], eggs, and vegetables daily. Yogurt every other day, and a whole fish once a week (in place of meat).
2. I don't give them supplements normally
3. I have no problem with them not eating it all in 1 sitting. Hasn't happened yet.
4. I don't leave raw meat laying around.
5. It isn't cheaper (or more convenient), from what I can tell. Although my beasts used to go through quite a bit of bag food anyway, and that wasn't exactly cheap either.

Basically, every Sunday I do all the major prepping for the entire week. I usually just buy whole chickens and portion them myself. In a pinch I will use leg quarters.

Originally Posted by shmike

For the treats, yes. She still gets them and is as excited now as when she was on a super-bland kibble diet.

The rule of thumb with raw foods is about 2% of body weight per day. That means Brinks would need about 3lbs of food, give or take.

Hopefully Kaneman will chime in on the best way to make that happen. It takes our dog almost 2 weeks to eat that much food!

Originally Posted by Kaneman

The weight percentage shmike mentioned is a good rule of thumb, and then you just vary it based on your dog's metabolism. My big guy weighs 90lbs and eats about a half a chicken a day, plus "fixins." He has a very high metabolism, I don't think a 150lb dog would eat a whole lot more. A whole chicken a day seems like a lot, but if you're talking a small chicken, like 2.5lbs...then that might be good.

I would find a Mastiff forum, most dog forums these days have a Raw Diet sub forum so you can see what other breed owners are doing for their dogs.

I don't give my dogs anything to chew on, no raw hide or anything. Its too hard to keep an eye on them with stuff like that laying around for me, but they don't chew up any of my stuff so its all good. The raw diet is supposed to satisfy that urge they have to chew stuff, seems to work.

I feed once or twice a day, depends on what food they're getting. Raw meaty meals are fed once, ground meals twice.

Originally Posted by VatorMan

We actually make a "glop" which is a bunch of raw veggies,eggs, yogurt, and a bit of molasses and freeze it. We have it sectioned out so its easy to just transfer a container of glop to the fridge to thaw before feeding.

I have beef and chicken sections separated into organs vs. Muscle so it's very easy to put a meal together for the dogs. We shop at the local Amish market so we get all fresh meat. We can get fresh duck and rabbit as well. It's fun to shop for the dogs as much as for us.

Lesson learned. Serve beef bones with marrow outside unless you want to mop the floor following feeding.

[OneSickPsycho]

Originally Posted by Kaneman

This is an update on the a conversation we had regarding putting your pooches on a "raw" diet.

We switched from commercial pet food (Pedigree dry, choice cuts and missing link) a few months ago to a raw meaty bone diet in an effort to ensure the health and stamina of my 90lb male Boxer and 65lb female Lab.

Initially I was using chicken necks and leg quarters as the main sources of meat but after a few raw vomiting episodes it became clear that they weren't chewing the neck bones enough and just gulping them down. I switched over to whole carcasses to force them to learn to chew and began feeding once a day instead of twice a day.

There are always good deals somewhere on whole chickens so there has not been a large cost increase compared to commercial dog food. The dogs main staple is 1/2 whole chicken, warmed to room temperature. I try to cut them in half so that the Boxer gets a bit more, but I don't weigh their food or anything to determine portion size....because they're dogs.

They get a ground beef/steak mix consisting of eggs, banana, some veggies and sardines/olive oil once or twice a week. They also get a whole raw fish (guts and all) once a week.

The results have been very positive, here are the bullet points of my experience thus far.

* Dogs thoroughly enjoy chewing and eating the food and seem very satisfied afterwards. They now have very well developed jaw and neck muscles.

* Dogs strength and stamina has improved on long runs and uphill pulls.

* Dogs have a very full and shiny coat that feels very healthy to the touch.

* Both dogs used to throw up once a week or so on the commercial diet. This is no longer a problem.

* The have completed ceased chewing on anything left out during the day and now have open access to the house while I'm gone...usually about 9 hours a day.

* They rarely fart and never have bad breath.

* And best of all, at our yearly vet exam a couple weeks ago the vet told me they were the healthiest dogs he had seen come into his office. Their muscle to fat ratio was perfect, their teeth and gums were exceedingly clean, and thorough testing revealed absolutely no bacteria or parasites in their digestive system. He was especially impressed with their muscle definition.

So far so good...we're definitely going to stick with it and keep watching them closely. My good friend came over while they were eating one day and asked a lot of quesitons. He switched his black lab over to raw and reported even better improvements than I got.

Originally Posted by Kaneman

Here is a quick update along with requested photos. We actually went to adopt a pitbull pup today from a local rescue and were denied because of the diet we feed. There was concern that salmonela poisoning was going to kill our dogs and their rescue. Our dogs obvious display of perfect health was not enough to counter their fears.

I try to find whole chickens for $.75 to $.85 a pound.

Cut it in half...I slice a little more on one side to give our larger boxer a bigger portion. This is an entire day's worth of food.

I put it in hot water to warm to near room temp. My understanding is that cold meat slows down the digestive process.

Then there is of course the mandatory sit and stare at your delicious chicken until I say differently because I'm bigger than you exercise....

Then there is only heaven.

Originally Posted by Kaneman

Well I picked up a grinder from Cabelas for $40 that clamps down and was pretty impressed. It took a while to grind down 10 lbs of chicken but it got the job done.

Here is my recipe for this weeks mix, already ground up, pre-mixed and packaged so feeding is a snap.

5lb ground beef
10lb dark chicken
3lb white chicken
2 large salmon filets
3/4 container of chicken liver
2 cups yogurt, plain
1 bell pepper pured
1/2 dozen jumbo eggs
some olive oil

They seem to be enjoying it, lol. In the couple of days that our new Pit puppy has been on this diet his coat has already started to show a glossy sheen and the spot of mange on his forehead is healed.

Originally Posted by Kaneman

They have the digestive system to take care of the things in raw chicken that would make you or me sick. You can't feed them chicken alone and I do feed raw red meats as well, depending on what is on sale that week. They also get eggs, cottage cheese, leftovers, pork and so on.

Red meat is $2+ lb vs. chicken at $.59 a lb. so chicken is the obvious choice to make up the bulk of their protein.

As the bones are part of their diet and cooked bones are dangerous to dogs feeding cooked is not an option. I do buy a big bag of quarters every week, boil that and strip the meat for a quick meal that isn't messy when I'm in a rush. Its more of a back up meal. A lot of fat is not a problem because they are not eating carbs, only fat and protein. Whole chickens have a good fat/protein ration.

In the time that I've been doing this I've seen my dogs digestive problems (throwing up, diarrhea, farts) virtually disappear. They have not been sick at all in the last 6 months.

Originally Posted by Kaneman

I fed beef heart and liver the other day, first time I've ever actually bought a cow's heart. I cut 'em up in thirds and gave them to the dogs.

Organ meat is a much richer than muscle and I guess their stomachs weren't ready for that. Nothing will clear a room faster than raw organ farts. Good sweet Jesus.

Originally Posted by HurricaneHeather

We got some beef livers because they are soft and juicy. Cats have never had to chew before and that is the problem with Triumph(the 'what the fuck is this shit?' cat). I cut tiny little pieces up for him and mixed it with wet cat food. He would pick up the liver pieces, realize he had to work to get it down and spit it back out.

Eva(the 'I love it, give me more!' cat) devoured all that we gave her then 20 minutes later we had bloody vomit to clean up on the carpet. It was disgusting.

Main point is, we have cats because they are low maintenance. We can put out a bowl of kibble and be gone for a couple of days and they'd be fine. We don't have the type of life that we can be home twice a day everyday, ya know?

Originally Posted by thirdgenlxi

Well... I've been doing alot of research on this lately as well, and decided to get Piggy off of the "poison" (as most referred to kibble as, lol), and get her headed in the right direction to a long healthy life. I always knew kibble foods weren't the greatest for dogs, but didn't know just how bad until I started digging a little deeper... YIKES!!

So today (sun), was Piggys first day on her new RAW meaty bones diet! As recommended by everything I've read, I started out very simple: plain chicken quarters. Everyone said don't add variety just yet, just pick one meat and stick with it for a couple weeks and let the dogs body get used to eating and digesting "real" food, then start adding variety, organs, etc.

I got her a 16" pizza pan too to eat off of, so there's room for her to pick stuff apart without getting it all over the kitchen floor.

Small doses to start off with until I know everything is going well. I fasted her yesterday to let everything else work it's way through first

At first she looked a little confused, like "ummm what do I do with this??" LOL. She kept looking up at me, then back down at the chicken, then up at me again, then she just started licking it, hahah

After a few minutes though, she was going to town on it. I watched her the whole time to make sure she didn't try and gulp it (she usually tends to eat pretty fast cuz of the other dogs always coming around her food bowl). But she did great... took her time and chewed everything, crunched all the bones, and all was good. Took her probably 15 mins to finish both pieces. She didn't leave so much as a crumb behind, hahah

She has hip dysplasia and very dry itchy skin in the winter time, and from what I've read, this should help out with both of those. She had a yeast infection in her right ear recently too, but that seemed to be just a one time thing and hasn't happened before that or since. A little maximum strength Vagisil took care of it no prob anyways, lol

So, we'll see how it goes! I'm cutting her feeding down to 1 meal per day and will watch her weight carefully. Hopefully it goes well! Never heard a single bad thing about a raw diet though

Originally Posted by shmike

Our dog gets mostly meat. They are naturally carnivores. A few of the meals she gets are "medleys" which have certain veggies or berries in them that aid digestion.

With a properly varied diet, supplements shouldn't be necessary except in extreme cases. The dogs get all the nutrients from the food just like their ancestors did in the wild.

We have switched from leaving dry food out for her to graze on to two feedings per day. She'll usually finish it within 10 seconds. On the rare occasion that it is not gone, we usually throw it away. We have left the raw meat out and left. It is gone by the time we get home.

It is definitely not cheaper than kibble. Our raw diet costs about 2X's what dry food would but we aren't bargain shoppers. Convenience > cost.



A raw food diet is the better, easier way. It's not cheaper though.

If you don't want to deal with the preparations that some of these guys go through, do what we do:
We have a local "Pet Deli" that prepackages all meals into individual packages. They are kept in the freezer. When the dog gets her dinner, we pull tomorrow's meals into the fridge to defrost. The next day, open the package and serve. Can't get much easier than that.

Originally Posted by defector

I can give you my answers on these, but I may not be doing it like everyone else.
1. My dogs get meat [on the bone], eggs, and vegetables daily. Yogurt every other day, and a whole fish once a week (in place of meat).
2. I don't give them supplements normally
3. I have no problem with them not eating it all in 1 sitting. Hasn't happened yet.
4. I don't leave raw meat laying around.
5. It isn't cheaper (or more convenient), from what I can tell. Although my beasts used to go through quite a bit of bag food anyway, and that wasn't exactly cheap either.

Basically, every Sunday I do all the major prepping for the entire week. I usually just buy whole chickens and portion them myself. In a pinch I will use leg quarters.

Originally Posted by shmike

For the treats, yes. She still gets them and is as excited now as when she was on a super-bland kibble diet.

The rule of thumb with raw foods is about 2% of body weight per day. That means Brinks would need about 3lbs of food, give or take.

Hopefully Kaneman will chime in on the best way to make that happen. It takes our dog almost 2 weeks to eat that much food!

Originally Posted by Kaneman

The weight percentage shmike mentioned is a good rule of thumb, and then you just vary it based on your dog's metabolism. My big guy weighs 90lbs and eats about a half a chicken a day, plus "fixins." He has a very high metabolism, I don't think a 150lb dog would eat a whole lot more. A whole chicken a day seems like a lot, but if you're talking a small chicken, like 2.5lbs...then that might be good.

I would find a Mastiff forum, most dog forums these days have a Raw Diet sub forum so you can see what other breed owners are doing for their dogs.

I don't give my dogs anything to chew on, no raw hide or anything. Its too hard to keep an eye on them with stuff like that laying around for me, but they don't chew up any of my stuff so its all good. The raw diet is supposed to satisfy that urge they have to chew stuff, seems to work.

I feed once or twice a day, depends on what food they're getting. Raw meaty meals are fed once, ground meals twice.

Originally Posted by VatorMan

We actually make a "glop" which is a bunch of raw veggies,eggs, yogurt, and a bit of molasses and freeze it. We have it sectioned out so its easy to just transfer a container of glop to the fridge to thaw before feeding.

I have beef and chicken sections separated into organs vs. Muscle so it's very easy to put a meal together for the dogs. We shop at the local Amish market so we get all fresh meat. We can get fresh duck and rabbit as well. It's fun to shop for the dogs as much as for us.

Lesson learned. Serve beef bones with marrow outside unless you want to mop the floor following feeding.

[OneSickPsycho]

Originally Posted by asdgirl

I have started my 2 Danes on raw finally. It's slow and they still get expensive kibble, but I wanted to introduce the raw to them first to make sure they could handle it.

I also decided to do it after getting my emaciated second Dane, Lexi. It was a perfect opportunity to start her on something GOOD compared to the damn Old Roy shit she was eating before.

Lexi just turned 3 and Andre just turned 5.

I started them off on turkey necks and we alternate between those and half chicken breasts without the skin for now (poop is not runny when taking the skin off).

Never had any throw up issues, choke issues, nothing.

They are both doing fantastic on it and I can see it is doing a lot for Lexi and isn't taking her as long to bulk up on raw than it did for Andre on kibble.

They also get raw egg (she gets all including shell, he gets just the egg as he refuses the shell), peanut butter, and some cheese and garlic powder.

Hadn't heard of the pat of butter thing. I'll try it as it is dry here lately and both have dry skin.

This month I will slowly be moving them to raw-only.

Originally Posted by Kaneman

Its cheaper before you add in the meds, vet costs and bones to chew. Raw meat is cheaper than premium dog foods per lb, and certainly more healthy.

I'm paying $.59 - $.89 per lb for leg quarters and whole chickens. I buy cottage cheese and the other supplemental on sale every week. How much you have to feed Brinks depends not only on his size, but his activity level as well. Start with a half a chicken's worth a day and go from there. Pay attention to his ribs and amount of body fat. If he starts getting too skinny, feed him more.

As far as known allergies and issues like you mentioned with his thyroid, everything we know medically about dogs is based on them eating food that they can't process correctly. For example, Rottweilers are known to have hip displasia "because they're so big", however it could just as easily be degenerated hip bones, tendons and muscles from 10 years of eating shit food that causes them to be crippled.

I don't like the slow conversion because when you feed raw and kibble combined the kibble slows the digestion down and allows bacteria from the raw meat to grow. Although I have mixed them before and had no problem I prefer the cold turkey (get it) method and switched all mine over in one day.

Originally Posted by Kaneman

If you have a set feeding time then just put the chicken out for him at that time, give him 5 minutes or whatever and if he doesn't eat it put it back in the fridge and repeat the next day. He'll eat it eventually... My Boxer/Mastiff was pretty skeptical at first, but he came around and now gives the same reaction if you try to feed him kibble.

Maybe put some other stuff he likes in there with the chicken, or you can feed raw beef instead the first day....I bet he'll eat that.

Originally Posted by Kaneman

This is true, dogs can get roundworm from raw pork. Sometimes my brother in law gives me pork that he buys in bulk and lets go bad in the freezer. I cook it then feed it to the dogs, never had a problem with that.

Any other meat should be ok raw though.

Originally Posted by VatorMan

So far our dogs have had chicken,duck,rabbit,beef, and goose. No pork. If I can catch Mr. Groundhog this year.they'll have that.

Originally Posted by VatorMan

That's where you use raw veggies,yogurt,eggs, molasses. We buy a lot of leafy greens{kale,romaine,broccoli,spinach,....) carrots,celery,etc..pretty much everything but onions. We have an industrial food processor and make a veggie glop. We have to make some tomorrow. I'll snap some pics. Tell you what-I'll snap pics of tomorrow's dinner.

Originally Posted by VatorMan

BTW-Wife bought meat and veggies-enough for almost 2 months for 3 20 lb dogs and spent $50. She uses coupons and watches the weekly sale paper but you get the idea. Remember-you are buying the stuff most people don't buy. Chicken backs and necks,liver,gizzards,hearts etc...

Originally Posted by VatorMan

Here they are. As you can see, Leafy veggies, carrots, ginger root, garlic,berries eggs,yogurt.vinegar and molasses. Damn dogs eat healthier than us humans.



Monster food processor. We burned up our Harry Homeowner model doing this shit. Basically 3 eggs, yogurt, and molasses per run. We did 4 runs.



Never said it looked good.

DAMN-it looks like a hideous experiment. Now you see why we call it glop.But the dogs love it.

Ready for freezing. About 2 months worth. Total cost- $20



Tonight's dinner. Beef ribs,chicken hearts and livers, and glop.

Originally Posted by Gas Man

WOW Vator... that looks awesome.

Uma & I doing more research tonight....

Don't listen to the vets.
Don't feed them pork.
Don't cook anything but maybe vegs.
Cold turkey switching is best
no vegs for first few weeks, just meat.
slightly browned hamburger is good to help switch
I can buy used fridge/freezers locally on craiglists all day long.

Oh and according to the math of 3% of the dogs body weight (150#) he needs about 4lbs of food a day!!!!!!!!

Really?!?!?

Originally Posted by azoomm

Sadie eats in one place, it's a tile floor and gets cleaned after she eats. The chicken gets dropped on the floor by her when she eats, it just happens. That doesn't mean she won't try and sneak it away....

Originally Posted by Kaneman

I use a Swiffer Wet with antibacterial stuff, takes less than a minute to clean up.....or I feed them outside when its nice.



Definitely a freezer. You can transfer a daily meal to your fridge to dethaw it, but to avoid going to the store all the time it pays to have a freezer.

Originally Posted by azoomm

My dog always behaves like her paws taste like peanut butter after breakfast. Probably because there is peanut butter in her mouth

I divide her food into single meal portions in cheap Ziploc plastic containers. Those go into the freezer. I have two in the fridge at all times, one thawing and one thawed for dinner. I rotate them. The bulk of them are in the freezer. At one time, we used freezer bags. But, the plastic containers are reuseable.

Originally Posted by Gas Man

I'm worried abt thaw time. Whole chickens aren't gg to thaw fast. And our fridge is always packed. 2 gals of milk, 2 oj gals, beer, soda, lots of left overs. No room for 2 or 3 whole chickens is various states of frozen/thaw.

Originally Posted by Kaneman

I fill the sink with hot water and soak it to dethaw...

Originally Posted by Gas Man

Thinking of making the switch sunday (later today). Question. Have any of you had any issues with the switch? Puking? Difficulty pooping? Do they poop whole pieces of bone or no?

Correct me if I'm wrong on any of this:
As long as he's chewing up the bones, no worries.
He gets 30 mins with his chicken pieces, if he don't eat it, back in the fridge, waits till following day.
Sit and wait for the food.
No more kibble.
Just run chicken, no veggies or other meats, for 2-3 weeks.

Originally Posted by Kaneman

All my dogs threw up a couple of times during the first month. There was always bone fragments in the puke, but I think that was mainly because I was feeding pieces too small for them to have to chew (neck bones)

The poop should be nothing more than compacted bone dust. It will turn while and basically be a powder when it dries....there should be no whole bone fragments in their poop.

Sometimes it helps to feed them by hand, you can teach them how to eat correctly by not letting them swallow it whole,

Originally Posted by Gas Man

Well picked up the food processor... it's a beast!

Bought carrots, lettuce, cucumber, garlic to make the veggy glop.
Frozen berries, apple, pear, yogurt to make the fruit glop. We bought bananas as well but forgot to put them in.

We combined all that and had Brinks taste testing it the whole way.

Like Vators it doesn't look good and while the fruit style tasted good, when you mixed in the garlicy veggy, it tasted funky. But Brinks LOVE LOVE LOVED it. He was drooling waiting for his next taste.

Originally Posted by VatorMan

Sorry I was absent- was at VIR wasting gas and rubber.

My wife just corrected my post. 2 OZ of Glop, 2 OZ of organs, and 4 OZ of meat per meal X 2. Thanks for correcting me OSP.

Originally Posted by azoomm

Morning:
1 Egg - broken but shell and all into bowl
2 Chicken livers
1 Banana
2 large spoonfuls plain yogurt
1 spoonful peanut butter
1 tsp butter

Dinner:
1 Chicken thigh

We have played with her diet - up and down. She used to get less breakfast and more chicken for "dinner." But, watching her weight and activity level - this right now is suiting her best.

She is a 65lb Black Lab. She turned 14 in May.

The main trick for this diet is to know your pet. Pay attention to your pet and watch their gain/loss of weight. Knowing their activity level and personality is key as well. What I LOVE about Sadie now is how close we are. She now doesn't behave like a typical pet - she is another child of mine.

Quoted for my own personal reference...

Gloppers... do you make one kind of glop or two? Seemed like GM was talking about making two different ones... a veggie and a fruit. If so, do you altnernate? I think maybe making two, both combos of veggies and fruit, would be the way to go... keep the dogs interested... though I only change kibble flavors about every 2-3 weeks (same kind, just differnet flavor)...

I'm figuring for Taco @ around 95lbs, he should get about 2.5lbs of meat per day... using 2-3% as the baseline... For Belle @ around 30lbs, she should get 1lb of meat per day... using a bit over 3% as the baseline (figuring she's a growing puppy)... gonna try it with the cats too, fuck it.

Correct me if I'm wrong... Here's my plan...

Gonna buy a freezer and a food processor... freezer first, processor not so urgent... Look for deals at the grocery store, but will also check out the butcher down the road (you walk in and say you want 'that' chicken and they slaughter it on the spot... AND it's less than 3 miles from the house!).

When the last of their kibble is gone (est another 1.5 weeks)... I will present them with a whole chicken... well, ~2/3 for Taco and the other ~1/4 for Belle... and the other ~1/4 split between the cats. I think I'll just put it in their dishes, chopped up so they don't pull the whole damn thing out and eat it off the floor. We'll do that twice a day for a couple of weeks, then start glopping.

We'll mix up some veggie/fruit glop at that point and add it to the mix... maybe 1/4 cup for Taco, 2 tablespoons for Belle, and a tablespoon for each cat along with the meat... Not sure on the portion sizes there... Obviously their weight at that point will make the difference... if I see ribs/getting fatty/etc... but I guess what I'm asking is what's the right glop to meat ratio? Is that in addition to the weight of the meat or is that a combined weight (the 2-3%)?

Probably will buy a grinder down the road and make some prepackaged meals for dog sitters, boarding, etc. I figure that would make it much easier... just buy a bunch of zip loc containers and freeze them... whoever watches them just busts out a couple a day and forget about it.

[defector]

I don't have a specific fruit/veggie mix, but...
Since we also have an iguana, I have started sneaking some of his leafy greens/veggies/fruits in the dog's mix. I just toss everything that isn't meat in the processor for a few seconds.

[VatorMan]

I'm thinking of patenting the word "Glop." Everyone owes me $1 for every use per post.

[OneSickPsycho]

More reading this afternoon...

Found this: http://rawfed.com/myths/feedraw.html

It says the veggie portion is completely unnecessary... thoughts?

[Kaneman]

Originally Posted by OneSickPsycho

More reading this afternoon...

Found this: http://rawfed.com/myths/feedraw.html

It says the veggie portion is completely unnecessary... thoughts?

I personally don't do it and have never had a problem.

[VatorMan]

Well, my dog's diet was championed by a California hippy. That diet seems to mimic a wolfs typical diet. I guess it's all in what you want to feed your animals. I would guess since we (humans) get nourishment from veggies, so would my dogs. Plus they like it and it stretches our food $$.

[OneSickPsycho]

Originally Posted by Kaneman

I personally don't do it and have never had a problem.

Yeah, but didn't you say you do supplement the meat portion with rice or something?