Dogs - Raw Diet Update

[asdgirl]

Originally Posted by Kaneman

They can start eating raw as soon as they're old enough to eat kibble. The general thought is to switch their diet cold turkey as feeding raw and kibble together is thought to cause other issues.

Awesome, thanks!!

[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.

[njchopper87]

What's with the shelter? This s how dogs are supposed to eat.. if anything they should be shocked that someone is actually putting this amount of effort into raising healthy dogs.

Your dog's coat looks great. I'd like to put my dog on this diet, but it isn't up to me.

[skiergirl]

What's even more ridiculous is that same dog will go to some family that ties it in the back yard and doesn't bother with it, train it or give it attention after 3 weeks when their kid gets bored with it and that's a better option to them.

Un-educated people irritate me to no end. Just because they don't know about it they assume it's un-healthy. Why couldn't they ask for more info from you or take the time to talk to a vet....I guess they don't really care about a good home for that dog.

end rant...

[Gas Man]

That is great. Do you always feed outside?

[njchopper87]

I talked to my parents about this earlier today, and they both had similar responses. There was the initial shock, then questions, and finally followed by "well, he doesn't like dog food." So we're looking into this in short. We're still uneasy about the bones, but alternating between ground and whole sounds good.

Originally Posted by Triple

Some people are using counter-top electric meat grinders, but they really aren't designed (or warrantied) to grind bones. I bought an old fashioned iron hand-crank grinder off eBay (new, $30). It's built STURDY, and I haven't encountered a bone yet I couldn't crush. It disassembles quickly for easy cleaning.

You have a link to said grinder? I see quite a few listed, but if you have good results with the one you snared I'd like to go the same route if we go through with this.

[Kaneman]

Yea I'm actually going today to pick up a grinder. We haven't had bad results with whole chicken, but with the grinder I can mix together different types of meat, organ, eggs etc to get them good variety at every meal.

[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.

[azoomm]

I'm moving Sadie to a raw diet this week. I've been reading up on it, here and elsewhere. It all seems just fantastic. She's getting up there in years - and we're starting to see some health issues. So, I'll feed her by hand for a while to make sure she can do the carcass chewing - it looks like that is the primary concern with older dogs.

But, my butcher is almost excited about it. They custom make quite a few dinner options and have a lot of scrap. Not all of it is *worthless*, it might just not all fit into the portions they are selling. The butcher section manager told me this is well handled and FREE. This includes the fish that doesn't make their date cutoffs - again, it doesn't mean that it's spoiled... just the date for purchase has passed.

I figure Sadie is spoiled in all other areas in life and she's truly a member of the family. I might as well feed her like one. And, that doesn't mean breaking the bank... just taking care of her health.

Thank you for this thread - it brought my attention to it!

[Gas Man]

Now I wonder if I could just give the dogs raw chickens every once and a while as a treat?