An Idea; "the Ultimate Dol Raw/prey Diet Information" Thread

[rose of tralee]

While hunting down a Sunday roast for the people yesterday, the butcher pointed out their trays of organs bits for dogs. Wow, was all I could say. Fresh and clean as, and in suitable portions for introductory tastes. Not that my girl will be getting much/ often due to her spots. We will share with the rels' dogs. The price? $2.99/kg

This selection would go a long way in providing organ variety.

Pic 1:

The tray

Pic 2:

From bottom left clockwise, there is spleen, heart, ??pancreas (let's call it sweetbread!), a misc scrap, and liver

Think it all may be pig but will check with the butcher another time. These people also sell pig's heads.

[jamie]

That is a brilliant post DeltaCharlie, thankyou very much for sharing it. That is exactly the sort of informaton we are looking for! :p

I know that not everyone who currently feeds a raw/prey model diet will not be able to post what DeltaCharlie has, but if you would like to contribute to this thread, can you please post that sort of information in that layout, (e.g daily feedings)as it would make it easier to compile the information afterwards.

Beauty! :D

After much trail and error, I've settled on a range of raw meaty bones that my dog likes and I can afford.I roughly spend a little over a dollar a day to feed my dog.

This would be a typical weeks feedings:

Monday:Chicken frame.

Tuesday:Beef heart

Wednesday:Whole Lamb neck+liver/kidney

Thursday:Bone in Chicken thigh or chicken maryland

Friday:Whole Beef heart

Saturday:Lamb shank+liver/kidney

Sunday:Salmon head/Salmon frame or whole fresh sardines

He also gets the occasional table scrap.

I would not label myself as either a prey model feeder or a barfer-just a raw feeder.

I think anyone looking for a good book on feeding a raw diet should look at getting the book "Work Wonders" by Dr Tom Lonsdale.

Here's a picture of the little cutie when he was still a pup.

[Joypod]

While hunting down a Sunday roast for the people yesterday, the butcher pointed out their trays of organs bits for dogs. Wow, was all I could say. Fresh and clean as, and in suitable portions for introductory tastes. Not that my girl will be getting much/ often due to her spots. We will share with the rels' dogs. The price? $2.99/kg

This selection would go a long way in providing organ variety.

Pic 1:

The tray

Pic 2:

From bottom left clockwise, there is spleen, heart, ??pancreas (let's call it sweetbread!), a misc scrap, and liver

Think it all may be pig but will check with the butcher another time. These people also sell pig's heads.

WOW!! That's brilliant! Where are you????

[rose of tralee]

Joypod, so far away.........

I'm in central Qld; this butcher in Mackay.

Maybe there's a butcher near you who could do with some marketing ideas for organs

Cheers!

[Joypod]

Bugger. You're really lucky having such a great supplier.

[spanky]

Hey Joypod

I'm thinking of switching Griff to raw.... his not a huge fan of dried food anyway... but I'm unsure of how he'll go with it. Does Gus have any problems with bones??? Griff's ok with chicken wings... but not sure if I should give him anything else.

And if it helps stop the 'gas' I'm definitely interested.

Do you use a particular type of Vit E suppliment?

Cheers

Erin

[Joypod]

Hi Erin,

Gus is doing really well on a raw diet. I used to add a Vitamin E supplement because I freeze all his food before feeding it (which destroys the Vit E) but I found his coat started getting a little bit oily. THEN I discovered that the raw egg once a week would be giving him sufficient Vit E so stopped adding the supplement and sure enough, his coat improved.

It's been slightly trial and error but I couldn't and wouldn't put him back on a dry food or any other processed food for that matter. It's so satisfying watching him with one of the larger RMBs like half a carcass, ripping the flesh off it and crunching on the bones. You can just tell he's getting in touch with is 'inner wolf'.

I've actually just started adding some natural yoghurt to his diet for no other reason than a lot of people on DOL seem to swear by it. Again, if it doesn't suit him for whatever reason, I'll ditch it.

If you need any other help then just PM me and I'll be happy to have a chat. It's really worth looking into though. I'm amazed at how little I knew about the benefits of feeding a raw diet.

Cheers

Vic

[rivergem]

Hi Guys,

I am new to DOL and relatively new to raw feeding or prey model diet (about 5 months so far). When I started I was/am feeding a 9 year old cocker spaniel, an 18 month old labby and a 3 month old labby. Basically what I can recommend is to read through sites already mentioned in this thread, namely www.rawfed.com and www.rawfeddogs.net and also join the yahoo rawfeeding group. These are all the resources I used and have done great with - I haven't bought any books or such - just heeded the advice given which made sense to me.

Basically I try to keep things as simple as possible, I am feeding 3 dogs and 3 cats. My feeding example is this, yesterday I went to the supermarket and the butcher, I bought lamb necks, lamb trim (about 15 kilos), beef trim (for the kitties they love love it , beef brisket, lamb breast, beef liver & kidney, lamb liver and heart, beef heart, kanga mince and some canned sardines and tuna. All this will last me two weeks - I packed some away in the freezer and the rest I left in the fridge ready to TAKE FROM FRIDGE AND FEED TO DOG easy as that As the saying goes aim for 80% meat, 10% bone & 10% organs which can be balanced over a day, a few days or even over a week.

Take heed from the poop you are thus presented with after the switch to raw (smaller, more compact and not as smelly poops) its a winner with me! Along with other changes such as more shiny silky hair, cleaner teeth (a real biggie, specially further down the track), more satisfied specially when I feed meals they have to work at. The big things I have learnt along the way are:

1. Feed big bulky pieces when you can (and to avoid those whom like in inhale food rather than chew!)

2. Start slow with one protein source and slowly slowly venture out to another, and then another, eventually adding organs

3. Remember that the Raw or Prey Model diet is ruled by MEAT, not bones. Once you know your dog, feed as much variety as you can find.

Cost wise I come out at about $70ish a week for 3 cats and the 3 dogs. The resulting health I now see in my cats and dogs leads me to believe this is not only worth it, but could end up cheaper down the track when I can forego on teeth cleanings at the dentist (my cocker had 2 out before the swap and it wasn't cheap) along with resulting health problems from feeding a diet not appropriate for carnivores. Oh and the only supplement I give is Omega3 capsules (due to particular animals now being fed grain instead of grass).

RED MEAT RULES Jess

Edited April 11, 2008 by LabRADor

[Jaxx'sBuddy]

i have fed my dogs a raw diet for years but i chicken :wink: out when they are puppies and i feed half raw half kibble until they are a year old. i introduce all the different meats/organs/fish with the kibble (ultra premium kibble EVO) so that by the time they are on raw they aren't fussy. i also feed raw fish.

i also believe that with adult dogs it is good for them if the have no food for a day sometimes, ie once a fortnight i would not feed them their meal at night and they would be fed the next night.

now i know some people will disagree with this but my dogs have lived well beyond what the "normal" age range is and most people when they saw them did not believe me when i told them how old they were. they always looked and acted much younger than they were. they were very seldom at the vet and didn't seem to get any of the ageing diseases that seem common.

i am having trouble finding a good "old fashioned" butcher who can supply me with brisket and other bones suitable for a puppy. i have given the pup roo bones but there is no way she can chew those so i am on the hunt for supplies in Adelaide. if i find good suppliers i will post here.

[InspectorRex]

we have a good butcher here in Morwell that has great brisket bones with plenty of meat and stuff on them

[niki schaef]

i am having trouble finding a good "old fashioned" butcher who can supply me with brisket and other bones suitable for a puppy. i have given the pup roo bones but there is no way she can chew those so i am on the hunt for supplies in Adelaide. if i find good suppliers i will post here.

ooo yes do tell if you find one i'm always on the look out for cheap suppliers at the moment i buy wherever i see cheap meat but would like to find a good place with fresh meat that is reasonably priced and has variety. dont know what suburb you're in but the foodland in newton is pretty good theres a leonards in the supermarket which does chicken stuff pretty reasonably. then the deli section is great too- chicken liver/giblets hearts etc and whole fish. they have a pretty good selection of red meats too. i've found that foodlands have much better variety then coles/woolies.

apart from the central markets does anyone know where to get different meats like rabbit etc? i never see any around and would like to feed more variety to ted instead of chicken, lamb, beef over and over though he doesnt seem to mind.

[Purple Julie]

My main question is - I know the prey model diet is based on species appropriate food (again based on the Wolf or other similar carnivores). Dogs differ from wild animals in that A) most are less active and B) They get daily food rather than having to gorge and then recover for a few days. With relation to this, does this effect how dogs would cope with the huge amount of protein?

I have read that it is recommended to fast the dog one day a week, which helps to make it a bit more like the wild dogs not eating every day and probably helps with the protein. But probably a lot of prey model feeders don't do the fasting once a week. We don't.

What I have started buying is boiler chickens - cost me $3.00 so I cut it in half and each dog's meal is $1.50

Where do you get your boiler chickens from Tess32? I've never seen chickens for less than $5 and usually just buy normal ones when they're marked down close to $5. I'm jealous!

I recommend these. I used to feed them to Jyra, they cost me $2.20/kg from Box Hill. I got the butcher to cut them in half and one half was a meal. I have had to stop them now because half a chicken is too much for Jyra now - she only eats 500g/day and these half chickens weighted from 500-800g and we don't have the tools to cut through the bones effectively.

hey raw feeders! i'm having lots of trouble getting ted to eat organs. i've mixed it with fish, egg, cooked it a bit, nothing seems to work. he will eat a bit if its cooked but if its raw at all- no way! just tried tonight mixed with sardines and he ate all around the liver i'm pretty sure hes even licked the fish off the liver i've only tried to give chicken liver. so any suggestions?

Try another liver. Jyra won't eat chicken liver either, but she eats lamb liver fine!

Jyra's prey model diet

Ok, here is what I feed Jyra:

60% Raw meaty bones

35% Muscle meat

5% Organ meat

She gets that 6 days a week and on the 7th day she gets fish - tinned mackeral and tinned sardines, plus a raw egg. The tinned fish is obviously not raw, but she often refuses raw fish, plus it's a heck of a lot dearer!! Even for the cheapest fish.

Jyra used to get 600g of food a day, but now it's 500g as she was putting on weight. She is back at and maintaining her ideal weight again at 500g/day.

It's two meals a day for Jyra. The meaty bones in the morning and the muscle meat in the afternoon. If it's organ meat day, then three meals that day. Or if fish day is the same day as organ meat day, then it's four meals that day!

Organ meat

The organ meat is divided into amounts for 3-4 days, so she is fed 100g of organ meat once every 4 days, rather than giving her 25g of it a day.

The organ meat that Jyra gets is:

Lamb liver

Lamb brains

Lamb kidneys

Chicken giblets

I rotate these, so she'll get liver one day, then four days later she'll get brains, and so on.

Raw meaty bones

Meaty lamb necks

Lamb shanks

Lamb off cuts

Pork soup bones

Chicken carcasses and other off cuts

In the past I have also fed: pig's tail, pork hocks, pork trotters, boiler chickens, lamb flaps/flanks, beef ribs

I found that the beef ribs were not always soft enough to be consumed completely, so I stopped them. Pork hocks are too big. Pig's tail and lamb flaps are fine - would use them again.

Occasionally a lamb neck is so big and so meaty that it will do for the whole day's meal without needing extra muscle meat.

Pork should be frozen for at least 24 hours before feeding it to the dog because raw pork can carry some bug/disease beginning with 'n' which can kill or make your dog extrememly sick.

Muscle meat

Lamb or ox heart

Ox tongue

Ox cheek if I can get it

Yes, heart is technically a muscle.

Everything mentioned so far is human quality, but if I don't buy enough muscle meat, I will get pet quality beef or kangaroo steak.

Food shopping!!

My recommended butchers (for people in Eastern Melbourne) are:

Norm Oliver Butchers, Knox City Shopping Centre: They sell really meaty lamb necks, while most other butchers have lamb necks that are not as meaty. They have a whole section of trays of food that is cheap - usually $1/tray. As well as lamb necks, I buy ox tongue, ox heart, ox cheek, lamb heart, lamb liver, lamb offcuts, chicken carcasses and offcuts from this butcher. I need to call up in advance and order the ox cheek though, and I usually forget. I want it whole and they usually mince it, but they often don't have it at all. You can also buy ox liver at this butcher, but it is so big it will last for months, so I don't get it. It costs $1 for this huge ox liver, so nobody needs to starve if money is tight! There's cheap meat around.

Butchers at Box Hill Centro Shopping Centre: There are several cheap butchers there - Asian ones. They are great. Boiling chickens $2.20/kg. Pork soup bones 2kg for $7. There is lots of interesting organ meat there: Pork bung, Pork Bible, spleen, intestines and so on. I don't even know what pork bung or pork bible is! Jyra's fussy and will only eat the organs I have listed above, so I don't buy the strange ones. They have chicken feet and duck feet too. And black chickens also. Quail is still expensive at Box Hill unfortunately.

Lamb brains are so hard to find. I usually get them from whatever local butcher I can get them at.

There's a pet food shop in Lilydale too in the main street, near the train tracks, opposite the station. That's where you can get beef and kangaroo steak and various diced and minced meats too. I think they sell minced meat with vegies minced through it too, I'm not sure because I don't buy that.

Hope you had fun reading that! Sorry it's so long!

Edited April 13, 2008 by Purple Julie

[persephone]

reading this and smiling at how everything old is new again

[niki schaef]

how important do you think egg shell is? ted likes eggs but doesnt eat the shell, i've tried breaking it up and mixing it in but he will only eat tiny bits (by accident i think )

and also whole fish he isnt keen on. is the tinned stuff ok?

cheers guys

[hopenfox]

Egg shell isn't necessary since your dog is getting plenty of calcium and minerals from bones. One of mine eats the whole egg, shell 'n all and the other always leaves the shell.

Whole fish is also not vital as a food, but it is easy to obtain 'whole prey', with eyes, brain and most body parts still intact, which is always great. One of my dogs will only eat his whole fish as a frozen fishcicle, so you could try offering the fish frozen. Tinned fish is cooked, so isn't as good.

[westiemum]

Have just read this thread right through - absolutely fascinating..

One question, how do people find the weight of their dogs is when feeding a prey diet?

I know it might be obvious, but I have a foodaholic westie boy :D who puts on weight at the drop of a hat and keeping him on the lean side of normal (under 8 kgs) is critical because of his arthritis and his ACL repair (and apart from the fact my gorgeous weight nazi vet has my guts for garters when he puts on an ounce! ). So feed modified BARF - I use veggies for weight control (with protein) - and his weight has been stable for ages - I'm under no illusions that the veggies hold huge amounts of nutritional value for him.

I'd love to up the offal and prey foods but am terrified he'll put on weight (I've had to work really hard to get his weight down, after I let him get too fat and I don't want to go through that again!) ;)

Very interested in comments and opinions - any advice and thoughts appreciated. This is new ground for me.

Thanks,

Westiemum ;)

[rose of tralee]

[quote name='westiemum'

I'd love to up the offal and prey foods but am terrified he'll put on weight

I found the late Liddie (old dal) who was a gutz (no polite way of putting it) more satisfiable with prey type meals. Lack of routine is a good thing I am convinced, and larger meals fed when you, not the dog, determine. Sorry not to be more specific but it's about becoming personally relaxed and deciding with a good do'er not to feel bad if they may be peckish.

E.g Lola's last few days (another Dal): Thursday, fished a few things, mainly lamb, out of the freezer in the morning. She got to wait while they defrosted somewhat on the clothesline. They added up to a moderately large meal, she was visibly full afterwards. Friday a travel day, no food given beforehand nor on arrival after dark so as to minimise chances of being asked to go outside during the night. (wild dog risk on a property). Quietly obvious she 's hungry this morning so tucked into a big piece of lamb flap with appropriate gusto.

I guess with your fellow don't be afraid to feed lean meat meals some of the time, not every meal has to be based on a bone nor have smidge of organ incorporated. Certain bones can be extra good exercise by the chewing they provide of skin/ connective tissue / accessible cartilage (thinking pig's trotter, chicken feet......). A bonus, cartilage is a source of chondroitin for the ones with arthritis.

[hopenfox]

I've found it's very easy to control my dog's weights feeding raw. Mostly just adjust amounts; gaining weight - Feed less, losing weight - feed more. You can also select leaner or fattier meats to feed, just remember that fat provides energy, so is essential to keep a dog healthy and active.

'Gorge & rest' feeding works well too to keep weight stable...feed two days worth of food on one day, than something tiny or nothing at all the next. But make sure you work up to this by slowly feeding more one day, less the next, or you risk runny poo.

I agree with rose of tralee; Lack of routine is a good thing...your dog won't be looking for food (and making you feel guilty) if he never knows when it's going to arrive.

Edited April 26, 2008 by hopenfox

[Guest Tess32]

I found it easy too, to control the weight of my male. I started him on too little, and he lost a couple of kg....I upped the diet 100 grams per day and he put the weight back on easily and now is in great condition. It's easy to take on/take off. Plus they are SO satisfied after their meals

[niki schaef]

thanks hopenfox- wont worry too much bout the egg then. and will keep trying the fish.

what types of fish does everyone feed? and is whole best- what about just fillets?

westimum- my boy ted also puts on weight at the drop of a hat. when i was feeding him dry he got a 'little' round (vet told me off ) i find it really easy to keep him at a good weight now. there is so many things to feed teds meals are ususally all different sizes so i can balance his food over the week and not feel bad eg if i give him a lamb shank or turkey neck one day i might give him a small piece of meat or some chicken necks the next day. the biggest thing for me was my guilt (yep i'm easy to con- its the eyes ) so this way ted always gets something to eat and it usually takes him a while to chew it down- everyones happy argee with tess- no matter the size of teds meal he always seems happy.