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Daisy is not what I would call a fussy dog, as most of you know, being a beagle she eats anything. Never had a problem getting her to eat any type of dried food or any of the raw meat I feed her now, vegies raw or cooked, fish etc. In fact I have a problem getting her not to eat whatever she can get her paws on!

However yesterday mum bought a packet of kangaroo meat pieces from the pet supply store. They were big pieces with no bone, kind of like breast or thigh pieces.

Anyway I gave Micha and Daisy a piece each last night, Daisy was starving (as per usual). I did our usual TOT routine and released her to eat in her crate, I assumed she had eaten it. An hour or so later, she has something in her mouth and drops it outside the crate - it was the piece of kangaroo meat, completely uneaten :) She had no interest in eating it whatsoever.

This has only happened twice before - when I give her raw liver, and with a BARF patty (she started off eating them but refused to after a day or two of begrudgingly eating them). Oddly enough, she likes eating raw heart.

Micha had no problem with his roo meat and Daisy happily ate some roo mince a few days ago.

Is this fussiness or does she just really really dislike these particular foods? She is very food driven so it is very very unusual for her to refuse to eat anything.

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Some dogs just don't like roo. You'd think they would given that it has a gamey smell even when very fresh.

I'd say she really doesn't like it, it could be the smell or the texture. I've got a bitch here at the moment who will eat just about anything, she won't touch roo either, so on roo night she gets a lamb flap instead.

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Thanks PPS. I thought it could be something like that, but she happily eats the roo mince and sweet potato mix I make for Cherry, maybe it's big chunks of roo that she doesn't like. I have a feeling she'd eat roo meat if it was on the bone (i.e. roo tail) as she loves anything with bone.

Edited by huski
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also-- depending on the shape of the piece of meat (and

most of the meat is leg)..she may find it tricky to start chewing?..some of the muscle is almost intact-and a 'bullet' shape- with the smooth fascia over it still... it can be hard to get the teeth in first up :laugh:

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Kaos hates roo as well, will eat anything else, but not roo

also-- depending on the shape of the piece of meat (and

most of the meat is leg)..she may find it tricky to start chewing?..some of the muscle is almost intact-and a 'bullet' shape- with the smooth fascia over it still... it can be hard to get the teeth in first up :D

:rofl: my boss had a dog, about 6 months old. I offered him a full frankfurt and he had no idea what to do with it! he put it in his mouth and spat it out and licked it and chewed alittle bit and dropped it again, funniest thing i have ever seen :rofl: :p - we used frankfurt for training with him, so he liked it, but didnt know what to do with it not chopped up!!

We tried it a few weeks later, and got the same reaction! :rofl:

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Is this fussiness or does she just really really dislike these particular foods? She is very food driven so it is very very unusual for her to refuse to eat anything.

I do believe that sometimes we need to trust the dog. Both Kal and now Mandela have 'shown' me at times when the food they are eating isn't agreeable with their system (for whatever the reason - not necessarily the food itself). You know your dog and you know fussiness is not Daisy's nature, so I'd go with the 'trust your dog' theory and not push it. Maybe try a different roo meat supplier and see if she's ok with that. I know of someone whose dog eats chicken frames readily, but didn't eat the chicken frames from one particular supplier.

Sometimes it is a fine line between pandering to fussiness (and thereby reinforcing it) and trusting in your dog's choices. I think it boils down to knowing our dogs well enough and I know in your case that you do.

ETA: As per other posters - it can be a 'texture' thing, if she's not used to it. You could try mincing some of the same meat and see how she responds to that.

Edited by Erny
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I do believe that sometimes we need to trust the dog. Both Kal and now Mandela have 'shown' me at times when the food they are eating isn't agreeable with their system (for whatever the reason - not necessarily the food itself). You know your dog and you know fussiness is not Daisy's nature, so I'd go with the 'trust your dog' theory and not push it. Maybe try a different roo meat supplier and see if she's ok with that. I know of someone whose dog eats chicken frames readily, but didn't eat the chicken frames from one particular supplier.

Sometimes it is a fine line between pandering to fussiness (and thereby reinforcing it) and trusting in your dog's choices. I think it boils down to knowing our dogs well enough and I know in your case that you do.

ETA: As per other posters - it can be a 'texture' thing, if she's not used to it. You could try mincing some of the same meat and see how she responds to that.

Thanks Erny. Daisy's refusing to eat something happens so rarely that I am happy to 'trust' her on this one. She also won't eat liver, but then Micha doesn't really like it either, so I think there are some things where the texture/taste just doesn't appeal to them. She did eat some of the roo meat a couple of days ago, so maybe it didn't agree with her? I didn't notice anything different with her but you never know I guess!

ETA: Cherry had some roo mince tonight. As part of her elimination diet, I usually mix in some mashed sweet potato, but I didn't have time tonight. She didn't eat any of it and left it in her bowl, Daisy didn't touch it (she normal checks Cherry's bowl for 'left overs'). Cherry has had no problem eating her roo mince the last week or so, but she is typically fussy. I ended up letting Micha inside to eat it, he did no worries, so maybe Cherry and Daisy are just fussy when it comes to roo. They've both eaten the mince before with no problem. The roo mince was from a different place to the roo pieces, and from the same place I always buy it (woolies).

Edited by huski
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Maybe the sweet potato masks some of the kangaroo taste? I think kangaroo does have a particular taste that they have to get used to as Sooty is normally a guzzle guts but she will pass up kangaroo tail. She eats kangaroo mince if I mix it with something like egg or yoghurt.

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Maybe the sweet potato masks some of the kangaroo taste? I think kangaroo does have a particular taste that they have to get used to as Sooty is normally a guzzle guts but she will pass up kangaroo tail. She eats kangaroo mince if I mix it with something like egg or yoghurt.

That must be it Adele, because Cherry is hardly eating any of it at all. I will mix in some sweet potato tonight and hopefully she will start eating again. She's barely eaten since the day before yesterday when I ran out of sweet potato/roo mince mixture.

Oddly enough, my cat is obsessed with roo mince!! She's normally a bit picky about raw meat but omg - she PUSHED Cherry out of the way yesterday to eat the pieces of roo I cut up for her (before I got more roo mince). It's hillarious. I gave her some mince this morning and she scoffed it :wave: She even growled at the dogs when they walked past her when she was eating it :)

Edited by huski
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Some dogs just don't like roo. You'd think they would given that it has a gamey smell even when very fresh.

I'd say she really doesn't like it, it could be the smell or the texture. I've got a bitch here at the moment who will eat just about anything, she won't touch roo either, so on roo night she gets a lamb flap instead.

Yes I had a very piggy girl who inhaled food and the one thing she would not eat was roo. I was very surprised.

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Oddly enough, my cat is obsessed with roo mince!! She's normally a bit picky about raw meat but omg - she PUSHED Cherry out of the way yesterday to eat the pieces of roo I cut up for her (before I got more roo mince). It's hillarious. I gave her some mince this morning and she scoffed it :) She even growled at the dogs when they walked past her when she was eating it :wave:

ohh yeah! the cats LOVE roo meat!! even my fussy girl who wont eat any other raw meat (only whiskers cans :wave: ) will eat roo!

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Oddly enough, my cat is obsessed with roo mince!! She's normally a bit picky about raw meat but omg - she PUSHED Cherry out of the way yesterday to eat the pieces of roo I cut up for her (before I got more roo mince). It's hillarious. I gave her some mince this morning and she scoffed it :wave: She even growled at the dogs when they walked past her when she was eating it :mad

ohh yeah! the cats LOVE roo meat!! even my fussy girl who wont eat any other raw meat (only whiskers cans :wave: ) will eat roo!

It's bizarre :)

I chopped up some of the roo pieces I had to give to Cherry, she turned her nose up at them, so Shandi pushed her out of the way and gobbled it down. Then Cherry came over to her and looked like she was thinking 'why are you eating out of my bowl?' and Shandi did a cat growl at her ;)

Shandi scoffed the roo mince this morning too, when she saw me take it out of the fridge she ran over and did her demanding 'rawrrrrrrrrrr' meow and followed me around rawrrr'ing until I gave her some :rofl:

Edited by huski
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I bought some Roo Barf patties a little while ago and my dog has refused to eat them. First time she's not eaten her food. But she has had roo Barf before, so I'm not sure what's going on. She will eat roo tails though and they stink and make her fart a lot!!!! Last week I tried some raw lamb liver mixed with some other food and she refused that too. But the cat loved it! I've dried it out in the oven and she prefers it like that so I'm using as a training treat now.

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Two of mine happily scarf down roo. But Fionn, spoilt PITA that he is, won't even touch it. He will nibble around it, and leave it untouched in his bowl. I don't bother about it much - I figure there are foods I don't like either :laugh:

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I have been feeding my guys ( 3 dogs and one cat and the previous cat) on roo for quite a few years. I never had a problem with the realy fresh stuff, would almost loose my finger if not the hand. Then the local supermarket starting stocking human grade, that was okay they thought still ate it. Local pet shop starting getting in legs and mincing it themselves and put into normal freezer plastic bags and frozen. That was fine by them too, but enjoyed it cooked more, as I had to do when I forgot to get it out of the freezer in the morning. Then it all changed. Pet shop starting getting it in from their other agency, in a shrink wrap plastic covering with metal ends. None of the four would touch it, they would walk up to it and sniff at it, walk away and look at me.... as if saying what it that cr#p you are trying to feed us! It would sit there until I through it out the next day.

Tried to feed them on different days after different meals. Asked the shop what they were doing differently, they said nothing, except the packaging. Left if for a week or so and tried again to feed them on roo this time on the human grade. Damn beasties... straight back into it, licked the plates clean.!

All I could work out and assume is that the packaging that roo meat comes in can affect the smell of the meat, and possibly the level of preservative has an affect too. Human grade has alot less than pet. So now I cook it on roo night and only buy the human grade or fresh (that I know is fresh).

I couldnt say that it was one of the kids being fussy when all four did it. So for me, smell plays a major part in whether it is eaten or not.

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