Calling All Raw Feeders

[t(AD)pole]

I read so much good stuff about raw food for dogs on the internet. She was on supercoat before raw and the amount of poop was enormous!

Now she does small poops and is healthy and happy!

Edited January 14, 2007 by t(AD)pole

[arby]

we've always fed our dogs left overs, fresh meat, fresh bones etc.

When we got Humphrey our boxer the breeder is a big believer in the BARF diet. She gave us a booklet on it and we started to add more fresh veg and some supplements (oils etc) into the mix and never looked back. We get great comments from people who see our dogs on how good they look, healthy happy, great coats.

If you're on a good thing why change???

[lovesdogs]

Hi, when I was a teenager....a long long time ago I worked for 2 whole days in a factory that made SNAPS dog biscuits (don't think they are around anymore). Even then I remember thinking "so this is what goes goes into dog biscuits it's not even real food! " The one ingredient I remembered most was meat meal which is a powdered blood and bone type product. There was definately nothing resembling meat or food. So I always fed my dogs a cooked stew. With rice and pasta etc.

Then about 5 years ago I went to a talk by Ian Billinghurst and the rest is history, I've since read another book sorry I can't remember who wrote it and have done heaps of reading on the internet. But like most things the proof is in the pudding and my dogs have never looked back, all my fosters have done really well on it this includes a 14 year old poodle who came to me in poor health with rotten teeth, of course he needed vet work on his teeth but still managed chicken necks and then improved out of site and lived until 17. When my own darling dog was hit on the road, the vet treating her guessed her age at 2 or 3, she was 10! I also feed puppies (foster) a barf diet from day one of solids and they thrive on it. With puppies and toothless etc I mix in chicken mince as this has the bones ground up in it so they are still getting the minerals. It makes sense, in nature puppies would eat the food regurgitated by the parents which would contain crushed up bone.

Like others I've done a lot of experimenting and at times thought it was too inconvient, but now I have a system (freezing the food is not recommended but that is one exception I make to add the convenience of commercial food) I have a mincer and make a batch of food about once a week freeze it and thaw one pack a day and add the raw meaty bones, it's very convenient and the dogs love it!

Sorry I got off the subject of why I started on RAW but I'm a real advocate of the BARF diet now!

In case anyone is interested or would like to comment this is what I make up:

My butcher makes up a beef mince that already contains offal so I usually use two parts of that then depending on what type of dog I am fostering add 1 part of either roo or chicken mince.

Then at home I mince: carrotts, greens maybe spinach or boc choy or similar, plus apples or any other fruit.

Then I mix in a small amount of rolled oats, bran, kelp and brewers yeast. A tub of natural yoghurt, honey and sunflower or vegie oil. I mix all this with the meats from the butcher and freeze into meal size serves.

When I feed it's one part this to two parts raw meaty bones, occasionally I add a tin of sardines or an egg.

LD

[dogdayz]

I always fed some raw with dry just because i figured the dogs liked it, but made the full switch when my weim was diagnosed with pancreatic insufficiency and allergy to chicken/egg making it hard to feed any commercial foods. Then decided if im doing it for 1 why not two, so thats how we have been for a couple of years.

Would i go back - not for the adults thats for sure, and my adult fosters have been raw fed. However i know i dont go into the hugely accurate detail that some do with their raw feeding so Im not sure i would be confident enough to feed a pup a full raw diet. Certainly foster pups have been raised in the same manner my own were, a premium brand dry combined with raw, and i know many will question that decision as I have effectively unbalanced the commercial foods by doing so.

[Ibizan]

Hi , I've been feeding my Afghans and now my Ibizans raw for over 25years and wouldn't feed anyother way.I started after reading a book by Juliette de Bairacli Levy 'The Complete Herbal Handbook for the Dog and Cat' who is known as the grandmother of Natural Rearing.I still use her way of feeding ,which involves feeding rolled oats and barley plus honey,yoghurt wheat germ,raw eggs,raw goats milk[or cows milk] and fruit in the mornings and raw meat[preferably not minced] with raw pulverized vegies,[mostly green] offal twice a week plus suppliments of kelp,brewers yeast[helps keep fleas away] oil.and plenty of raw meaty bones,some days they will just have big raw meat bones.

This is fed 5 days a week,on the 6th day I feed fish or cottage cheese with vegies and the 7th day is a fast day.

This is my basic diet.

None of my dogs have ever tasted dry food or any other commercial pet food

I love this way of feeding my dogs and they love it just as much and I will be ever thankfull to Juliette for writing these books.Another book which is a must is 'Let's have healthy dogs' by Helen Cramer

Marion

[Malamum]

When I first got my dog I read about the BARF diet on a number of forums and although the principle behind it made sense to me it just seemed too hard. Being a very new dog owner I was also scared off a bit by the people who said you would kill your dog if you didn’t feed exact percentages and ratios of different types of food.

After being a dog owner for a little while longer I started to think that it really shouldn’t be all that hard to feed a dog a natural diet as I manage to feed myself fine. I got the Billinghurst book, made the switch and have never looked back. That was about 3 years ago.

[Lab_Rat]

Wow! Good thread! I hope it continues with lots of long term raw feeders contributing! The more info the better! For everyone!

I would love to go 100% raw/natural, but like Malamum I am concerned that I wont be giving my dogs exaclty what they need nutritionally. At the moment they are fed mostly raw/natural, with roo meat and lightly cooked veges, plus rice. They also get eggs,chicken wings and sardines twice a week. However they still get a certain amount of dry food. Living an hour from anywhere decent to obtain bones, they dont get as many as they probably should, but I think after reading this excellent thread I'll just have to make more of an effort.

I guess like alot of people I still have it stuck in my head that they should still get dry food (I use RC), but like most people have pointed out - we manage to survive on the food we prepare for ourselves!

One question I have is about chicken frames. I notice in other threads alot of people feed these, some seem to be feeding solely chicken frames. Are they a good source of nutrition for dogs? Does anyone feed chicken drumsticks or are the bones not suitable?

Our two dogs are doing pretty well on the diet they are on, and I get comments on my RR's coat - but ultimately I would looooove to go just raw/natural!

[JRzipper]

Wow! Good thread! I hope it continues with lots of long term raw feeders contributing! The more info the better! For everyone!

Well OK then :-)

I used to breed working kelpies and Jack Russells and tried my darnedest to feed them a "balanced" kibble diet like my vet told me. The dogs had other ideas though and spent their days on the farm eating dead animals, afterbirth, animal poo. horses hooves, fruit from the orchard and even the odd galah that got drunk on fermented grain after the rain LOL...

I was a bit slow on the uptake though and it took kidney failure in my first Bullmastiff to send me into a panic and look for a way to keep my precious Harley alive. Once I could see what was right under my nose (or on my nose if the kids kissed me after their fossicking!! Yuck) I switched all the dogs to BARF. Sadly it was too late to save Harley but I immediately noticed a change in the other dogs and my Bullmastiff girl who had suffered from terrible skin problems quickly developed a healthy lustrous coat and never looked back.

I've been feeding my Bullmastiffs on BARF for six years now and love it. There's someting about buying and preparing that fresh food for the dogs that satisfys some secret little nurturing part of me that that no one else has ever seen or even beleives exists!!

I live in a large regional city and have sussed out good suppliers for all the bits and pieces for the BARF diet. The only things I have a hankering after (on behalf of the dogs of course!!) is green tripe, wild rabbits, and a good supply of whole fresh fish. They would make my life complete

[BittyMooPeeb]

My first animal family, my two cats ( ) were getting older and having some problems. I researched and found to my complete horror that most of their problems were *caused* by the tinned and dry food I was feeding them.

I vowed not to make the same mistake again, and when my kitties went to the bridge and new feline family members were adopted, they started straight away on diet that contained plenty of raw food.

A year or so later when dogs entered my life, I continued to feed raw food. because of the experience with my cats, and because of horrible childhood memories of the smell of Pal .

When I get overwhelmed and feed dry food instead, I always regret it because of the poos. What time I save in shopping for and making up their BARF mix I spend instead picking up stinky offerings in the garden .

The only problem that I have is that I cant get my cats to eat bones/meat on the bone/chicken wings and necks. Bailey especially who is only two is already having teeth problems . any suggestions?

[poodlefan]

RidgyGirl:

Does anyone feed chicken drumsticks or are the bones not suitable?

Yep, I feed them to my little guys. I think big dog owners find the frames more economical.

The only things I have a hankering after (on behalf of the dogs of course!!) is green tripe, wild rabbits, and a good supply of whole fresh fish.

I don't bother with feeding fish apart from the odd can of mackeral. Fortunately, I have a supply of wild bunnies on tap at the moment - the dogs love them.

Someone could make a nice earner shooting bunnies for dog people.

[Gemelo]

We feed 1/2 1/2 here

Roxies on supercoat dry as well as chicken wings and a barf mix, but sometimes she'll go off the barf for awhile (spoilt little dog) and wont eat it so she then gets those processed rolls that she loves

She hardly touches the dry though, theres normally some in her bowl before dinner time thats left over so she'll eat that if shes hungry (normally less than a handful)

[Malamum]

I also feed drumsticks.

For the chicken part of their diet I get the following from the chicken shop

• backs

• necks

• Casserole pieces –includes drumsticks, wings and thigh pieces. For some reason buying out of the tub called casserole pieces is cheaper per kilo amount that buying these items individually.

[Mr R & NR]

I switched to raw after my Rotty X got bloat twice at the age of 3. Both episodes within 6 months. And No she hadn't been fed before or after exercise. She also had skin problems, itching all the time and red and sore between her paws. Another thing that made me start thinking about it was she threw up one day, 4 hours after her dry food breakfast and it all came up, just been sitting in her stomach................. what is that all about?

As you do these days I started looking on the net for answers. There seems to be no conclusive evidence on what causes bloat but I really liked the raw food idea, sounded sensible to me, species appropriate food. I read lots and lots, joined a k9 nutrition group and then went for it. I didn't feed that much in the way of RMB's at first, got scared of the gulping. Had two large dogs at the time and they couldn't get to their food fast enough once I changed (I did used to mix cooked mince with their dry food). Skin and allergy problems cleared up for my Rotty X but then came back, was advised to cut down on the roo and beef and feed more white meat, rabbit and chicken and she came good again. She was not fat but once I changed to raw she muscled up so much, and the shine on her coat was sensational. Unfortunately I only had her for a couple more years, she got osteocarcinoma at 8.

I now have too young, 15 month pups, who I purchased from raw feeding breeders, deliberately, it was a requirement. I have my first raw raised pups and I would never go back to commercial food. They have grown nice and slowly and are a fit as fleas. Shiny soft coats, and as someone else mentioned, I get asked what I feed them because of their coats. I am also asked how often I bath them (same with the old guys) and I don't ever bath them, just brush them once a week. "But they don't smell" people say.

I don't find it hard to prepare and like another poster said, it feels good to do it for them, they enjoy the food so much, particularly the RMB's, chicken frames, thighs, necks, turkey necks, lamb flaps, necks. Wish I could get bunnies at a reasonable cost. $11 a go is a birthday treat only!

[SengeChow]

We've been feeding raw for over 10 years now - before that, it was a mix of a high quality kibble and home cooked foods.

My grandfather, who was still alive before we made the switch (in his 90s) allowed as how in his day they didn't have commercial dog food (he was a fox hound breeder) and their dogs lived long and healthy lives and he wanted to know what self respecting dog ever went into the wild, harvested grains, ground them and cooked them...

We ended up with a little girl whose immune system was virtually non existent and the commercial foods simply didn't work. Found that raw foods did the trick and we never looked back. She lived to be six, four years longer than predicted.

I do owe Ian Billinghurst cudos for his book, but found his menu too high in grains for my crew (instant hot spots) - prefer Tom Lonsdale's approach.

Also, for supplements, can't go past the website/store - www.k9rawdiet.com - it's an American based company that supplies folks with all kinds of raw product we simply can't get here & they can't ship it to us; BUT the vitamin supplements and the like are a great find and reasonable cost and they will express ship things. Think they even take PayPal.

If anyone is interested in perhaps starting their dogs on a raw diet or just seeing a diet plan set out, I have one on my website which is what I give to puppy buyers - its found at http://www.geocities.com/sengechow/chowdiet.html

And for sourcing rabbit in Melbourne - try the guy at the Vic Market in the red meat section who has the pet meat stall - good prices; either that or try the small poultry stand across from the fish mongers at the Footscray Market - I've found rabbit at both for under $8

Cheers,

Judith-Ann

[poodlefan]

SengeChow:

I do owe Ian Billinghurst cudos for his book, but found his menu too high in grains for my crew (instant hot spots) - prefer Tom Lonsdale's approach.

Billinghurst has now walked away from grains in his diet. His newer books don't have grains in them at all...

[Mr R & NR]

Oh yes, hotspots, disgusting things, Ruby had them all the time until I switched to raw. She had one the size of side plate on her neck once. Poor little girl.