How am I doing? (feeding raw)

This is a dedicated place for all of your questions and answers about Raw Diets. There are also some really cool groups like "Raw Fed" on the topic you can join. This forum is for people who already know they like the raw diet or sincerely want to learn more. Please remember that you are receiving advice from peers and not professionals. If you have specific health-related questions about your dog's diet, please contact your vet!

Member Since
01/11/2013

Barked: Fri Jan 11, '13 1:46pm PST


	8 year old terrier mix. So we get out dog food from http://www.armellinosk9.com/.. and they provide it to us in 5 pound frozen chubs (we get either beef, chicken, or lamb currently) and also 1 pound beef organ chubs. So the routine is, I will slice each 5 pound chub (70/30 meat to bone ratio) into 10 (8 oz) patties. Our dog is about 50 pounds or so. So everyday, we will give him one patty in the morning and one in the evening. In addition to the meat, we also add salmon oil (about a tablespoon or so) 1 Pet Natural's hip and joint treat, and probiotics. Every once and a while we will add the organ meat chub to the food (we also cut that 1 pound chub into 10 pieces)... For the times when we aren't adding the beef organ, we will add a multi vitamin from Pet Naturals (called Daily Best).. from time to time, I add sweet potato and/or broccli. Don't get me wrong, I am not a dog freak or nutrition nut... I just want to make sure I am doing right by my dog since this is a new venture.. (well sort of, we have been doing this for the past 4 months) Coat is great, no itching, great solid poop.. My only two questions is that his energy is ok. I mean sometimes he is all over the place and running, and then sometimes just not as energetic. He gets atleast two hours in exercise everyday. In addition, he loves eating mudd... all the time. Sometimes he can control himself, and other times not. Essentially, if what I am feeding sounds right, then I am not worried. Just wanted to make sure I wasn't missing a step.

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Maxwell

I'm triple- superior MAD- now!

Barked: Fri Jan 11, '13 3:36pm PST


	Sounds like a very nice start. 30% bone is too much though. Over time the excessive bone can cause trouble. It can bind zinc which will hurt skin and coat health and do something with the joints too. If you simply feed one of those cut patties and a meal of boneless red meat it drops to 15% which is about right. We consider liver, kidney, spleen, thymus, brain and eye to be organs but a lot of providers call heart and lung organs as well [mine even puts tongue in there]. Find out what is put into that organ blend so you can feed about 10% liver and those over the course of the week. Does the organ chub have bone in as well? 1 tablespoon of salmon oil is a lot if it is pure, that amount would be enough for Max for an entire week. You need to offer vitamin E with oils. The vitamin chew is fine for supplementing magnesium and manganese but doesn't have enough E or zinc to be helpful. I would see if I could cut the bone by feeding one meat/bone patty per day and one boneless patty. You might feed 1/2 a bony patty with 4 ounces of meat for a couple days for instance. There isn't any rush, 10% bone is just the amount required for a well balanced diet. Many premium kibbles would be giving my dog more like 100% the calcium required for instance. Check with the vendor on the organ blend and adjust the amount fed to 10% actual organ over the course of the week. Since the organ blend I get is 50% liver and the rest I feed double Max's organ needs with the stuff and call it good. Check the label of the fish oil to be sure you are feeding the correct amount. While you can offer a lot more than the 180/120mg of the particular omega 3s needed per 30 pounds there is an upper limit way up there. Add a vitamin E capsule and possibly a zinc supplement to the diet. My guy gets about 5-10mg of zinc daily and a 100unit vitamin E capsule every couple days.

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Member Since
01/11/2013

Barked: Wed Jan 30, '13 7:18pm PST


	thanks for the response! So to answer some of YOUR questions :0) .. The salmon oil we give our dog already contains vitamin E (so we should be ok in that dept?) ...The organ mix doesn't have bone in it, I think. In addition, i'll reach out to them to find out what is in their organ mix. ..So if I were to add red meat meal to his diet, how would one go about that? Like go to the butcher and buy a bunch of ground beef? He is 8 years old, so I want to make sure I am not hurting his joints with the over consumption of bone/calcium. Thanks!

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Maxwell

I'm triple- superior MAD- now!

Barked: Wed Jan 30, '13 8:57pm PST


	Oops, some kibbles would give Max 200% of his calcium requirement. Fish oil has vitamin E added to preserve the omega 3s, dogs need more as omega 3s deplete vitamin E. Max's diet is low in vitamin E anyway according to nutritiondata.com so he gets a couple capsules a week. Perhaps the fish oil you have isn't as high in omega 3 as most oils, check the label. Apparently 5 grams would be a maximum and a teaspoon is 4 grams so you should be just fine. It sure sounds like a lot compared to a single gram! http://www.dogaware.com/diet/supplements.html#fishoil That is good, don't need more bone in the organ blend too. In any case feed one bit a day as 10% of 16 ounces is 1.6 ounces. Yes, ground beef or pork or turkey or lamb would work. Or you could buy whatever cheap meat is there and cut out the bone or buy roasts and cut to serving size. Cheap, tough, not too much fat and as little bone as possible works for me. Heart, tongue, shank [but never the super hard bone!], chuck, shoulder have lots of meat to little bone and easy to cut away fat. Max needs me to cut his boneless meat into longer strips rather than chunks or he tends to fail to put tooth marks into it but I do try to keep the whole meal as one piece of meat. If you want to chop it smaller fine though. Edited by author Wed Jan 30, '13 9:04pm PST

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Member Since
01/11/2013

Barked: Sat Feb 2, '13 3:52pm PST


	thanks! last question: So currently the raw meat we get are 5 LB tubes of meat (with the boned all ready grounded up into it)... Those are 7 dollars a tube. What would be the cheapest alternative to look for? Obviously I don't want to go by $12/ steak. Any recommendations for what I should ask my butcher for? Thank you so much again.

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Maxwell

I'm triple- superior MAD- now!

Barked: Sat Feb 2, '13 6:47pm PST


	Cheap and tough! I look for less fat and boney stuff is worth less to me than boneless. Pork shoulder, fresh ham and beef chuck and round are usually cheaper cuts with lots of meat and if not already trimmed have easy to trim fat. Get whatever costs less and do a bit of work later to save some money. We may feed fat to gut tolerance but it is always a good idea to be able to cut it off. Also look through the clearance bin for good deals. Sometimes you can get something marvelous like $2 a pound leg of lamb there! Hamburger or other ground meat can be used in a pinch but if it is $2 hamburger or $2 chuck I would take the chuck every time. You could ask the counter guy or manager if there is a bucket of scraps you could have, some people do get food that way. It might be mostly fat which isn't good but silverskin [connective tissue], tendon ends of muscle and such would be well worth feeding.

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Saya

I want to play!

Barked: Sat Feb 2, '13 10:30pm PST


	I wait for deals to come out and stock up.. Pork chops for sell $1.29lb I get one pack or two and maybe a third for Bella.. pork shoulder for 99cents and sometimes 88cents lb happens not sure how often, but when it does I usually get one shoulder roast sometimes two.. I get beef tongue, heart, beef liver, beef kidneys from farmer I also get pork, lamb tongue, pork, lamb heart, and lamb kidneys.. Sometimes he has lamb rocky mountain oysters.. The farmer usually cuts me a deal on whole lot if I buy good amount.. beef tongue is coarse bit pricier. $5lb, but ah well. Saya and Bella like it and it's pretty chewy. I sometimes see ground beef for 1$ and something a lb so I get it. Once in while see an OK deal on beef roast so I get one. Saya is 20lbs so stuff lasts a bit for her. Bella is 52 or 55lbs she isn't full on raw diet. She gets is one to three or four times out of the week as a meal instead of kibble or as a snack or treat. I'm working on it so she have it more often regular four times at least. Pork chops I always cut bone off that to make boneless meals plus the bone on it can sometimes be pretty sharp. Saya likes pork ribs and pork shoulders provide a good work out. One way to tell how much the dog ate is weigh before you feed it then after you think the dog ate enough then that shows how much he/she ate of the big item.

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