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[quote=“6stringsamurai”]Hey Stray Dog,

Have you tried feeding dogs a cooked diet before? If so, how are the results you found compared to ones on Raw? If you have done this I would be interested in knowing the results.

Also, are you suggesting that its better for me to not use any kibble at all? I never intended to use kibble as the main dietary source, just a sprinkle here and there to promote chewing and clean teeth as a cooked diet is generally soft. Also, I don’t want to turn him off kibble completely, as there may be some days I don’t have time to prepare cooked food and may have to feed kibble (mixed with canned) for a day here an then. I’m afraid that if he doesn’t get a little bit here and then he’ll stop eating it completely. We can all agree that homemade diets (cooked or raw) is more time consuming, but our dogs should be worth it.

Thanks for the info here. Not trying to pick a fight … just someone trying to make sense of what veterinarians and dog nutritionalists can’t agree on.[/quote]

Hey again, 6stringsamurai.

BTW, my intention isn’t to convert you, but to ease the concerns of others reading this forum - I should have made that clear. You’re giving your dog a vey good diet.

I haven’t tried cooked food, and that’s simply because we couldn’t work out how to replicate raw bones, which are the core of a healthy diet for dogs. They need all the nutrients that bones offer and essentially in the same proportions - for instance, the right balance between calcium and phosporous is extremely important, particularly to young, growing dogs, and particularly to those prone to conditions such as hip dysplasia. I read that I could supplement with egg shells and phosphorous additives, etc., but then it just hit me that I could stop trying to replicate raw bones and just give them raw bones instead.

I do give my dogs cooked meat on occasion, but it is rare, as I tend not to allow them ‘treats’.

Re. the kibble as a minor supplement, as sandman points out, if it’s just for cleaning the teeth, ask anybody here who stopped feeding kibble and converted to raw bones; their dogs teeth cleaned up beautifully. You could try rawhide bones instead.

I’ll be honest and admit that I used to have a bag of kibble on hand for emergencies, but then I kept reading about the importance of fasting dogs every couple of weeks, to detoxify the system (as many humans now do), so I tend to just fast my dogs when we’re out of meat (or give them an egg or table scraps, or the suchlike). I don’t feed at set times, and that prevents them building up acid in their stomachs in anticipation and vomiting when feeding time passes without a meal. This makes fasting a much easier event for my four-legged family.

I feed a raw diet to roughly 35 dogs each day, complete with fish oil, powedered supplements, and a raw egg, and I can feed the whole pack in less than an hour, and that includes moving them all between their accomodation and the exercise area. It really is a doddle once you get used to it, and probably easier than cooking (though not as quick as processed dog food).

If you want an excellent book on the subject, I can lend you a copy. Just PM me to arrange delivery. It’s an excellent read, and the common sense of it all just smacks you in the face after just a few pages.

But, like I said, I have no beef (cooked or raw) with what you’re feeding; I just don’t want others to be misled about the health benefits of feeding raw.

Cheers!

Sean

82

[quote=“6stringsamurai”]Hey Stray Dog,

Have you tried feeding dogs a cooked diet before? If so, how are the results you found compared to ones on Raw? If you have done this I would be interested in knowing the results.

Also, are you suggesting that its better for me to not use any kibble at all? I never intended to use kibble as the main dietary source, just a sprinkle here and there to promote chewing and clean teeth as a cooked diet is generally soft. Also, I don’t want to turn him off kibble completely, as there may be some days I don’t have time to prepare cooked food and may have to feed kibble (mixed with canned) for a day here an then. I’m afraid that if he doesn’t get a little bit here and then he’ll stop eating it completely. We can all agree that homemade diets (cooked or raw) is more time consuming, but our dogs should be worth it.

Thanks for the info here. Not trying to pick a fight … just someone trying to make sense of what veterinarians and dog nutritionalists can’t agree on.[/quote]
My bet is that it would be very difficult for you to keep your dog interested in dry food after giving him meats. Before I became a fullblown convert to raw (yes, I know that many of us here seem pretty religious about it), I tried mixing raw meats and dry food. This was just with one dog, so it’s not like I did a scientific study, but the boy just refused to eat any dry food as long as I was giving him a little bit of raw meat. And I got to the point of giving him just 50 to 100 grams of meat a day-way below what he needed. He just didn’t care how hungry he was. Even when I mixed dry food with ground beef, that little fucker was able to eat evey speck of beef in the bowl without swallowing one bit of dry food. He seemed to prefer starving on the good stuff to surviving (though not thriving, as Sandman has put it before) on dry food. He eventually won. I binned the dry food and switched to a whole bird or fish a day. As long as you are feeding your dog good quality meats, cooked or raw, then I doubt he’ll go for any dry food.

If I were trying to do what you’re doing (and I wouldn’t), I would just give them the rawhide “bones.” However, those things don’t seem to be such a good substitute for the real thing. They just aren’t gritty enough, and they don’t seem to scrape the tooth all the way down to the gumline. IMO, dogs need to break a bone down in a couple of different ways in order for their teeth to get the full benefits of bones. One way is to slowly naw at it and pick it apart. This scrapes most of the tooth well and gives them good muscle exercise. However, in order to really clean the tooth down to the gumline and between teeth, the dog has got to bite straight through a few bones. Most dogs don’t do that with the rawhide bones, and even if they do, the rawhide ones don’t seem to have enough grit to really clean the tooth well. Raw bird leg or wing bones seem to be good breaking bones for dogs. I also give them the soft part of beef rib bones. That part of the rib is not quite cartlidge, but not as hard as most bones; they’re fibrous, but not too hard. I feed them raw, but you could try boiling them for 30 seconds if you’re worried about bacteria. It seems to me that this sort of bone won’t harden up too much if it’s just blanched in a bit of boiling water. You could give it a try. My rule is that if I can’t cut through most of a bone with one wack from my chopper, then it is too hard for my dogs. That rule might also apply to cooked bones, provided that they don’t break into sharp pieces. Or you could just give the raw bones a go. Happy feeding!

83

Now that we’re back to the original question – cleaning the teeth – I’d recommend the long bones from cattle. I give ours a chunk of one every week or so, usually including the rounded hip part. He gets that for a night and gnaws away at it for hours, which also keeps him stimulated. Next morning before work I split it lengthways with a cold chisel and mallet, and get home its cleaned of its marrow.
Really, whatever you’re feeding, there’s simply nothing that compares to a big raw bone for cleaning teeth.

84

Well, my pooch doesn’t seem to mind bits of dry food mixed with the cooked food. He still accepts total dry if I’m in a bind for time and can’t prepare his meal. I think I’ll stick to a few sprinkles of dry in his food just so he keeps eating it afterwards when I’m in a rush. It may do some minor cleaning in between his doggie bones and toothbrush cleanings.

About the teeth thing, I’m thinking about bones on occasion…but giving it a quick boil 10-15 secs to kill outer bacteria. I do give him Rawhide, but as it gets soft, it might not get to all those little crevices in his mouth. I’ll try This, and I’ll keep on brushing the doggies teeth every week… Oh how he hates having his teeth brushed :slight_smile:

85

An excellent compromise, and one that the book recommends for those still uncomfortable with the thought of feeding raw bones.

86

I’ve seen this mentioned a number of times, especially by Stray Dog, but a search didn’t turn up anything comprehensive - just lots of references.

We have four (!) dogs now, two of them around 18 months and two of them around 4 months. I’m not all that happy with the bags of dry food we’ve been feeding them so far - firstly it’s expensive and inconvenient, and secondly we’ve ended up with three very thin dogs and one very fat dog (and no, it’s not the one dog eating everyone’s food, they all eat the same).

So I’m thinking about giving the raw meat thing a try. Some questions:

  • What kind of meat? What animals and cuts? I’ve heard that anything with chicken bones in it can kill dogs, for instance.

  • From where? There are lots of traditional markets around here but they aren’t very cheap. How does one go about finding a wholesaler? Do you buy real cuts or make a deal for their table scraps?

  • Do you buy fresh every day, or get it wholesale and refrigerate? If the latter, for how long?

  • What else do they need? You’ve mentioned vegetables and supplements, but which?

  • How expensive does it end up being?

Cheers,
Brendon

87

Can’t answer any of those questions, but you may have to be prepared for four very hyper hounds. I have a couple of wolf hybrids back home, and any time they get raw meat (every so often someone gives us a freezer full of moose), they seem to remember that they’re wolves and go a little berserk. Kind of like a 4-year-old on sugar bomb cereal.

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[quote=“Brendon”]

  • What kind of meat? What animals and cuts? I’ve heard that anything with chicken bones in it can kill dogs, for instance.[/quote]

Avoid meaty bones from older animals, because of the amount of steroids and other chemicals they will have been fed (most of which are not destroyed through cooking). Stick to ‘young’ animals, such as chicken, duck, lamb, and fish (maybe older, but fewer, if any, chemicals - avoid salmon and tuna because of the mercury). Start with chicken and fish, as the bones are very easy to break down; move on to duck and lamb when the dog or cat is more experienced, as the bones are tougher. We don’t feed pork, but pork ribs are a great workout for the teeth, as are lamb shanks, if you can get them. Load-bearing bones on older animals (pig, sheep, cow) are generally very tough and can break teeth.

The chicken bones myth stems from the dangers of feeding cooked bones. You could feed cooked chicken bones forever with no problems, but there is the potential for the bones to splinter and cause problems within the digestive system. Raw bones are pliable and break down quickly and easily and are the basis of a healthy diet. We have fed over 300 animals a diet consisting mostly of meaty chicken bones and we’ve never had a problem yet. Having said that, one Forumosan did have a problem with her dog, but that may be because of the dog rather than the bone - she can elaborate on that.

Any supermarket will sell chicken backs, which are very, very cheap and great as the bulk of the diet - say three or four times a week. They’re more bone and cartilage than meat, so feed something meatier on the other days (whole fish, or chicken legs or wings). Buy whatever is going cheap that day and you will be spending less than if you were feeding tinned food (much less) or dry food (similar). Or traditional markets will give you great deals, especially if you take the most unpopular cuts, such as chicken necks (with heads, if you like) and backs. We were buying from a wholesaler (ask a friendly restaurant where they buy their meat) but now we buy good cuts (legs, meaty backs, wings) and they give us the scrappier parts free - this is a service to them, as they would otherwise have to pay to dispose of them…

[quote]

  • Do you buy fresh every day, or get it wholesale and refrigerate? If the latter, for how long?[/quote]

We usually get enough for two or three days. It can be kept in the fridge for two days no problem; the third day is still OK but starting to lose it’s freshness. Freezing is an option, but thawing is a big problem for us (25 - 30 kg at a time).

Eggs, garlic, apple cider vinegar, yoghurt, green leafy vegetables, very ripe fruit - all blended together, perhaps with some chicken organs for flavour (organs need to make up about 5 to 10 percent of the diet). We give powdered supplements from http://www.b-naturals.com - usually the daily blend, probiotics, and green blend. We notice a huge difference in the health of the animals if they go too long without these supplements.

[quote]

  • How expensive does it end up being?[/quote]

Far less than feeding tins, even if you get organic vegetables delivered to use in their veggie mix. When I was paying for everything for my own dogs (10kg, 15 kg and 17 kg), it cost me about NT$25 to NT$50 per day per dog. Bear in mind, we no longer had to express their anal glands, get their teeth cleaned, treat diarrhea outbreaks, bathe them so much, have so much ‘clean-up’. The benefits are huge.

[quote]Cheers,
Brendon[/quote]

You’re welcome.

92

Thanks for the detailed reply, Mr. Dog.

We went down to the local market today and, after some asking around, got a huge carrier bag full of chicken necks for 60nt, and a giant pork rib for another 60. I’ve never seen the dogs so happy in their lives.

It doesn’t seem to have turned them into wolves, either :wink: