PLEASE READ

[Bacchus 0]

I have been feeding my dogs, including rearing puppies on the barf diet for over 10 years and find the dogs do far better on it than on processed commercial food. Also cheaper and the dogs produce much less crap and it is more solid and less smelly so much less work cleaning up kennels.

 

The main base of my dogs diet is raw turkey necks. I also feed lots of raw rabbits, skin, feet, guts the lot and make sure my dogs are wormed once a month (which is a good idea if you have a lot of dogs in a kennel environment anyway). They also get some raw meaty lamb bones occasionally and venison bones, paunch, lights and other offal. I keep chickens so they get the odd raw egg too. Pheasant carcasses when I have taken the breasts and legs off (feathers and all), same goes for most other things I shoot or catch too - they are happy to eat pigeons, squirrels, whatever comes to hand. Someone has mentioned giving yoghurt which is good for the 'friendly bacteria' but if your dogs are walked in an area with livestock they will get all they need from the muck on the fields.

 

I also whip in for an amateur pack of hounds and we have over 50 in kennels which we look after ourselves. They are fed on a raw meaty bone diet almost exclusively. They do not get the crushed vegetable matter that my own dogs do but dont seem to suffer for it and they are certainly worked hard, hunting 2 days a week throughout the season, so maybe that side of the diet is not so important. However it is easy enough to feed a whole rabbit so my own dogs will continue to get the crushed vegetable element.

 

Feeding raw needn't be a chore with lots of time spent in the kitchen, in fact just the opposite, if you start cooking up food you are destroying some of the nutrients and lock up others. By feeding the offal and stomach contents you avoid the need to spend all that time mincing up veg too - more time in the field with the dogs.

 

It is worth noting that the bone side of the diet is very important, a diet based on meat will be too high in protien and lacking in calcium, essential fatty acids etc and will cause problems (ricketts has already been mentioned). It is also a phallacy that bigger dogs need more calcium, they need the same proportion of calcium in their diet as small dogs (1-2%), they just need bigger portions (obviously). In fact if you supply increased calcium in supplements the excess will pass through the pup but will lock up other valuable minerals on the way through - bad times!

 

A dogs natural diet contains hardly any carbohydrate so a diet based on grain is also not a good plan.

 

Wilf mentioned his dog not carrying an ounce of fat on the raw diet as an example of the amount of fat in the commercial diet. The weight that can be seen on fat dogs fed commercial diets most likely comes from all the added sugar present, large amounts of sugar is an unnatural form of energy for a dog - fat is a good natural source of energy for our hard working dogs, but not the heat damaged stuff in commercial foods.

 

If feeding raw seems to be too much of a hassle then you are better going for a high quality commercial feed but dont supplement it with anything (meat, minerals etc). The dog food companies have spent vast sums balancing their food and you will gain nothing by adding anything but will just unbalance the food.

 

However, I would urge you to give raw a try. If you feed as I do, without messing around with recipes and pointlessly mincing stuff up, it really is no trouble, takes no time and I believe it makes a great difference to your dogs.

 

I know this reads like a lecture but its just my opinion (or rather other peoples opinions that I liked and so stole!) but it is based on rearing and keeping many dogs over the years. I am sure other people have had great success with commercial foods and if it works for you then it doesn't matter what anyone else is feeding, although if you haven't tried raw then don't you wonder what your dog might be like on that diet - you can always go back to the bag if it doesn't work out!

 

Picture of Gem who has been on a raw meaty bone based diet since the day I got her.

 

 

Two of her bitch pups at 4 weeks old - they have been sucking at raw meaty bones since 3 weeks old and are tearing into them now that they are 5 weeks old (3 dogs still available PM me if interested!)

 

 

[Guest elstudro1986]

thanks for all the great advice lads i am now feeding my dogs on a little meat(off cuts from the butchers) mixed with james wellbeloved and to tell you the truth they seem like different dogs they are not eating as much food so i presume its filling them better than what the boiled meat was. they get 3 portions a day in seperate bowls....

2 handfuls of biscuits each on a morning then out for a walk

1 handful of half boiled meat in the afternoon

1 handful of biscuits mixed with raw meat in an evening then out for another walk

 

does this sound better than what i was previously doing and does it still need improving?

let me no mick

P.S will post some new pics of the dogs either today or tomorrow when i get time out with the camera

[Guest markbrick1]

shit, how much do you lot spend on dog food??????? i feed my dogs a lot of rabbit and a bit of redmills are similar, they dont have all these tablets and other things to compansate for a loss in somthing, they also eat a few raw mackeral every week,now when i show my dogs in summer they usually always win as many of you have seen and there in tip top condition,ive never fed and i mean never my ferrets on anything but rabbit i thought this was what its about having working dogs catching theres and yours food ok i go to tesco but iam no were like in the condition my dogs are ,mark

[Guest POT FILLER]

BACHUSS YOUR SANDY BITCH IS A CORKER IN TIP TOP CONDITION A REAL CREDIT TO YOU

[MIKE 18]

Spend 2 hours a month shredding veg the rest is fed as nature intended raw and on the carcass................... each to their own but I.M.O. dried food is shit and can cost you far more than a healthy barf diet ..............everyone has to start learning somewhere novice or not but you should also make your own mind up. I changed over to barf a good few years ago and could see the difference in the dogs after about 2 weeks, if I couldn't have seen a change I probably would have stayed feeding complete but the change for me was significant and was highlighted on a day out ferreting when my mates dog spent most of the day shitting and pissing and drinking due to complete food he changed after that day and hasn't looked back since ..................take on peoples views but in the end it's YOU that has to make the choice................

 

Thanks Martin the black bitch is almost two years old now and has done very well to date

[ferret15 0]

thanks for all the great advice lads i am now feeding my dogs on a little meat(off cuts from the butchers) mixed with james wellbeloved and to tell you the truth they seem like different dogs they are not eating as much food so i presume its filling them better than what the boiled meat was. they get 3 portions a day in seperate bowls....

2 handfuls of biscuits each on a morning then out for a walk

1 handful of half boiled meat in the afternoon

1 handful of biscuits mixed with raw meat in an evening then out for another walk

 

does this sound better than what i was previously doing and does it still need improving?

let me no mick

P.S will post some new pics of the dogs either today or tomorrow when i get time out with the camera

 

you don't say how much meat ? but it is vastly improved from before

i would do away with the dry food altogether over a period of time ( it wont do them any harm but its a waste of money) they will get what they need from the meat as long as they have some bones (raw) for calcium ask your butcher for some bones for them to gnaw on. and a bit of veg just prepare a little more when making your dinner

 

and i wouldn't bother boiling it you remove some of the goodness when you boil it, and it will save you time to.

chewing on the raw meat will help clean their teeth. and split what you are feeding into three equal meals. they will learn to turn there noses up at the biscuits in hope of the meat later.

and remember keep the walks short while the pups so young do lots of training through play in the garden

Edited July 28, 2007 by ferret15

[higgins 75]

look for a balance in the diet,feed them anything that's been recommended on here,then narrow

it down to what the dog will eat and what's convenient for yourself,dog's will pretty much eat anything

but let your common sense tell you what to give them,if it's mostly natural raw food then it will be

okay,don't worry too much,all the best,

Higgins.