RAW FEEDING What's in the bowl today? **PICTURES WELCOME**

[IShitGlitter]

My Border Collie is raw fed and roughly gets 500g of raw a day. I thought this would be a good thread to start and other raw feeders can share and can give us all some ideas to add inspiration and variety to our dogs diet.

So today my dog had half a rabbit

[Snufflesdog]

We don’t raw feed yet, but would love to know how you all started out too if anyone’s happy to share any tips

[IShitGlitter]

I started out on just minces for a long time and introduced a new meat each week. Chicken wings are a great starting point and dont be scared to give bones I was for a long time and there was nothing to it

[TeacupRex]

Our two cocker spaniels had a bowl of Furry Feasts chicken and rainbow trout mince with green lamb tripe. :)

[yetwig]

Mine have had a beef tracear filled with tripe for breakfast and sardines, chicken paws and minced lamb and bone for tea.

[IShitGlitter]

Sardines for breakfast we have a turkey drumstick for tea later.

[Woody479]

What benefits have you seen from raw feeding? Can puppies have it? Our pup is 5 months old and very disinterested in his kibble/wet meat. I know nothing about raw feeding though. How do you calculate how much to give them? He’s 6.5kg.

[GeraltOfRivia]

Our 9month old puppy has a kilo a day (still growing!) and we currently use the pre prepped minces from our local raw supplier. Then some added bones, veggies and fruit here and there.

[IShitGlitter]

There is so many benefits to feeding Raw it's really good for the teeth my 8 year old collie has pearly white teeth with no smelly breath ect. It's just good all around really a raw fed dogs coat is amazingly soft and non smelly also the dog poo amazingly shrinks... It does need a bit of research before heading into the world of raw.
dogsdinner2.webs.com/
This link is great and covers everything you would need to know including starting raw.

[TeacupRex]

@Woody479 - I have two raw fed dogs - one was switched to raw as an 8-9 week old puppy and the other was weaned on raw, they have both been raw fed ever since. Puppies can absolutely be fed on a raw diet!

You can buy pre-made raw completes that already have the right meat/bone/offal ratios weighed out. You just have to defrost them the night before, weigh out as much as your dog needs and feed. Most completes have the consistency of chunky pate. These are a lot less scary than jumping straight into DIY raw, with all the raw bones, organs etc! A 5 month old pup should be getting 5-8% of their bodyweight in food per day. These websites might be helpful : www.wolftucker.co.uk/raw-feeding-guide-for-puppies/ www.dogsnaturallymagazine.com/starting-puppy-on-raw-diet/

Benefits of raw (my own experience) - smaller, less frequent and less smelly poos (my dogs will poo once or twice a day max), no farts, lovely white teeth, no allergies. They never get bored or turn their nose up at meals because they get a good variety of meat - the bowls are always licked clean, they love their raw food! And maybe I've been very lucky in the health department but I think feeding raw has really helped their general health - I can count the time they've been to the vets on one hand! I was advised by the vet to switch to raw with my first puppy and have never looked back.

[Woody479]

Thankyou for all the information, it’s so interesting. Is it much more expensive than ‘normal’ feeding?

[EnglishRain]

I cheat and feed mine Nutriment complete minces mostly. My youngest doesn't do well on much bone, my eldest used to live off chicken carcasses and tripe though, he loved it.

They get fish at least once a week and a raw egg here and there.

The best thing about raw has to be the tiny poos and clean teeth.

[IShitGlitter]

No at lot of the time it's cheaper. If you can source some cheap staples.

[TeacupRex]

It's a lot cheaper if you can buy in bulk (we have an extra freezer in the garage just for dog food), I spend around £80 with a raw supplier which lasts about 2 months for 2 cocker spaniels. I don't just stick to one brand, they get a mix of cheaper and pricier ones to make the money go a bit further. It often ends up cheaper than some of the mid range/high end kibbles/wet foods plus you're getting pure meat (if you're a prey model feeder rather than BARF which includes fruits/veg/herbs) with no crappy fillers like rice, potato, maize, soybean etc.

If you're looking at brands, Bulmer, Durham Animal Feeds (DAF), Thistle Raw Feeds are some of the cheaper complete brands. Furry Feasts, Manifold Valley Meats (MVM), The Dogs Butcher, Nurture Them Naturally, The Raw Factory, Landywoods, Natural Instinct are more mid range. Paleo Ridge, The Dog and Bones, Benyfit, Nutriment, Henley are more expensive. I've tried quite a few different ones over the years! Nature's Menu is okay (the only raw brand stocked in Pets At Home) but very expensive for what it is, and some of their products contain rice so that's best avoided.

You can get thrifty once you're familiar with raw feeding - some people manage to get hold of some extremely cheap discounted meat in shops or offcuts from a butcher for next to nothing. I'd recommend joining some raw feeding groups on Facebook like Rawfeeding Rebels or Raw Feeding UK - they're always willing to help newbies and answer any questions.

[IShitGlitter]

Nothing too exciting today sardines again for us.

[GeraltOfRivia]

Mine had chicken mince, some apple and a small sardine today. He can't have offal, beef, lamb or venison as it gives him the runs. As did kibble 🤦‍♀️

[ThatLibraryMiss]

I feed Small Dog on Paleo Ridge complete minces. It's easy to feed a big dog on a good mixed diet of chunks but harder to balance it with a small dog, especially as he doesn't like offal and will drop chunks of it over the side of his bowl. It's great quality and he loves it. It's about £3.60 - £6/kilo, mostly towards the cheaper end. He gets about 4% of his weight per day because he's small and very active and he costs me well under £1/day.

This afternoon, for a treat, he had lamb bones from Morrison's for his tea. They do lovely meaty bones with loads of meat on them. Their beef ones are good too. It's good for his teeth to have something to really chew on.

[IShitGlitter]

Weve got a pigs tail today the butcher gave me a huge bag full for £2 a total of 13 tails and a few slabs of lambs ribs for free. Has anyone fed tails before?

[ThatLibraryMiss]

I think tails would be fairly bony and not much protein so I'd feed them sparingly. They may work as chews better than as a meal.

[StillMedusa]

Mine has just wolfed down a mix of beef and tripe... grim stuff but she loves it and she can be fussy so I go with it.
I used to buy Paleo Ridge but she wasn't always keen and she can't stand Natures Menu..the nuggest are too sloppy when defrosted in her highness's opionion.
By chance I happened upon Albion [https://www.albionmeatproducts.co.uk/]] tried some on her as nicely priced and she really likes it (especially tripe or anything plus tripe)
She also has raw chicken wings as snacks.

I'm not a purist.. she still has treats ( she will do anything for a bit of cheese!) and the odd bit of kibble or cooked meat but raw is the bulk of her meals.
I'm still a bit nervous of giving proper bones though as she chomps quickly and I'm worried she'll choke (she's 8 months and medium/large breed)

[GeraltOfRivia]

@stillmedusa ours is a 9month old medium/large too and I've just started with bones. It's daunting isn't it. He's done well so far with them though.