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We feed our dogs on a species-appropriate diet of raw meaty
bones, raw meat, raw vegetable, and supplements. This diet is a combination
of the diets presented in Ian Billinghurst's books, Give Your Dog a Bone
and Grow Your Puppies with Bones; and in Kymythy Schultze's book,
The Ultimate Diet : Natural Nutrition for Dogs and Cats. Other good
books that you may find useful are: Tom Lonsdale’s books, Raw Meaty Bones
and Work Wonders: Feed Your Dog Raw Meaty Bones. An excellent book if
you are just switching to the diet is:
Carina Beth
MacDonald, Raw Dog Food.
Most of these
books are available from several sellers on the Internet, including
www.amazon.com and
www.dogwise.com. You can often get good buys on these books used at
www.half.com or search
www.bestbookbuys.com for the book you are interested in.
According
to Marion Patricia Connolly, Executive Director/Curator, Price-Pottenger
Nutrition Foundation, "Providing species-appropriate nutrition for our
companion animals through raw carnivore foods helps them flourish as nature
intended, even in modern households. [The books mentioned above] provide a
helpful how-to guide for pet owners and a valuable compendium of important
nutritional information. . . on the benefits of raw versus cooked food for
animals. As Dr. Pottenger demonstrated in the 1930's, the response from pets
manifested in health, vitality, personality, intelligence and companionship,
is a rich reward for the small amount of time and effort needed to provide
them a natural diet that meets their complete nutritional needs. [A raw
carnivore diet] offers pet owners and their treasured companion animals the
opportunity to realize these benefits."
TYPICAL
DAILY DIET
Feed about 2 percent of the dogs weight
in raw meaty bones and 1/4 to 1/2 cup mush each day. You can split this
into two meals a day, or feed one meal a day.
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NEVER EVER feed cooked
meaty bones. Cooked bones splinter and can cause punctures to your dog's system. Do
not feed too much cooked meats: the enzymes are killed and the cooked fats are not what
your dog needs.
DO NOT defrost meat or Mush in the microwave: It will kill the enzymes in
the raw food that your dog needs. |
Veggie-Ground
Meat Mush
12 pounds of raw ground meat – (beef,
turkey, pork, emu, venison, etc. depending on what is available and
since we are always looking for variety, different meat from what we
used the last time we made mush)
To this, add:
• 1 to 2 pounds: veggies, pulverized (we use a VitaMix or put
everything through the meat grinder): veggies typically include
collard greens, mustard greens, turnip greens, etc. Avocados if
overripe. Fruit that I have on hand.
• 8 - 12 eggs, raw, shell and all, pulverized in the VitaMix with the
greens or put through the meat grinder
• 1 heaping tablespoon crushed garlic
• Raw apple cider vinegar, enough to make it possible to pulverize
the veggies in the VitaMix or food processor or enough to be able to mix
everything up easily
• Any leftovers like cooked rice, potatoes, winter squashes, cooked
meat that happen to be in the fridge, also all ground up
• 1 pound or more of ground liver (beef, pork, emu, venison, turkey,
chicken)
• 1 pound or more of ground pork or beef kidney or turkey or chicken
giblets
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This recipe makes
enough to feed three adult Airedales for four to six
weeks. We typically feed about a ¼ cup at one meal a day five times a
week. Freeze in containers; once defrosted, it will keep up to five
days in the fridge. Never defrost in the
microwave.
If your dog has runny stools, add a probiotic to this
meal until the bowels have the hard consistency of a barf-fed dog.
Bowels should not be runny on this diet. If the stools continue to
be runny, you may be feeding too much muscle meat in proportion to bone.
Ease back on the quantity of mush.
If your dog has unexplained runny stools, she may have a
gastrointestinal bug. You may want to fast your dog for a day, feeding
only chicken broth. Then add in some cooked rice the next day. The next
day, you can add some cooked chicken meat (no bones), and feed the rice,
cooked chicken, broth combo until the dog is feeling better. Then, start
weaning your dog back to raw: ¾ cooked combo with ½ raw for a couple of
days, then half and half, then ¼ cup cooked to ¾ raw, and finally all
raw. |
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When we feed the dogs,
we add vitamins, probiotics, a zinc supplement, additional vitamin c and
any other supplements that our dogs need. For example, our 12 year old
gets a half teaspoon of Acti-Flex 4000, a joint supplement. All the dogs
get fish oil, about a tablespoon each, added at the time we feed them. |
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