Concerned about raw diet

[my3muchachosnme2]

This is going to be a long one...........
After much pursusassion from my local pet store, I have finally made the leap and started William on a raw diet. After reading many posts here, I was convinced I made the right decision until I read a thread about the negative sides of a raw diet. Now I am scared! I will give you a short summary of William Wallace:

5 years old, health and allery issues since he was 6 months old, thyroid problem and takes medication, and allergy issues ( I have to give him shots every 3 weeks) and I dont think this is working, thats why I decided to switch to the raw diet. He also takes medrol and I used a prescribed cream on his paws, legs, belly and face......methly something

Hes been on the raw diet for 2 days. He absolutely loves it.........I dont think he tastes his food when he eats. Our local pet store has natures variety. I bought the beef medallions and patties. I think I am going to have a problem having access to the food there because they were out of the medallions, thats why I bought the patties. Another issue I have is that is incredibily expense. A 3# bag will last gim 2 1/2 days! $10 a bag! I noticed the ingredients have fruit as well. Is there a more economical way I can prepare this myself? I have a freezer of 1/2 of a cow! I dont know if I have it in me to give him an entire chicken breast. (as I saw in some pics) He has really nice teeth and I worry about that with the raw diet.

Sorry for the long post, but now I am concerned......my vet is dead set against the raw diet and I am not even going to tell him and the local pet store said nutrition is their specialty and they hightly recommend the raw diet.

Thanks and this is an awesome site.

Robin and William Wallace :dogbark (tried to upload a pic, but file is too large)

[Jo Ellen]

Take a look at the Blackwing ostrich dog food. This dog food is supported by Dr. Bloom of the University of Michigan. I understand dog allergies are his specialty.

Please feel free to call Blackwing and talk to them about William's medical issues. They will be very helpful to you.

http://www.blackwing.com/product_shop.php?pcnm=Pet%20Food

Good luck, keep us posted!! :003

[elvira]

My oldest golden had diarree. Every night he waked us and we had to let him out. We tried all kinds of dog food. The vet gave him all kinds of medicins. Nothing worked. I sujested to feed him raw and the vet said I shouldn't do that, it wasn't complete (although I wanted to feed a complete raw food). I was so stupid to listen. She send me to a specialist and she said try other dog foods, doesn't matter what and try to find something that is good for him. I want you to try this, before we do some painfull investigations. Then I switched him to a raw complete food. No diarree anymore. I was so happy that he was oké now, but angry that my vet advised against it and with myself that I listened. I have read a lot of books about raw feeding and feed him now a home made raw food. He is doing well and I'm sure I know much more about feeding dogs than my vet. This vet stopped and the vet I have now, knows I feed raw, but he doesn't say anything about it. He doesn't say I shouldn't, or that pet food is better. There are some vets who are positive about raw feeding, but unfortunately most believe what the petfood industry tells them.
A lot of dogs have allegries for grains, so they benifit from a raw diet.
Good luck with William and don't let your vet scare you. Perhaps you can join a list about rawfeeding.

[Jo Ellen]

It's tough going against the vets. I think that's one of the biggest challenges I face with feeding raw. It's alot of pressure to stand firm.

[catsdogskids67]

Hi,
You may want to check out a book like "Dr. Pitcairn's Complete Guide to Natural Health for Dogs and Cats". He is a homeopathic vet, and while I do not personally agree with all that is homeopathic, I do have a lot of experience feeding raw, with excellent results. This book is supposed to have recipes for making your own raw diet for pets.

I used to feed a raw food called Oma's Pride which was flash-frozen raw chicken and neck bones; it comes in tubes in 1lb to 20 lb sizes. It was about $2.00 per lb. a couple of years ago. They also had raw rabbit, but it cost a bit more. It has nothing added so you can add your own supplements, etc as you wish ( like missing link or whatnot). My cats LOVED it, but I cannot get a distributor anymore, so now I have switched exclusively to Life's Abundance dry. If I could get it a good raw food again, I would!!

good luck with your doggie! :woofpup

[my3muchachosnme2]

I am still struggling with this raw diet. The first 2 days didnt bother me. Now just the though of giving William raw food makes my stomache turn. Tonight I gave him kibbles (because I forgot to thaw out his dinner) I didnt even hear him crunch on it. I am feeding him raw according to the package. The girl @ the local pet store said raw has more calories. She also told me its ok to switch between the 2. I though I read somewhere on this board that you arent supposed to do that.

[elvira]

It is better to feed it not on the same day (kibble and raw). When you read all about the recall, I would be more concerned to feed kibble than raw.

[my3muchachosnme2]

I hear ya on that one. But I just cant get "past" feeding him raw. All of the negatives keep talking to me. Most of all, I love our vet and trust him................and he's against raw diets. I noticed that William is drinking ALOT of water.....is this a concern?

[lammer29]

my3muchachosnme2: I recommend the Whole Dog Journal publication, which gave a lot of info and resources on feeding raw. You can get some info online, but you do have to subcribe to get most of it, but it is a great publication, with lots of good info for dog owners/lovers.
www.whole-dog-journal.com is the link.

[Sandra]

I hear ya on that one. But I just cant get "past" feeding him raw. All of the negatives keep talking to me. Most of all, I love our vet and trust him................and he's against raw diets. I noticed that William is drinking ALOT of water.....is this a concern?

You give commercial patties now, right?
Most dogs find raw food very tasty and some clever dogs drink water as 'work tool' for licking out the bowl. Does your dog do that? Drinking and at the same time licking out his bowl. Stanley does that to be certain all the scraps are out of his bowl.

It's no concern he's drinking more. Mostly it's the other way, more drinking after eating kibble. My dogs are on the raw meat diet and do not drink much.

Both my dogs are under super vision of my vet. Every 6 months they're undergoing a checkup, bloodtest or bladder test. I have to do those checks, due to a bladder stone in his urine (hope this is normal English.....) when we fed kibble.
Believe me, no vitamine and mineral difficiency, great looking furs and they're healthier then ever before. Please check my dogs in the Photo area, the condition of Stanley a few years ago was terrible.
My vet understands my way of feeding and is convinced it's a good option, especially when dogs have problems.
I love my vet too.....but I do not trust him blind, especially not on feeding issues and prescribing medication without hearing my voice on the negatives of that. :D

[Peter]

I had many of the same concerns re feeding raw, my3muchachosnme2, and my golden is a puppy that just turned 16 weeks this week. There is much info here re RAW and much information on the net, and I believe the administrator of this site has a section with several book recommendations (do a search).

Like you I started with a commercially prepared RAW diet from Primal foods when we adopted our golden at 7.5 weeks old (I don't know if Primal is available in your area I'm from Northern California), and I've continued with Primal though I do feed Raw Meaty Bones now as well. Chicken backs, rabbit, duck, turkey necks, cornish game hens, and I'm looking for goat, duck, lamb to round things out.

Much of the evidence for eating raw is anecdotal but I believe you'll find those that feed raw are having much success. It's simple for those of us that have taken the RAW plunge to say it's easy and so forth, but like you I had a hard time with it in the beginning as well. I mean, after all, raw food is contaminated with parasites and bacteria...right? Well it's not that simple. Do some research and you'll likely satisfy yourself that RAW is not only simple but much more satisfying for your dog and probably much better nutritionally than kibble. Also, I agree with the anti-grain crowd, especially re allergies, and speaking frankly grains aren't that good for humans either.

I'm now used to Bentley "wolfing" down a raw turkey neck or chicken back but it wasn't always that way...stick with it and I think you'll find success for you and your dog.

[my3muchachosnme2]

Thank you thank you thank you!!!! See, its when I read posts like these that make me feel better. There is no doubt in my mind that William likes the raw food. Yes, I do feed him commercial raw food. I would love to make my own, but that scares me even more than feeding him raw. I am going to stick with commercial for 6 weeks and see if there is any improvement. $12 for 4 days is a little spendy. But it is what it is and if I have to buy commercial, so be it. Does anyone make up their own ground beef mixture? I know for sure that I cannot feet him raw chicken. Im not ready for that yet. My utlimate goal is to stop giving him "allergy" shots every 3 weeks, stop giving him medrol every other day and top giving him antihistamines almost every day. The poor dog is a mess!! Right now his skin is so dry and when I brush him (which is every day), the flakes are like a salt shaker. I did subscribe to the Whole Online Journal Lammer reccommended and there is a ton of info. Thank you! Once again, this forum has been a tremendous help to me. I love William like a child and only want whats best for him.........Robin :dogbark