Cooking your dogs food?

[Summer]

Hey guys,

Well, I add a few supplements to my dogs raw diet and I also know people who don't and their dogs look healthy.  When I cooked for Jax (my old dobbie) I didn't add much in the way of supplements and he looked spectacularly healthy even when he had Cancer. 

With Summer I am pretty religous about adding Flax Seed Oil since there are a lot of people who believe it is a good preventitive for Cancer.  Actually we both get it mixed with our morning yogurt (mixing it with the yogurt makes it easier to digest).  I'm one of those holisitic, all natural nuts, so when I give supplements they tend to be things like seaweed or mushroom concentrate to ward off colds.

I do think there are some really good kibbles out there today (certainly better than what we could get years ago) but it is sooo much more expensive to feed than my organic raw diet so that's one of the reasons why I go that route.

Off for now.  I think I'm going to try and figure out how to link a photo with my name when I post:)

[brigid67]

I feed raw and have had no problems at all...  And i am here to tell you that if I can do it - anyone can do it.  I am a single mom with 2 teenagers and I work full time.  I have found it really quite easy.  The only problems i have run into are when I forget to take meat out of the freezer.  In the morning it takes me about 10 minutes.  I juice a bunch of veggies (carrots, green leafy veggies, some fruit - etc)  I add the veggie mix to ground chicken mix (this chicken (necks/backs) I buy in 40lbs for about 23.00 - I spend one day every 3 weeks or so grinding half of it.  The other half I wrap in meal size portion) this gets mixed together with  vitc, kelp, salmon oil, msm, and brewers yeast - I sometimes also add an egg or yogurt/cottage cheese every once in awhile.  That takes about 10 min.  In the evening they get raw meaty bones.  I can but 4 whole chickens at costco for about 12.00.  I cut them in half and freeze.  Willow is eating about half a chicken for dinner.  Just throw that in the bowl - your done.  They wll also occasionall get pork, fish, tripe, lamb etc.  But it is mostly chicken.  It has really been pretty easy.  I just bought one of those foodsaver things that sucks the air out of food packages.  So I can prejuice tons of veggies and they won't go bad for about a week or so - makes even easier and less time.

There is a good receipe for veggie patties - it is by billinghurst.  you can pre-make and then freeze.  It was just kinda messy for  me.  I tried it for a bit but too messy

[GreatDanz]

I feed more the prey model of raw feeding.  Talk about simple, some meat, bone and organs.   Divvy up a whole chicken, hand your dog a piece, there's breakfast. 

I do supplement with salmon oil, ACV, all natural honey and Flexicose, and sometimes bone meal if I am feeding plain ground beef.

[BabsT]

we seem to use the same diet LOL and yup pretty easy once you have your dogs figured out

[Summer]

Summer likes to eat grain at the barn.  She loves it...I'm not sure if that is because she see's the horse eating it and anything her big brother gets she wants too!

[BabsT]

Regarding Biotin...I was told this by an experience raw feeder..cant remember the name

Egg whites contain avidin (a glycoprotein) which can readily bind biotin. Cooking the egg is a simple solution since it deactivates avidin, but it also deactivates every other protein in the egg (the egg is still nutritional, just not as beneficial as raw.

From my research on eating raw egg, the natural design of the egg compensates for the avidin. The solution is the egg yolk which is very rich in biotin (has one of the highest biotin concentrations found in nature). The problem lies if you only eat the egg white, then the avidin binds to the biotin found in the body and this creates a deficiency.

Adding other foods rich in biotin can eliminate this problem as well. Foods such as organ meats, whole grains, dairy products, etc