Not just a raw 'meat' diet! What do you feed your dogs?

My dogs eat dry food and canned. The dry food they get are Orijen Adult, Orijen 6 Fish, Acana Grasslands, and Acana Ranchlands. The canned they get are EVO 95% meat, Wellness, Wellness CORE, and Before Grain. All mainly meat based and grain free foods. The treats they get are freeze dried raw Lamb, yogurt with banana slices (sometimes frozen), and beef bones to chew on.

A well done raw diet is very healthy. I'm not brave enough to try it because I'm too nervous that I'd do it wrong and be one of those people who make the diet look bad. Which is silly, really, since I've done a LOT of research on it. lol It's just nerves.

My dogs get Blue Buffalo for the most part. It's the only half way decent commercial food available in my area. Innova is available, but it made two of mine throw up a lot. I'm not sure why (it's a good food) but it did. Blue Buff works for all of them.

My corgi mutt *gestures to picture* gets a combination of canned and home-cooked. The latter of which I did a LOT of research on before I started. I definitely know what I'm doing and it's not just meat, either. Nor is it just meat and grains. Or even just meat, grains and vegetables. It takes even more research than feeding raw, I think. I don't know why I wasn't as nervous to try it, but I wasn't. She has a lot of food intolerances, though... so, cooking makes it easier to catch them if she should ever develop a new one and makes it a LOT easier to manage them. I imagine raw would, too, if I'm ever brave enough to switch my dogs to it.

Kudos to you for doing your research. I've always wanted to try giving my dog kangaroo meat, but it isn't exactly readily available where I live, lol

My dogs eat Merrick, which I might just give the rest of the food to my uncle because I am putting both my dogs on a homemade (or is it called something else? lol) diet. It will have raw meat, vegetables, eggs, organs and oatmeal (the plain kind). My mother used to be against homemade diets for dogs and would only feed them dog food. I kept nagging and nagging and finally used the magic words "It will be cheaper......" lol!! AND THAT WAS THAT. No more kibble or canned food for my dogs (I bought all of their food anyway). EVER!!! Besides, she likes mixing up stuff all the time and should have fun; plus I promised to buy her turkey bacon.........she thinks she's getting 1 pack but I'll add 9 more when she isn't looking. lol!!! I have to keep her tolerable somehow until I get into the military. hahahaha.

ADD: Mr. Curtis, I will grid the vegetables with a blender or food processor (which ever I decide to buy). I will take the oatmeal out of their diet once I get started and just use that money to add another meat. I guess I'll get it right sooner or later. lol!!

Totally with Bindi & Curtis in that it is the best thing for your dogs and I wouldn't feed anything else. I like to know what I am putting into my dogs. It is also most definitely not too late at three years old to change over. All the very best with it. Can I just say though that one answer suggests kibble & raw. This is one of the big NO NO's of raw feed. You really should do one or the other. Reproduced for your information as to why not below written by a friend of mine ............ --------------------------------------... Several people have recently asked why it is best not to feed a mixer with raw or a complete as a 2nd meal. Briefly, it goes back to the difference in pH the they create, a carnivores digestive physiology is suited to an acidic environment, not the more neutral environment that is created by dry food. A dogs digestion should begin in the stomach. It is Pepsin which is responsible for starting the digestion of protein in the stomach. Pepsin is pH dependant and does not become activated until the pH drops below 4. Complete dry diets alter the stomachs environment which directly affects the action of Pepsin. As the environment of the stomach becomes more neutral pepsin becomes denatured and its ability to digest raw food is reduced. A dry diet shifts the start of digestion to the small intestine rather than the stomach this places a burden on the pancreas to work harder in producing enzymes. This is why so many dogs fed dry diets end up being fed supplementary enzymes. Dry diets introduce insoluable fibre into the dogs system. The fibre binds bile which prevents reabsorption of the bile. When bile is lost from the system the liver must work harder to increase its rate of production in order to maintain a pool of bile. Under normal phisilogical conditions 95% of the bile would be recycled.

One of my dogs is on a raw food diet (out of necessity) and she gets everything that you feed your dogs but I have always had trouble sourcing rabbit.

I'm in Aus too. If you have the time can you let me know where you get your rabbit from?

If you visit a larger butcher they will often have a good variety of offal available or you could ask for it specifically. My local butcher has kidneys, brain, lung, tongue, liver, heart etc.

I also find that the DrBruce pre-packaged varieties of raw meat is fantastic. I buy that at my local pet store and feed that along with other raw meat. I know my dog is getting the best of the best food she can have and her teeth are strong and healthy. Raw has totally fixed her digestion problems.

I would love to feed a prey model raw diet, but I just haven't done enough research to raw feed my Dals.

They do get raw on occasions - just the other day they had a turkey leg with a lamb heart each ... mmmm

I currently feed Canidae ALS, but if I had a different breed, they'd be on raw, no doubt about it.

For the person who answered just before me ^^^ Dogs aren't ominivores, but carnivores and rarely do wolves/dogs each the stomach contents of large ungulates like deer, elk, buffalo etc. They shake it out and eat the lining. In small prey like rabbit, mice its unavoidable.

Dogs' stomach acid is far more acidic than ours and can tolerate bacteria us humans couldn't. Also their digestive tracts are much smaller than ours, preventing bacterial flora to proliferate and grow.

I would also like to feed a raw diet but im just a little bit of a scardy(spelling?) cat when it comes to feeding them raw:)

All of my dogs are currently eating Blue Buffalo Wilderness and Basics formulas,I am happy to say that I have started feeding two of my dogs raw eggs as treats(there very first raw egg was given to them yesterday),so far there doing very well with it:)

I feed prey model. taylor, don't feed oatmeal...it's a grain...grains are bad. You can feed veggies but it's a waste of time, they'll be pooped out the way they came in unless you cook them or pulp them thoroughly...the nutrients in veggies simply aren't needed. All you need is 80% meat, raw, 10% bone, and 10% organ, half of which being liver.

I always thought dogs were omnivores but, I guess they're really just adapted carnivores.

The diet you described sounds all meat to me. Which part is non-meat?

Don't carnivores usually eat the stomach contents of their prey?

My dogs eat mainly store bought dog food (pedigree brand, only cause they couldn't tolerate walmart's cheaper "Ol' Roy" brand) and they seem to stay healthy. But man, do they love chicken! Beef and fish, too but it's the chicken they really love. I'm not giving 'em any raw chicken though. Is salmonella bad for dogs?

I basically feed about 90% or more, the same as you, Joh.

(prey model raw)

I am also in Australia.

Mostly I feed chicken, turkey, lamb, beef and roo.

Occasionally pork, and once a week fish (I too feed a mix of tinned and raw).

Less often rabbit, which is ironically so expensive here and hard to get, considering the millions there are running wild over here (what’s with that?!)

So my dogs only get rabbit when friends go shooting, or when they catch one themselves :)

I find some offal is often expensive here and therefore hard to get cheaply.

So like you, I feed liver mostly (cheapest), as well as mixing it up occasionally with kidneys, brains and heart (when discounted/close to use by date).

Eggs from the chooks.

However, I do also feed a variety of healthy house hold scraps, but no grains (other than maybe a little rice scraped off my plate after dinner sometimes), for treats sometimes I give cheese or a spoon natural yogurt.

I do feed some veggies, not necessarily every day.

But my dogs have always been VERY partial to my roast pumpkin and carrots and steamed zucchini.

They also steel raw carrots from my horses feed bins regularly, and sorry, but I have never seen them poop out carrot undigested, and my large dogs still have very small stools.

I love the prey model raw diet, but still give my dogs a few other things as I discussed.

My dogs are extremely healthy, and my current b!tch has never been to the vet for anything other than vaccination and desexing.

I far prefer knowing EXACTLY what goes into her food... AND the quantities.

Commercial food does not give you that option.

But each to their own, dogs can survive happily off either.

But I think it would be very interesting if pet food companies were forced to actually put PERCENTAGES on the ingredient list like human food has.

Listing it in order really helps very little, as we are still only guessing as to the percentage difference between the first and last ingredient??

I think many would be in for a shock.

Of course all that said...

I pile total crap into my own diet all too often!?

I am so careful about my animals, but happily eat too much crap myself?!?

No self-control, I guess.

Pity I don’t have someone to monitor me, like my animals do!!

@ Benji

Don't be nervous!

If you have done your research and know the basics, it is not that hard, and you will never look back.

Know your percentages.

Feed a variety of meats.

Edible bone.

Make sure you feed fish.

(raw fish can be hard to get a dog to accept if they have not been given it since puppies, but start with tinned and slowly add bits of raw).

Ironically same can be said of raw chicken sometimes, so add little bits of raw in with cooked to tempt them.

Once they develop a taste - they never look back.

Raw lamb and beef they tend to relish.

I think this is often because people tend to give them those, as raw bones from when they are young, so they have already developed a taste for it.

It is all about conditioning.

And don’t forget eggs.

Yes, us Aussies are very lucky roo is so readily available!

It is SO lean, and therefore great for getting weight off pets and us!

And VERY good for you (and them).

"Roo-lami" and "Roo-chooz" are my favourite dried treats to give my pets!

I buy it in big 1 kg bags.

Can you get that where you are?

Healthy and low in fat.

My dog and cat LOVE it!