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Search Results for 'primal raw'
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Hi Cheryl. When I switched my three girls from kibble to commercial raw foods (I started with Primal Pronto Beef) about three years ago I never did a transition period and none of them had any gastrointestinal upsets. I’ve never looked back. I no longer remember who told me to just go “cold turkey” and do it and so I did. Many friends have asked my advice on making the transition to raw I have to tell them I never transitioned. I just fed them the raw. Of course, it took me a while to get up the nerve to do it, and me being me, I researched everything to death for months and months and months. Then one day just got my nerves together and just did it. I had the food in the freezer for a couple of weeks before I was brave enough to do it. It seems so funny to me now that I was so nervous about the concept of feeding raw. Good Luck, you’ll be fine and like me wondering what the big fuss was all about. Which Primal did you get, by the way?
Pro Den Plaque Off. Some local pet food stores carry it but a lot of on line sites carry it also. I usually order from Amazon. Follow directions for the size of your dog and just sprinkle it on your dogs food once a day.
Kristin,
You asked what my background was so I told you. I don’t give my dogs cattle or hog feed either LOL and I agree in my effort to explain I get too wordy. I don’t understand what you mean by this “The information you provide and your approach is not supportive” but that is ok.
I do advocate for meeting a dog’s nutritional needs when feeding them.
Edit:Currently Brooke is on Annamaet Lean as her base but she has been on it about 8 weeks and her coat is looking dull. I’ll prob rotate back to Purina Pro Plan weight management. I’ve also used Wellness Core reduced fat and EVO weight management too. She maintains the best coat on Purina. For toppers I add fresh and sometime commercial. Currently I have Primal raw, Stella and Chewy freeze dried and Pro Plan canned in the house.
For Jack, the crested in my pic he eats RC venison and potato, as his base along some Hill’s V and P canned with fresh and some Primal and some Stella and Chewy venison. He’s the reason those brands are in the house: ).
Ok so I have lurked here for a little over a year, and recently started making my own raw cat food via Lisa A. Pierson, DVM because one of my boys almost died after getting into the Dry food AGAIN and his whole GI system blocked up because he cannot handle the lack of fluids in dry food. He is such a picky eater that I had put off the raw diet dreading that he would turn his nose up at it like he did the other high quality raw/semi cooked food I tried buying him. He LOVED the home made food, he even batted off his BFF to eat his food too!
HoundDogMom, other raw feeders please bear with me I know that the whole shebang I know as of now it is 6 pages long. I am trying to paint the whole picture with the dogs, their special needs and what is causing me confusion with the Raw feeding books I have read. There is so much going on right now in my personal life that I am having a very hard time understanding this and if anyone could help point me in the right direction or even a book or website or from experience I would be so very very grateful.
The biggest reservation I have about feeding Raw to the dogs (who LOVED the scoop of homemade cat food I gave them as a test) are the bones and sadly the limited ingredients I can use for my Special Needs Hound.
I have a 14 yr old Walker hound (Forest) who has like no teeth left and was just diagnosed with cushing’s disease but has some pretty abnormal liver tests because of the damage that was done while he went undiagnosed. His liver is so enlarged it displaces his stomach sideways and upwards which makes EASILY digestible food a must. He cannot have food high in phosphorus, copper or ammonia which means little to no red meat and lots of poultry, eggs and pork. He also has problems with chronic Constipation so I would have to be VERY careful about the amount of bone I add to his diet but I also want enough in there to give him the nutrients he needs. Since he is older he also burns a LOT of calories, He is on Vital Fresh pet Turkey or Chicken and gets 1.5 lbs a day. I don’t know what is causing him to burn so many calories except for old age or maybe his body is trying to repair itself – all he does is lounge in the lawn and do his hound dance for food – people or animal whichever he can mac on at the moment lol
My 3 yr old yellow lab (Nova) is also a high calorie burner but she is super active, we do scent tracking, retrieving, and lots of walking/running on the grass. She will go until she drops which I have never seen before, so now I watch her very closely for signs she is over heated. She eats up to 2 lbs of the above dog food a day but is still losing weight on occasion when her activity jumps up again. She has always had double the amount of Eosinophils in her blood that she should at a “normal” rate. She has been checked for parasites so the best I can come up with is that she might have GI issues going on intermittently – she doesn’t transition food gracefully and really doesn’t tolerate even high quality kibble (after research it’s not such a mystery anymore) which is in part what turned me onto Freshpets Vital.
To top it all off I have a Four month old female lab puppy (Ellie) that is still growing. I have her on 2 lbs of Freshpets vital but I am worried that she is not getting something in her diet as well. She has three white lines running across her nails – each nail on every paw. In my experience when the horses have white lines or even indents it means either they were very very sick or have a mineral/vitamin deficiency of some sort. I know when Ellie came to us she had a severe infection of hook and round worms. Her infection was so severe at 8 weeks old that the vet said she would have died untreated – thank you OCD and taking her to the Vet the same day she was brought home lol. They were resistant to the normal worming meds and for 2 months we battled with getting them under control and gone. If Dogs are like horses that would cause the lines because of how sick she was during this (Great going Lemon law Florida) yet I also worry because I know parasites in small animals or even large can cause a huge system imbalance with nutrients which hinders growth.
OK Limited ingredients – because of Forest I have to stick to Chicken, Turkey, and Eggs as a main protein source due to his liver problems and because Rabbit in completely unviable to me unless I want to raise them myself. I have no local butcher – the closest one is three hours away so Chicken and Turkey liver will have to do for organ meat – sometimes I can get chicken hearts once in a blue moon. For Fats I have to choose VERY easily digestible fats from an animal protein because with Forests Liver problems his biliary system can be overloaded very easily and that would be disastrous. Maybe I can add some duck occasionally to his diet?Copper Issues:
If ammonia restriction is required, feed less red meats and organs since they produce the most ammonia. You may not want to eliminate them entirely though, as they have important nutrients that help with liver function.
Instead, cut back. Feed more poultry, fish, eggs, and pork. If feeding red meat, even in small quantities, buy the absolute best quality you can afford. Preferably grass fed, antibiotic, and hormone free.Meats generally low in copper are:
• Beef (muscle meat, not organs)
• Eggs
• Turkey (white meat)
• Chicken (white meat)
• Rabbit
• Fish
Meats generally high in copper are:
• Lamb
• Pork
• Pheasant or Quail
• Duck
• Goose
• Salmon
• Organ Meats
When feeding organs for copper issues, some animal livers contain more copper than others. Beef liver is higher in copper than chicken or pork livers. Regardless, the zinc and b vitamins in liver help to reduce the risk of copper toxicity. Though if your dog has an issue with copper, opt for chicken or pork liver. (http://primalpooch.com/raw-feeding-guidelines-dogs-liver-disease/)I have read Unlocking the Canine Ancestral Diet and Dr. Pitcairn’s New Complete Guide to Health of Dogs and Cats. I have some major issues with either of the books, UtCaD is so absolute – if you feed this protein then you need this oil. First of all Canola Oil? Corn Oil? Soybean Oil? Walnut oil? Flax and hemp seed oil? I own horses and I would NEVER give them Corn oil with the GMO crap going around I don’t trust Corn or Canola at all. If I am not comfortable feeding to my strict Herbivores I am definitely not OK feeding it to the other animals. By the way the 2,000 lbs animals have had major GI upset from Canola, Corn, Soybean and Flax seed oil. I’ve given it to them in small amounts – 3 tablespoons a day and I have seen a massive systemic effect that made me take them off of it immediately. It was supposed to give them the right ratio of Omega’s 3 and 6 plus help my older guys move and keep weight on since it was winter. The recommended Ratio of 6 to 3 fats are 10:1 to 5:1 for dogs – I have read that small fish or Krill are the best to supplement dogs with because of the low contamination rate and it should not carry Salmon Sickness. Soybean oil is also something I would never give my dogs or humans or anything because of the way it can mimic hormones and interrupt the function of the Thyroid. Also Kelp is recommended a lot, but there are so many negatives that came out during the feeding kelp to horse’s fad that I will not touch the stuff. If it can affect the horses with the amount of iodine to the point horses became toxic I don’t trust the manufactures. It was not that kelp was being fed in large amounts there was absolutely no regulation on what type they harvested or what it contained. Missing link for dogs is a product I am familiar with and they do make it for dogs with trace minerals but it is flax based. Won’t this completely mess up the balancing? Does anyone here feed this instead of kelp?
The Missing Link Ultimate Skin & Coat:
Active Ingredients (per tbsp)
Flaxseed Dried Kelp
Glucosamine Hydrochloride (Vegetarian) Zinc Monomethionine
Freeze Dried Beef Liver Lecithin
Blackstrap Molasses Chromium Yeast
Rice Bran Selenium Yeast
Primary Dried Yeast Pyridoxine Hydrochloride (Vitamin B6)
Sunflower Seed Niacin (Vitamin B3)
Dehydrated Alfalfa Garlic Powder
Dried Carrot Yucca Schidigera Extract
Shark Cartilage Powder* Riboflavin (Vitamin B2)
Freeze Dried Fish Protein Powder Thiamine Hydrochloride (Vitamin B1)
Freeze Dried Oyster Powder Folic Acid
Barley Grass Leaves Powder Cobalamin (Vitamin B12)
Guaranteed Analysis Amount
Crude Protein (not less than) 18%
Crude Fat (not less than) 28%
Crude Fiber (not more than) 15%
Moisture (not more than) 10%
Linoleic Acid (Omega 6) 450 mg
**Linolenic Acid (Omega 3) 1000 mg
**Not recognized as an essential nutrient by the AAFCO Cat/Dog food nutrient profiles.Also if everything is so precise that does not leave room for error such as what if the chickens were raised on Florida soil which is heavy in limestone and deficient in other areas – rather than let’s say somewhere in the bread bowl what about if they were fed a corn based feed and another batch was fed free range? If the meat analysis is different it throws everything off and we all know that meat from south Fl is very different than meat from MI or IN – same principle goes with growing vegetables even organic. How much of a God Factor is there for the abundance of some micronutrients and lack of others? UTCAD also has an abundance of some nutrients way over the NRC guidelines – are dogs different in the fact that they can rid themselves of excess things very easily? I know in humans and horses Vit E and Selenium can be deadly because it builds up in fat and the body doesn’t flush it out like the water-soluble vitamins?
Dr. Pitcairn’s New Complete Guide to Health has a lot of oat meal, rice, beans?! Half and Half milk, whole milk, whole wheat bread corn? That sounds not so great for dogs and especially not for cats like it says it can be. What about kidney beans? With feeding my dogs I have learned they do OK on rice occasionally when they have an upset GI but if they are on a diet with rice too long they get backed up. Also the beans – the dogs seem to have issues with digesting them like people sometimes do – why are there so many carbohydrates? Why cannot I do sprouted microgreens or carrots or even baked potatoes because I know the dogs tolerate those vegetables very well. Also Brewer’s Yeast? Isn’t yeast as a whole bad? It’s in everything and I know Nova already is prone to yeast infections in her ears and when she gets a UTI – Also can Brewer’s yeast cause or attribute to bloat? Milk – isn’t milk products bad if they are in large amounts such as 2 cups milk plus 2 cups rolled oats and 2 eggs and calcium powder? Everything to me seems so skewed.
Also RMB are out of the question – Forest cannot eat them and Nova and Ellie are gulpers – they came from a large litter and it would be just my luck to end up in emergency surgery with one of them. I have a grinder to which I can grind the bone up with the meat and I know the purpose of the bone was for dental health but if I make Meat Jerky and other goodies can I replicate that without worrying about emergency surgery or broken teeth?
Since I own a grinder already for cat food why cannot I grind bones to supplement their food with? So far in my research the basic recipe and consensus I have come across is as follows:
16% Organ meat
10% – 25% Bone
The rest of the food would be muscle meat and muscle meat
Meat is very high in phos and the bone is high in Cal which means the Cal to Phos ratio should be 1.2 to 1.5:1 although 1:1 to 2.5:1 is ok as well. I just need to make sure the dogs consume more Cal than Phos but the question is do I need to add bone meal or can I grind my own bones to supplement?
Here is what the Article analysis the bone content to be in prey animals:
Bone Content In Raw Foods
When sourcing bones for your dog’s diet, it’s a good idea to know the approximate amount of bone in commonly sourced foods. Here is a quick guide to help you keep your dog’s bone content in the right range; between 10% and 25%.
Chicken Whole chicken (not including the head and feet): 25% bone/Leg quarter: 30%/Split breast: 20%/Thigh: 15%/Drumstick: 30%/Wing: 45%/Neck: 36%/Back: 45%/Turkey/Whole turkey: 21%/Thigh: 21%/Drumstick: 20%/Wing: 37%/Neck: 42%/Back: 41%
Pork Feet: 30%/Tails: 30%/Ribs: 30%
Beef Ribs: 52%
Rabbit Whole rabbit (fur and all): 10% Whole (dressed): 25-30%From this can I remove the proper amount of bones or add more bones in to balance or would you suggest a bone meal powder? Also I have yet to factor in the percentage of vegetable/fruit/microgreens in the recipe – I am just so lost so if HoundDogMom could help or someone else could chime in I would be so grateful. I am trying very hard to learn as much as I can but between the animals and two sick family members and special needs animals by the time I have a moment to sit down I am out like a light for the night or my brain is so frazzled everything looks like it was written in French. Am I over thinking this? I just don’t want to screw Ellie up – she has already had such a bad start with the worm infection – and Forest needs nutrients to rebuild his liver correctly and I wanted to see if this change in diet would help Nova’s Eosinophils come to a normal level. Also has anyone ever seen white lines on every toenail that grows parallel with the skin? Any help would be so appreciated there is just not a lot of room for error with Forest right now with his liver Alt levels 4 times what they are supposed to be. They cannot stay on the Freshpet much longer because to feed the dogs its 19 dollars a day and that’s not a very good long term solution.
Thanks so much everyone~!~ I Hope everyone had a great New Year and wonderful Holiday
`RedMareHi Barbara. Sorry I haven’t chimed in sooner, it’s been a very busy day. As I’ve mentioned to you before, it has been a very long road to achieving a quality to Katie’s life. My favorite and most trusted commercial raw foods are: Primal Raw Formulas (the formulas are the only one of their foods that are complete and balanced), Nature’s Variety Instinct Raw Foods, Answer’s Detailed Raw Foods (a bit difficult to find but any pet store that carries their raw goats milk should be able to order in the food for you), OC Raw, Stella & Chewy’s (I go back and forth with my feelings about the taste of their food for my dogs but as a company they are top notch), Vital Essential Raw, Nature’s Logic Raw. With all of this said I continue to always be on the look out and continue to tweak Katie’s diet. The companies that I mentioned are the ones that I feel very confident and comfortable with feeding to my dogs; but you always have to be on the look out that if any of these foods you feed to your dog don’t agree with them, look for different ingredients in the foods that may be the culprit. Katie cannot have any fowl whatsoever. Sometimes a food may be labeled “bison”. Please make sure that there is no other animal protein in the food. Sometimes some companies will add chicken fat, turkey fat, or some poultry to up their protein requirements for their label. Also some companies may have an over abundance of peas or some other ingredient which may bother your dogs. I have not found that to be the case with any of the above mentioned companies and foods. I do have to be careful which foods from these different companies I feed my dogs because Katie cannot have poultry of any sort, duck, lamb, quail. I stay away from all those. The only kibble that is fed to my dogs on very rare occasions is Nature’s Logic Kibble. They are not strictly a grain free food because their formulas contain millet which is a pseudo grain. For some bizarre reason Katie, who cannot tolerate any grain whatsoever, doesn’t seem to have any reaction to millet. It started out as an error on my part. I thought Nature’s Logic was a grain free food. It wasn’t after some time that I found it contained millet which I didn’t realize it was grain free. I was looking for a kibble that she might be able to eat because my husband who, on the rare occasion has to feed my dogs, is very squeamish and hubby is a bit on the lazy side, and just wants to be able to scoop a food and pour into their bowls. It doesn’t happen often because I don’t like feeding them kibble. Anyway, if I can be of further help please ask away and I will do my best to answer any and all questions that I can.
Just a quick add on to my post is that I do rotate brands, proteins within brands, etc. etc. My very favorite of all commercial raw foods is Primal. Without a doubt I have no qualms about recommending Primal Formulas. Primals Pronto Formulas are also an easy way for you to transition into commercial raw feeding because they are small little bits that you can scoop out frozen and put in bowls and wait till they soften (approx. 15 minutes) and then feed. I have three dogs…..5 lb. Yorkipoo, 6 lb. Maltipoo and a 7.3 lb. 15 year old Maltese. They have been eating these high protein, moderate to high fat, low carb foods for approx. 3 years. None have developed any issues from eating high protein, moderate to high fat foods. Many will scare people into believing that some foods have too much fat to feed dogs. It’s not the quantity of the fat or the protein for that matter, it is the quality of the fats and proteins in the foods. Huge Huge difference. As I’ve said, I have spent years figuring all this out, researching ingredients, companies, supplements in the foods and I’m very confident that I feed my girls high quality foods with high quality ingredients from companies that I trust implicitly and companies that, to my knowledge and investigation, have never had recalls.
I think I have found something that works for my dog for colitis. He is a small 7lb poodle and he is 10 y.o. Its been now 4 months and no flare ups! I started feeding him raw diet made by primal foods. I usually get him the chicken. I started mixing licorice root extract with the food for a week. Then I stopped that so that he wouldn’t get it excessively, only long enough to help his gut to heal. I have been adding raw goat milk by answers and green mush by healthforce nutritional since the day I switched him to raw. It seems go be working wonders. I’m not sure if it’s the combination of things but I’m so happy to see him feeling good again!
*I want to add that the raw goat milk by answers is full of antibiotics and the green mush has all kinds of wonderful herbs as well as digestive enzymes.*
Topic: Let's talk meat grinders!
Hey! My first forum post.
We recently got a puppy (he’s now 4 months), and since getting him we’ve switched 2 of the dogs onto raw. We feed a mixture of Preference by Honest Kitchen with either Primal or Vital Essentials. LOVE Vital btw.
But since reading all about raw and the benefits, I am avid about switching them to a more natural raw! I’d like to start buying my own meats for them and grinding them up with the occasional raw bone.
Any suggestions for a first meat grinder? Nothing too fancy.I really would like to share some experiences and get some help if possible!!!
I have an amstaffy 4 years old. He has a very sensitive tummy that was treated with diarrhea for a month after we got him ( Back in early Aug this year). Ever since, his stool had been stable with Acana Grassland. Few weeks ago, we took him for a general check up in vet and got recommended with Purina FortisFlora as well. It did made his stool seems drier and harder for the three days that I had been feeding him with Purina, but soon stopped since I was really concerned with not knowing what animal digestive is?! However, it got me all interested in adding probiotic into his diet. Then I was trying out raw goat milk from Primal. Giving little spoon to a 50 lbs dog for straight three days, he ended up with really bad diarrhea in the past two days. Therefore, adding goat milk to aid as probiotic doesn’t seem like an option to me.Though his stool is normally fine with just Acana, I was hoping to improve his whole digestive systems overall and started research about probiotic and prebiotic…etc. I have problem getting a good result as many probiotic recommended online are sold in USA only.
Are probiotic a waste of money? is prebiotic a really better and safer option even it might feed both good and bad bacterias? any good suggestions in Canada available?
or am I just simply too greedy?! should just stay the same…leave it simple with just Acana kibbles….>,<
I’m not sure if there is a best way to start pups on raw. But some recommended premixes are See Spot Live Longer, Urban Wolf, The Honest Kitchen, Granda Lucy’s, maybe Dr Harvey’s. There are also some premade frozen raw that come in small nuggets like Primal Pronto and Natures Variety Instinct which are quick to thaw and easy to introduce.
Hi Chabs. I feed all three of my dogs (they are the three in my avatar) commercial raw foods. I also feed rotation with the different brands and also with the different proteins within the brands. All with the exception of anything fowl or fowl in the ingredient list. One of my girls, Katie, is highly allergic and intolerant. The brands that I rotate within are Primal Formulas, Vital Essentials Raw, Answers Detailed, Stella & Chew Raw, Nature’s Variety Instinct Raw, OC Raw. I used to feed Darwin’s also but they have upped their fat content and raised their prices so though all commercial raw foods are pretty expensive, I don’t appreciate a company raising their prices due to a fat increase. More nutritious ingredients I would have been fine with but not fat. I feed my girls pretty high fat foods as it is. I feed high protein, moderate to higher fat and low carbs. As for dehydrated foods (not strictly raw in the truest sense) I use The Honest Kitchen (now that they have removed alfalfa from Zeal), and Big Dog Natural. Once in a blue moon I would use freeze dried but freeze dried is the most expensive way to go. I used to need freeze dried when traveling with the dogs. I’m not one to drive around with frozen foods in coolers. Now that The Honest Kitchen has removed alfalfa from their Zeal formula (the only one that Katie could eat until she developed an intolerance to large amounts of alfalfa) I’m using THK and Big Dog Natural for traveling with the dogs. Yes, the commercial raws are expensive but not as expensive as having to spend a lot of money at the vet with issues that now no longer exist so it all paid off for me and my girls. 🙂
By the way, though your vet may have meant well, tear staining is not necessarily from the water but more an issue with foods being fed. Somewhat of a grain intolerance or allergy. There is not a type of water that I have not tried throughout the years. Tap, filtered, bottled, distilled, reverse osmosis. I even went so far as to put in a whole house water filtration system. I have an additional filter in the fridge. None of that worked. Changing them to grain free and then raw is what did the trick.
Recent Topics
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