What food do you usualy serve to your dogs ?

[D69]

I am asking because recently I started to think about dog cancers. I am quite sure it is not caused by poor diet and all those different kinds of ready chips.
So I was thinking if buckwheat with various meat sauces could be served or maybe rice ?
It is not a question if they will eat it but rather if dogs can digest it properly.
So, what are your experiences and recipes ? :)

 

[shellycheval]

I recently found this advice which I think is sound and reflects what I've heard from other serious dog owners about nutrition. I have three large dogs and have not yet been able to fully switch them to an all raw diet so I feed dog food with absolutely no grain and as little vegetables as possible.
For now that is a brand called Evo by Natura company, but have been told that the Evo brand has been bought by a large corporation which will likely dilute the quality of the ingredients in the next few months to provide more profit, so I am always looking for healthier ways to feed my pets.
shellycheval

"Jenny said:
January 14th, 2010 on 3:14 am
The best food for puppies of any breed doesn’t have a brand.
I have lost all confidence in the commercial dog food industry since the melamine contamination; I’ve switched my dog to her species’ natural diet: raw meat on the bones.
I feed raw/prey model; my 50-pound shar-pei mix gets about 12oz a day, but when I have a gorge meal for her, like a turkey carcass that will take her 4-5 hours to eat, she won’t be hungry or interested in food for 2-3 days. In general, a dog is fed 2-3% of the ideal body weight each day. A puppy gets 2-3% of the ideal anticipated adult weight each day, divided into 4 meals.
The ideal diet should consist of approximately 80% raw meat, 10% raw edible bone, 5% raw liver, 5% other raw organs, the occasional egg, shell and all, raw. Puppies start off with chicken breast, since it has the most accessible edible bone.
NO veggies, NO fruit. Dogs cannot digest vegetables or fruits; they lack the enzyme necessary to break down cellulose. Look at cows: they have the enzyme, and they still need four stomachs and they have to eat the cellulose twice. Dogs have one stomach and a straight-and-simple digestive tract. So fruit tastes good, but it’s nutritionally null for your dog.
They also don’t have flat-topped grinding molars: the dog’s back teeth are carnassials, designed to scissor through meat and bone, to break up prey animal carcasses into chunks small enough to swallow. This is something every dog has to learn; sometimes they have to hork some pieces back up, shear off a piece, and try again. Totally normal.
NO grains; again, dogs can’t digest cellulose, and the other ingredients are the primary cause of allergies and diabetes in dogs.
NO dairy; dogs are lactose intolerant: another digestive enzyme they don’t have.
NO supplements other than a spoonful of deepsea fish body oil for the Omega-3 that corn-finished meat does not contain.
Chewing up raw meat takes work, as does chomping through the incidental bones. The exercise involved in handling Big Complicated Food (several days’ worth), and in breaking up bones into swallowable chunks, keeps dogs teeth clean and satisfies a part of their brain that nothing else touches. These dogs are less hyper, friendlier and a bit more calm and satisfied.
http://www.rawmeatybones.com
http://www.rawfed.com
http://rawfeddogs.net
http://www.rawlearning.com
http://pets.groups.yahoo.com/group/rawfeeding/
Your female can be switched to raw right now; she’ll love it and it will make her milk healthier for the pups. Raw meat is cheaper than high-end dog food. We start dogs on raw by handing them an appropriately-sized chicken part. For a standard dachshund, buy a whole chicken (usually 60-80 cents a pound, much cheaper than fancy dog food), and take it apart at the joints. Since she’s nursing she should be fed all she wants. Just offer her a drumstick, or a wing, and watch how happy she is.
When the pups are about a month old she may start regurgitating some meat for the pups. That’s perfectly normal; let her do her mommy thing. Best fun is dropping a whole chicken breast (skin removed and the meat slashed up a little so little jaws can get a grip) in the middle of the litter, and watch them all have a great time ripping and tearing and growling like they’re wild animals. It’s so funny, you’ll want a videocam.
Raw meat on the bone, with small portions of raw organs is all the dogs need. No supplements, no pills, no kibble or cans. Buy their food in the same place you buy your own. Puppies are adaptable; in a week, introduce another meat, perhaps turkey or beef. Every week, let them try something new.
They’ll be happy and healthy and their teeth will stay clean, their droppings will be smaller, drier and smell hardly at all. It’s all good.
Good luck!"

 

[Seamus]

Hi drygol,

I would like to share my experience with dog diet and tumors. My family has a 12 or 14 year old chocolate lab named Nutmeg. We have always tried to feed her the best dogfood (Evo lately) that we can find, looking for brands with little or no grain, but she is primarily my mom's dog and my mom is very resistant to the idea of a raw food diet. She says she is afraid that it will make Nutmeg sick.

About 3 weeks ago we took nutmeg to the vet because she was lethargic and uninterested in food, which is strange for her, and the vet did a few tests, decided to take x-rays and found a tumor the size of a baseball growing on her spleen. According to our vet, this type of tumor is quite common in dogs these days. The vet said that if the tumor was only attached to Nutmeg's spleen it could be removed and she had a very good chance of recovery, but that if it were growing into her other organs she would have to be put down. After a long debate about whether or not we wanted to put her through a potentially painful recovery, we decided to try the surgery and Nutmeg pulled through and has been recovering nicely.

I don't know if the tumor is a result of her eating commercial dogfood all of her life, the vet said it was impossible to tell. I do know that she has had persistent yeast infections in her ears since she was a puppy and she has subcutaneous fat lumps all over her body. The vet said these things are common in labs, but I am convinced they are at least partially related to her diet. Since her surgery I have been buying chicken for her and cooking it with rice. I thought this was a good compromise with my mum, since she doesn't want to try the raw food diet yet, and Nutmeg seems to be very happy with the diet change. The chicken is expensive, but she seems to bee eating less and she doesn't seem so ravenous all of the time. FWIW, her ears seem better, and she seems to have more energy.

@shellycheval - Thank you so much for posting all of the information and links, I am going to print them out to read them and pass them along to my mom.

 

[D69]

Wow great answers ! I am glad I asked. I could commit a terrible mistake with that buckwheat
I`ll try switching them to raw food diet.
Thanks guys 1000 times ;D

 

[shadowsaround]

I have always fed my dog Purina benefull healthy radiance. I do admit i have not checked out the ingredients for it and thinking about it I will when i get back home. My biggest problem is my dog is a Alaskan husky/wolf mix. Normally this doesn't bother me except when it comes to the raw meat issue. I have refused to feed my dog raw meat based on the fact that I've done it before and she actually scared me. Now I'm not a small guy nor do i get scared easily yet when she had some raw hamburger i dropped on the floor, the look in her eyes made me question alot of things. Normal female husky's weigh between 70 and 90 pounds and My dog tips the scales at 125-130 pounds. She isn't fat she is just very muscular and active. The one thing that gives me the biggest clue from everything I've read is normal dogs only have two sets of back molars. Phoebe has 3 sets, which simply means she can chew through a 4 foot long chew bone in about 4 hours, much to the distress of my budget I've thought about giving her ham bones and all that but my biggest concern is that she is strong enough to knock me down and the worst part is she was very much abused when I got her, allthough i have been working with her.

 

[Seamus]

Hi Shadowsaround,

Corto Maltese suggested the following books in another thread:

These are my favorites
- The other end of the leash from the same author Patricia McConnell
then - Calming signs - on talking terms with dogs by Turid Rugaas
all Cesar Milan TV series ( although they get repetitive sometimes )

and my all time favorite The Dog Who Loved To Much with specific case studies which will be most valuable for a clinician

I have been reading The Other End of the Leash and Calming Signs, they are both excellent. I don't know what your training/background is with dogs, but these books have given me new insight into how dogs behave, how humans behave around dogs, and how the two species communicate. I am working to modify my behavior so that I can better communicate with my dog and make her life better. I am treating it as an exercise in external considering.

I hope this is helpful!

 

[shadowsaround]

I will definitely look into that, Thanks! I wouldn't call myself a expert with dogs, far from it. I do know that since I've had my dog that she has taught me many things about them.

 

[Seamus]

Its amazing how perceptive dogs are. My dog is a chocolate lab named Nutmeg. She is really good with hand signals. I think I would be afraid of her if she acted like Phoebe!

Phoebe sounds beautiful and very powerful. How long has she been living with you? (Just curious)

 

[shadowsaround]

Its amazing how perceptive dogs are. My dog is a chocolate lab named Nutmeg. She is really good with hand signals. I think I would be afraid of her if she acted like Phoebe!

Phoebe sounds beautiful and very powerful. How long has she been living with you? (Just curious)

She has been with me for 3 years come this halloween. I got her when she was 6 months old. Funny thing was I found her on craigslist advertised for free. I picked her up and researched and found out that Husky's are never free as they are upwards of 300 dollars or more. Unique situation regardless. Her biggest thing is the "who is the alpha male of the house". That was my first lesson with her. My ex best friends girlfriend found that out the hardway. She walked into my yard one day and very plainly showed fear to Phoebe... big mistake. After that Either i or my ex best friend had to walk her past my dog. I thought it was hilarious and tried to explain to my friend that you can't show fear to a dog, let alone a dog with wolf in them. Needless to say they never learned and in fact got quite mad with me because i never scolded Phoebe over it. The 2ND lesson i learned was she hates crystal meth users. Guy i knew in high school got hooked on it and showed up at my house one day with my ex best friend. Phoebe very willingly let him in the yard and even the house. Once he was in the house and on the couch, that was all she wrote. Phoebe never let him off the couch and she showed fangs everytime he moved. I knew him to be a thief so I all i made sure was that she wouldn't go for him. Everytime he moved on the couch she would emit a growling sound so low that you could barely hear it. It was funny to me because yet again he showed fear. He left my house very quick and hasn't been back since. I thought it was hilarious while everyone else wanted me to reprimand her and scold her. I never did and still don't to this day. That was when i started trusting her judgement of people, and it has been very interesting.

 

[Harold]

Great post Drygol.

So I can just change to raw? Chicken? Turkey? Cool! Any no no's? I've been thinking about this for a few months now. I give my dogs a no-name brand.... not that good, and cooked scraps. I heard there poop is really little as they use up everything.

Hi Shadowsaround,
Corto Maltese suggested the following books in another thread:

These are my favorites
- The other end of the leash from the same author Patricia McConnell
then - Calming signs - on talking terms with dogs by Turid Rugaas
all Cesar Milan TV series ( although they get repetitive sometimes )
and my all time favorite The Dog Who Loved To Much with specific case studies which will be most valuable for a clinician

I have been reading The Other End of the Leash and Calming Signs, they are both excellent. I don't know what your training/background is with dogs, but these books have given me new insight into how dogs behave, how humans behave around dogs, and how the two species communicate. I am working to modify my behavior so that I can better communicate with my dog and make her life better. I am treating it as an exercise in external considering.
I hope this is helpful!

In Sept. of last year I started to train my dogs, for several reasons.
1) To be more in the moment and focused.
2) To avoid getting hurt myself, in the winter, particularly.
3) To better understand their psychology.
4) External consideration given to their safety.
5) Add a new dimension to our relationship.

I raised them on a farm for the first three years I had them. Then I moved to the city. They are great, friendly, social etc. But on their lead, they are very protective, of me I think. Once I began to understand dog psychology, I learned that they were confused about who is the leader.

Now they are calmer when walking, they heel etc. They can be social when they are on their lead. I'm (a little) more relaxed. I think it is safer for them and me too!

My question is this; the act of training, physically managing them, all the commands etc. Its very rewarding, but seems a little too controlling. Now I'm not a parent, but I think feeling safe and secure, needs discipline. There is a hierarchy and reminds me of STS stuff.

Then I think about, as above, so below. Maybe I'm being trained by my masters? Sounds strange, I think so, but there is a parallel to my arrival to the forum. I do wonder about it. And I don't want to be a STS beast master. Nor do I want to be under ones control. ;D

 

[Ben]

Just like us, dogs did not evolve to digest grains. These are a cheap basis for commercial diets that can be made expensive by the addition of the actual nutrition the animals need. The best diet for them would include as many organs as possible (in addition to the meat itself), these are the part of the carcass that cats and dogs in the wild seem to favour because it provides them with all the nutrients they require rather than just protein and fat. The only thing I would avoid would be small bones they could choke on or which could splinter.

 

[Al Today]

The only thing I would avoid would be small bones they could choke on or which could splinter.

Every now and then I get a raw bone with the most meat on it I can find. Cow, beef. But that dern dog... He goes and buries it.!.!.! Almost every time. One boy and myself love to give the dog a bone and watch. When he comes back, my boy & me start walking towards the buried bone. Ole Chester (the dog's name) starts to get nervous and tries to get between us and the bone. Seems like Chester is saying... "Nope, nope, nope, you don't wanna go there. Don't go there. Come over here..." Tail a wagging and trying to divert us from his bone.

I guess this is more funny to see than I can explain.

 

[Lilou]

Our German Shepherd, Scooby Do, was the only dog we've ever had that buried his bones. Like you, Al, me and the kids loved to sit back & watch. He was sooooo very protective of his bones. Comical, but you'd better not try to take that bone away from him!
The instinct is strong, and I'm not so sure he wouldn't take a bite outta someone, trying to take his bone. He didn't dare with me or my husband....but I didn't trust, in regards to the kids.

 

[Al Today]

I love Belgian Shepard's. One was called Nephite Warrior. He had papers and huge. He never barked. And this scared people. He had the snot knocked outta him by a flat nosed F-150 pick up truck hitting him on the 2 lane highway out front of the house. We thought he was gonna die but by the time we got him to the vet, he was up on his feet, and "okay". Just a bloody nose. He was never the same, I guess... My wife and kids told me this huge dog scared them after that. I told them they're crazy... Until I heard the growl when one of them got to "bug" him. I HAD to put him down. At the Vet during THE injection, Nephi tried to bite the Vets head off and he was scared and said we can do this another day. I said NO. Now or I cannot do it. If it weren't for that truck whamming him, I think he was ready for graduation...

 

[cholas]

Thanks Drygol. I too had the same question stirring around upstairs recently.

Wanting to avoid commercial corn-food, we've been giving our spanielish ball of joy cooked chicken 'undesirable parts' with rice and vegetables regularly. Stew-style.

[But...] Thanks for your input shelleycheval, I didn't realize dogs have problems digesting veggies.