raw feeding 4 dogs - advice pls?

gettingready

My friend, Ewa - plans to move her 3 dogs and my Zara onto raw food.

Zara - 43 kg should be around 38 kg
Cortez - 43 kg should be around 38 kg
Nora - 30 kg should be around 27 kg
Prada - 9 kg and this is about right for her

I had a quick look at some sites but frankly this is way over my head, only remember one should feed 2-3% of dog's body weight.

Are we talking current body weight or desired body weight?

Even if we are talking desired body weight, with the 4 dogs listed above at 2.5% body weight per day, we are talking around 80-85kg of meat per month.

That looks very expensive for someone like me who never done it.

Me or Ewa do not eat meat ourselves so really do not know what the best place to buy meat for dogs would be?

Could someone please let me know if they feed raw - where do they get it from?

Ewa lives in TW13 - so must be somewhere that will deliver to this post code.

Large freezer will be ordered soon - to accommodate the new food for dogs.

Also looking at mincers capable of grinding meat and bones - thinking of this one:

Mincer

Any thoughts on this? The idea is to mix veggies into the mince.. Zara is not too keen on raw chicken and Prada would be a worry with bones as she is an older small girl....

Thanks a lot for any input xxx

Iain_L

Should be based on the desired weight.

We get a lot of ours from the local(ish) abattoir, but I gather that several places now offer delivery services which may be more convenient.

HappyMJ

I would try 2% body weight as meat and mix with veg.

2% of desired body weight would then be around 67kg of meat per 30 day month. You can pick up meat for pets for less than £1 per kg so not really that expensive at all. Abattoir direct, butcher or online. Quick Google search brings up a site willing to deliver 68kgs of mixed meat (beef/chicken) for around £80 including delivery.

gettingready

Thanks, which vegetables will be good for dogs? I assume veggies cooked?
I can only imagine veggies mixed with mince, how else could you mix them with raw meat/bones? Dogs would pick them out and leave, mine one would..lol

Fosterdog

You should start off at closer to 2.5% of the desired weight and adjust from there. Myboy is on 2% as he isn't very active these days and could do with losing some weight, my girl while not very active is at a good weight so gets 2.5%. My friends dog who is extra active gets closer to 4% a day.

Before starting you need to decide what raw diet you are going for to make it easier to make sure they get a balanced diet. I chose the prey model diet for mine which is 80% meat, 10% bone, 5% liver and 5% other offal. They do not need any veggies as this is a balanced diet. I do however still give some veg more as treats such as a carrot or slices of peppers as I'm preparing my own meals.

You need to start off with one simple meat source, most choose chicken, feed it boneless to start with then gradually introduce some bone (preferably minced at this stage for ease of digestion) it can be between a week and a month before the dog adjusts to this, once used to one meat source introduce another and gradually introduce more meats as the dog gets used to it. Only introduce offal when the dog is eating at least four types of meat.

Best starting meats are chicken, turkey, beef, lamb, pork and white fish.

Others to add later as they can be too rich when first starting are oily fish, duck, rabbit, venison, goat, horse, pheasant, and other game meats. A raw egg added a couple of times a week goes down well and some occasional salmon oil or coconut oil.

I find it easier to prepare a week to fortnights meals in advance, it means I'm not rushing every day to get the food sorted and I can trust OH to feed if he just has to empty a pre-prepared tub into their bowls.

I tend to do breakfast as a bone in meal with offal and supper as boneless meat only, it means I don't have to worry about the balance for every meal, although they get occasional high bone meals (turkey neck, lamb back, large salmon heads) that mean they get boneless for the next few meals to keep the balance.

If you are on Facebook have a look at the groups BARF UK, Raw Feeding UK and Rawsome and Holistic! All three very informative. I get my food between my local butcher (mostly trim and bones) supermarket yellow sticker bargains (1.2kg of herring yesterday for £1.10) and a place called Raw Pet Supplies (Cardiff) (also in Facebook and deliver all over the country).

I'd love to feed all chunks or whole prey but it can get very expensive so I try to get a good mix each month of cheaper pet minces and some nice more expensive chunks to make it more interesting for my two.

krlyr

The 2-3% is a guideline and should be ideal bodyweight. Veggies aren't included in this - they're an option supplement, if you do feed then the need to be blended or lightly cooked so the dog can benefit nutritionally. You'll find lists of safe/unsafe veggies online - not everything is suitable, e.g. onion is bad for dogs.

Within the 2-3% daily amount, you break this down into a ratio of 80:10:10 - that's 80% meat, 10% bone and 10% offal. Half of the offal should be liver, the other half 'other offal' - there's some rules on what does and doesn't count as offal (heart and lung are considered meat, for example).

I'd really recommend the Facebook group "Rawfeeding Rebel", the Files section is a great resource and well worth asking questions on there.

This page is a good guide too - http://dogsdinner2.webs.com/

I use a mix of suppliers, one's called The Dog Food Company - based in Suffolk but they deliver to Surrey on a 4-week schedule, I would check if they deliver to Twickenham as their prices are pretty good (minimum order of £20 with a £9 delivery charge - but even with the delivery charge their prices beat a lot of other suppliers). The only downside is they don't do a huge variety (chicken, tripe, lamb, beef, turkey, rabbit) - but they can source some 'off the menu' items, so worth asking, especially if you're buying in bulk (their food comes in 2lb bags, handy if you're buying a lot/feeding big dogs).

The other is a local DAF stockist in Slough, he delivers to me on a weekly basis, with no minimum and no delivery charge. Some prices beat TDFC, some a bit more pricy. I don't tend to buy bones via DAF at all because of the price. But they do a bit more variety (e.g. venison, duck, oily fish, etc.) and the 1lb bags are a little more convenient at times (sometimes I just feed a 1lb block straight from the freezer as a meal)

There are other stockists around - you find some stockists will stock a few different suppliers' foods, sometimes the same as the supplier, sometimes a little more expensive, but it means you can source something you may not normally get in your area. Dave's Doggie Dinners does the South East area, Tadley Pet Suppliers..the Facebook group "RAW & BARF DEFRA APPROVED SUPPLIERS UK" may be worth a browse.

Then there are suppliers that send by courier, so no geographical limitation. DAF do supply direct, for example, The Dogs Butcher in Devon is another (a bit pricier - but locally sourced to them in Devon, ethically slaughtered, human grade, etc. and a huge variety of different proteins)

In terms of price, it costs me about £60 a month to feed my two - that's a 35kg and 40kg dog, feeding ~45kg in meat. So just under twice that for you/Ewa.

To feed a 'complete' raw, i.e. not worrying about balancing it yourself, will cost more. Brands like Nutriment and Natural Instinct are the more mainstream brands, or suppliers like DAF, The Dogs Butcher and Paleoridge do some completes in their range.

It's not rocket science to do 'DIY' raw, but it is important to get the balance right, so the dog is getting everything they need nutritionally. Some people choose to 'prep' their own balanced meals each day, but you can also achieve balance over the course of time. I place my orders in the 80:10:10 ratio so I know by the end of the month, I've fed the right balance. I don't plan what to feed every day - though I do prepare the offal into daily portions, just because Kiki is fussy and won't eat it unless I defrost, blend and freeze in single portions. Other than that, I'll just grab out some mince, blocks or bone meals, for breakfast or dinner.

So an example for this weekend - yesterday morning was venison and chicken mince. The chicken mince had some bone in, so that did their bone allowance for the weekend. Dinner was a large beef chunk, fed frozen to occupy them while the trick or treaters came around. Breakfast this morning was oily fish mince (they only get this once or twice a week - too much mercury etc. in oily fish to feed more frequently, and dinner will be a tripe-stuffed beef trachea.

Other meals I feed consist of minces in various forms (frozen into blocks, stuffed in Kongs, defrosted and fed in a Green slow feeder), whole chunks (beef, tripe, salmon, etc.) or edible bones (e.g. chicken carcass - you want to pick bones appropriate for size, so no chicken necks for GSDs example as they can be a choking hazard, but not overly large weight-bearing bones like lamb legs).

If you have any specific questions, just ask and I'll try to help. Been raw-feeding for about 6 years now, so pretty seasoned at it!

gettingready

Thanks a lot - wowwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww...

Sent the link to Ewa as Zara is still there (I am away from home Mon-Fri for work) so Ewa is in charge of feeding the lot.

Thanks a million again xx

krlyr

Also, something I forgot to cover - lots of the cheaper mincers like your link will struggle with bone, you'd need to spend a couple of hundred on a more industrial size. However, there are so many minces available already minced, I wouldn't even bother. You get bone-in minces from places like TDFC and DAF (e.g. their chicken minces both tend to be chicken carcass minces - i.e. 20-40% bone) and this will cover their needs if you opt to not feed whole bones.

For example, Prada at 9kg would need roughly 180g a day, or 1.26kg a week. 10% of that should be bone, which is 126g bone a week. Assuming you buy bone-in mince that is 20% bone, you'd need to feed 630g of that mince (or a variety of 20% bone minces) over the week, and she's got her bone requirements sorted, with no need to add whole bones. If it's 40% bone, then it's 315g a week.

I've got some spread sheets I made for myself to calculate what I need to order and how much it costs from local suppliers - if you PM me your email address I can send it across if you like. I'm wanting to make it a bit fancier working out bone % of bone-in minces etc. but that's going to be a bit more complicated I think! As I feed things like carcasses, which are up to 60% bone for example (TDFC carcasses often come with a fair bit of meat on them though), I tend to assume the meat I don't count in my bone meals cancels out the bone I don't count in my meat meals (but I don't feed masses of bone-in minces, I try to buy boneless minces and meat chunks as well)

sheramber

I have fed raw for 15 years including one from 12 weeks old whi is now nearlt 11.

Over the years my regime has cnanged. You will find everybody feeds what siuts them and thier dog. We don't all feed ourselves the same way.

For many years now I have fed DAF minces with bone. tripe, liver/kidney. I have two medium sized freezers on the garage for the dogs and order 9 montha supply at a time because of delivery charges to my rural area.

My dogs get tripe and liver for breakfast 6 days a week, tripe and a raw egg the other day.

Tea time is bone in mince.

They get a raw chicken wing in the evening.

I no longer feed veg puree but the dogs get any left over veg from our meals. I have not found any noticeable dofference in the dog's condition since stopping feeding veg.

Murphy's golden retriever genes mean he os a 'good doer' so he gets less then 2% of his weight but Cleo gets slightly more than 2% of her weight. The vet is happy with their weight.
and these are the amounts that I have arrived at to maintain that weight.

They aslo get a large knuckle bone from the butcher each week which they grind away.

If you have been feeding dry food the amount will look small but there is no bulk in raw feeding.

paddypaws101

The AJ mincer will be fine for chicken carcasses but no domestic machine would handle bigger, harder bones.

gettingready

Thanks everyone.

Ewa ordered a big chest freezer due to arrive on Monday and placed an order for the meat - do not remember where but she ordered 65kg of meat.... hope the freezer takes it hahah