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Posted on April 27, 2010
My freezer is full of pork necks and chicken parts. Because for almost a week now I have been feeding my dogs raw meat. And I am excited. And my dogs are even more excited!
Just a few perks this has already: 1. I don’t even think about what kind of chew toys I could get them next, because the bones left from their meals keeps them plenty busy (and their teeth healthy). 2. I don’t dread picking up poop anymore, it became small and ODORLESS! But I still have a foster that is being fed “vet recommended” food and her poop still stinks. Literally.
After two weeks, I am supposed to notice a significant mental and physical change in my dogs. I will keep you posted. For now I wanted to review a few books I have read on the topic. If you are interested, all of these books are rather thin. I think I read each of them within one or two days. And I am not the person who usually reads books within days. More like weeks… or months 
My favorite is called “Work Wonders” by Tom Lonsdale. It is my favorite because it is easy and written by a vet. My second favorite is also easy and straightforward, but not by a vet and I can’t help but trust someone with credentials a bit more. Although concerning nutrition my trust in vets in general is shaken. But this one is great! He is not afraid to tell you that raw meat will reduce your vet bills. Makes you wonder if other vets recommend crappy food to make sure their patients keep coming back!? Anyway, as I said, it is easy and straight forward. Don’t be put off by the silly cover. Read it and start making your dog happier! (Right now it is actually on sale at sitstay.com)
The second book, which I also like very much is called “Raw Dog Food” by Carina Beth MacDonald. She write from years of experience with raw feeding her own dogs and because she wished she would have had a book like that when she started. And it really is what she wants it to be. Simple guidance to feeding your dog better.
The third book I am not too excited about. It’s called “Pet Food Nation” by Joan Weiskopf. She is a nutritionist and I have an affinity for nutritionists. I LOVED my (equine) nutrition professor and I love the topic of nutrition in general. And if you are looking for a book to tell you what is wrong with commercial pet foods than I would almost recommend to read her book. Almost, because in my opinion she goes a little far in the alternative she suggests. She does not recommend feeding raw but cooked meat and veggies. And I’m sorry, but I don’t even cook for myself every day. I am still looking for something that is not too time consuming while healthy for my dogs. And I find her reasoning against raw food pretty iffy in light of the many people who successfully feed raw.
So that’s it so far. I will keep you posted on my experiences. Feel free to comment with questions or your own experiences!
EDIT 1: Lexi asked about my budget. To be honest, the only thing that held me back from trying raw food in the first place was that I didn’t want to spend more money than I am with my dry kibble. So after reading the books I made some calculations and figured I need to spend no more than $1 per pound of meat on average. And that is what I am doing, I am looking for sales and often the kind of meat you feed dogs (with bones) is the cheaper kind anyway. So no, no dent in pocket. I think with my two 50lbs dogs I am going to spend about $60. Not more than most premium kibble. Actually less.
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Posted on April 26, 2010
I totally love wrinkles. Thanks Daisy!
Posted on April 16, 2010
Finnegan lives in heaven. No one knows what kind of a past brought him to the local pound of the Pottawatomie County Humane Society, but his new family seems to make up for anything. This pretty Golden Retriever is now 3 years old and gets spoiled all day. Truck drives to work with dad and hanging out in the kitchen with mom. I am still in love with his soft and shiny copper fur.
Posted on April 11, 2010
After a quick sneak peek on my facebook page, here are a few more of the two cuties I met on Friday morning.
Posted on April 9, 2010
I have a new favorite blog that I thought everyone out there interested in dogs might find helpful, too.
It is called “The other end of the leash“, which probably reminds some of you of a book with the same title. And rightly so because the blog is written by the same author, Patricia McConnell. Her book “For the love of a dog” was recommended to me by a good friend and fellow dog lover. I have not even started, yet, because I try to finish the other books I have started first, but I have subscribed to her blog right away because I tend to read blogs more than I read books.
So, Patricia McConnell, Ph.D., is an ethologist (Ethology = scientific study of animal behavior ). She helps to train problem dogs, gives seminars, writes books, and probably does a whole lot more, too. And on top of all of her knowledge I love her writing as well. Smart, understandable and funny, like this: “… I will say here that the misuse of the term “dominance” in dog training is so pervasive that it causes ethologists like me to want to poke pencils in our eyes.”
Now go and read!
Posted on April 7, 2010
… anyone know that joke?
Posted on April 6, 2010
Thanks to the discussions we had lately on my facebook page I have done a little experiment with dog chews. Nothing that requires a lab, just my dogs and many different kinds of dog chews. My goal was to find one that is no health concern, is not mainly made of fat, one that the dogs like and keeps them busy for longer than 5 minutes. Preferably longer than 10 minutes, too. And that is no easy feat! At least if you disregard a filled kong or a nylabone, which I both love and are my first choice, but I also like to give my dogs something… organic you could say, I guess.
A little background on why I even started this: The common dog chews you can find in most local grocery and pet stores are rawhides, hooves, bones and pig ears. All of which are not necessarily the best products for your dogs to digest or chew on. I won’t go into detail but in general I’d like to warn you that raw hides can obstruct your dog’s bowel by expanding, if they are cheap and not made from one piece they can splinter and basically tear their guts. Hooves and bones, although I like them, are supposed to be too hard for them, so they can chip a tooth and pig ears are mainly fat.
So I ordered a load of “healthy chews”, which you can get from places like k9cuisine.com or sitstay.com
(and no, I don’t have any affiliation with sitstay other than I like them). They are mostly dried muscle or tendon. I orderd cow ears, bully sticks, braided bully sticks, twisted bully sticks, spiral flossies (tendon), and bully springs. Unfortunately quite a lot of other things I wanted to try are out of stock in several stores. Like I wanted to try achi
lles tendons or lamb pizzles. Anyway, so all of these products usually have a description that tells you the size of them, but even though I read them 6 inches on my ruler looks a lot bigger than some of the six inch chews I got. My bad, I guess. Just let me tell you, if you have a 50lb. dog, you probably don’t want to get the 6 inch chews. I hardly have to make any differentiation here, almost all of them were gone within minutes that I gave them to my dogs. I’d actually love to hear other peoples experiences, because maybe I have some crazy chewers on my hands, but I don’t think so. I think my dogs are pretty average. They go to town on a rawhide but they don’t destroy a KONG. That is my definition of average.
So out of all of these chews there is only one that I will order again. It’s the normal bully sticks. I think they lasted at least half an hour and those where the 6 inch one. So my conclusion: I am going to stick with Nylabones, KONGs and the thickest and longest bully sticks I can find
(Pictures courtesy of sitstay.com)
Posted on April 4, 2010
Dog noses are so miraculous. They know so much more about the world than we do. If we could just see all the things they can smell.
(and yes, that hair is on her nose not my lens… I hope shedding time is over soon)
Posted on April 2, 2010
Now how cool is this??? (Click on the picture for more info)