RAW Feeding

[da.drew]

Holly, 3 year old ESS, 13 kilos, 400g chicken/meat, 200g veggies, small piece of tripe. Storm, 16 month ESS, 24 kilos, 800 grams chicken/meat, 200 grams veggies, small piece of tripe. I feed RAW, 3-4% of their body weight

[Bryn]

Fair enough, I suppose the weight difference is water.

[da.drew]

Fair enough, I suppose the weight difference is water.

Do you mean with regards to weight of food or the difference between the two dogs? The 13 kilo one is very small in stature, so her weight is propotionaly right. the 24 kilo dog is a big lad, no fat on any of them.

They seem to thrive on RAW, the real beauty of it is, for me anyway, is that I know exactly what their getting, if you read on a tin or on kimble it quite ofton says something like 20% chicken, 15% other animal derivitives (what are other animal derivities?)

[Bryn]

meant with the weight of food isn't RAW @80% water? 1litre of water = 1kg so of the 400gms of RAW something like 320gms could be water

I'm slowly moving towards more fresh meat, just not sure how much of what I should be feeding, just got 1Kg of sprats at £3/kg from tesco and 2kg of dog mince at £2/kg from the local farm shop, we have our own eggs and once we've moved and I have my FAC & shotgun licence sorted out I'll be able to add some rabbit to the menu now and again. My biggest concern is ensuring they get enough vits, minerals and trace elements if I moved away from a formulated kibble.

I'm thinking along the lines that once we move I can get a larder type freezer and get various foodstuffs in bulk when its available and freeze it, to use as required.

[Miesque]

I add the veg/vit/mineral mix from Berriewoods to ensure that mine gets all he needs alongside the raw meat

[Tarimoor]

I tend to mince fish up with offal, and am going to start doing my own tripe shortly. I also put veggies through along with things like garlic, fresh curcumin root, as per the sticky. I do have a fair bit of freezer space though, two chest freezers, and two upright freezers, not all for the dogs, but I've certainly got space to shuffle around any freebies I get.

I don't get hung up about exact weights, but feed by eye. As long as you feed a good range of fresh quality food when making your own raw diet, that should be good enough for your dog to gain the nutrition it needs.

[Bryn]

Thanks, the house we're moving to effectively has 2 kitchen so I plan to use the ground floor one for keeping and making up the dog rations, the dogs' sleeping areas will be in the room next door with access straight into the garden. I'd like to move more to more raw but just haven't had the knowledge/confidence, maybe I've been over-thinking it. We've always fed the collies a dry feed for convenience (storage and time), so RAW is new to me.

If I start out at 3% of adult weight bodyweight and adjust it from there I'll be about right?

[Tarimoor]

Thanks, the house we're moving to effectively has 2 kitchen so I plan to use the ground floor one for keeping and making up the dog rations, the dogs' sleeping areas will be in the room next door with access straight into the garden. I'd like to move more to more raw but just haven't had the knowledge/confidence, maybe I've been over-thinking it. We've always fed the collies a dry feed for convenience (storage and time), so RAW is new to me.

If I start out at 3% of adult weight bodyweight and adjust it from there I'll be about right?

Sounds about right. I've got a similar set up, three basement rooms, once of which I use to store freezers/fridge etc, and a larger room set out with crates for the dogs, which has a sink and cupboard. I get a lot of free bones from a good local butchers, where I know the meat/bones are from locally reared animals. I also get boxes of chicken carcasses very cheap, and pick up a lot of reduced fish from the local supermarket fish counter. It can be very cheap if you shop around and make a few friends.

[Bryn]

We move in 4 weeks and I've spent more time planning for the dogs than anything else

[Miesque]

meant with the weight of food isn't RAW @80% water? 1litre of water = 1kg so of the 400gms of RAW something like 320gms could be water

I'm slowly moving towards more fresh meat, just not sure how much of what I should be feeding, just got 1Kg of sprats at £3/kg from tesco and 2kg of dog mince at £2/kg from the local farm shop, we have our own eggs and once we've moved and I have my FAC & shotgun licence sorted out I'll be able to add some rabbit to the menu now and again. My biggest concern is ensuring they get enough vits, minerals and trace elements if I moved away from a formulated kibble.

I'm thinking along the lines that once we move I can get a larder type freezer and get various foodstuffs in bulk when its available and freeze it, to use as required.

Cheers for the heads up on the Sprats. I bought all my local Tesco had yesterday. Cornish Sardines are also on sale for £3 per kg in Tesco currently. Mine is currently on a rotation of lamb mince (with bones), green tripe, salmon, rabbit, liver, poultry necks, sprats and sardines. I use the Berriewoods vit/min supplement to ensure he's getting everything.