Gundog Training Forum

Hi all

I was hoping to get some advise from those of you on here that have converted to the barf diet.

I have recently swapped both my dogs, one 7 year old ess bitch and one 4 month old lab dog onto the barf diet.

The older of the two seems to be fine and is loving the new food! The pup on the other hand authough seems to be happy enough eating has developed very loose, light brown and jelly like stools over the last few days. For the first week on just barf he seemed fine but recently seems to be having troubles, he seems to go roughly 6 times a day now where as before it was twice when on dry food, should I be concerned or it it just his body adjusting to the barf? I am quite concerned and am on the verge of putting both dogs back onto skinners dry food.

The barf diet I have been following is the one on this forum by tarimor, like I say he was fine for a week and the last few days has been having issues, he has gone to the toilet twice in his sleeping area of his kennel during the night also which is odd as up until now he has been incredible clean. As you can probably tell I am worried I may have made him I'll, if he is no better by this time tomorrow i will take him into the vet. He seems to be himself and has plenty of energy and no vomiting that I have seen!

Any help would be appreciated greatly!
Many thanks
Tom

You'll have to give us an idea of what you're feeding. And if you're really worried about the pup's condition then go to the vets. I feed a meaty bone based diet & light brown doesn't figure in that.

Naj

Consult a vet.

To be honest, there are lots more BARF feeders on Facebook with dedicated chat groups. You may get more diet specific joy there.

It may be that the conversion to raw has been too quick for the growing pup. Or it may have just scavenged something disagreeable and it may have little to do with diet.

A trip to the vet could put your mind at rest that it isn't anything serious.

For what it's worth, I feed my two (10yo lab and 14mth ESS) raw, but I don't follow Tarrimor's diet. Nothing personal, I just have my own menu plan and both thrive.

I converted pup at around the four month mark and started with pre made mixes, and went a week on one mix e.g. chicken before moving onto a new protein source.

Do you weigh pup regularly (weekly) and adjust rations accordingly? How many meals per day is pup getting?

I weighed the pup myself and he has also been weighed at the vets for worming and jabs etc, puppy gets fed 3 times a day and older dog twice. I'm not on Facebook so cannot have a look unfortunately, I have spoken to the vet and I am going to go back to dry food for a couple of days to see if things improve! Hopefully it's just something in the new diet upsetting his tummy!

Thanks all

Chopping back and forth every few days rarely cures anything, a change of diet on an unsettled stomach often prolongs or make the problem worse.

If I ever have an issue its water only for 24hrs then possibly some boiled rice the following day.

Never needed more than this, or to change diets.

thanks for the reply, the trouble is as the pup Is only 4 months old I don't want to fast him for 24 hours, I have followed the vets advice and given him a small amount of scrambled egg and will continue to do this again tomorrow.

thanks

Hi Tomm

I can't see from your post how you are feeding your dogs, but I feed my Cocker on raw but i don't "make my own" like many others here. I feed Maddie Natural Instinct which requires a bit of space in your freezer but definately worth it i think, they do a great puppy and working dog range and also a "pure" range, always having fed previous pet dogs dry or tinned food i find this to be a revelation and i wouldn't go back i have to say, she has bags of energy ( maybe that's because she is a mad cocker ?! ) and her coat is amazingly glossy. I feed her the bone element through chicken wings, turkey necks, ox tails, duck necks or anything else i can get my hands on from the butchers - although Asda does a big thing of chicken wings for about £2.50 - she loves them all. The one that doesn't agree with her is fish, so we stay away. If i need to put any weight on her ( she loses a bit of form during her season ) i feed her butchers tripe and that works a treat.
I guess what i'm saying is that there could be an element in your food that is not agreeing with your pup, so maybe take it back a step, or try the frozen raw food brands and see how they go.
Good luck and let us know how you get on.

If she is still poorly its a Vet visit with three days of poo samples (nice!) to check for infection.