Need help with raw food

[buttercup132]

There are TONS of raw feeding threads in dog general and dog health just do a search and you'll find alot.

Benaful(sp?) is terrible food. The way I see it to compare is feeding your dog Mc Donalds everyday compared to eating a healthy home cooked meal every day. It would probly also help her loose weight.

[Hellow]

Yes, i know now. What i found out is that Bentaful contains all of the ingridients thats ist not supposed to have like corn and by - products. My dad agrees. All that i need to know now is WHAT should i feed her to keep it balenced and not kill her. Also, should i lightly cook the meat to kill the bacteria? Do i get the meat at Walmart?

[bckrazy]

A well-balanced Raw diet WILL improve the health of most any dog, for sure. Both of my dogs are in amazing health because of it! I really couldn't be happier. But, I did research the diet heavily, for months, before feeding it. You really need to do your research to do it right. Here are some helpful links!

http://www.rawmeatybones.com/ (you can download 2 of his books for FREE! very good introductions to raw.)

http://rawfeddogs.net/

http://www.rawdogranch.com/

http://community.livejournal.com/rawdogs/profile

http://community.livejournal.com/rawdogs/120730.html (awesome post!)


Yes, it will probably be more expensive than feeding Beneful. However, Reggie is a little girl, and will require a very small amount of food! (think 2% of her body weight! which, I'm guessing, will be less than 1/2 pound per day.)

You do not lightly cook it, at all. That's why it is called Raw! Raw feeding includes feeding raw bones, within the meat, and even light cooking makes bones dangerous and depletes many of the valuable nutrients in raw meat. However, I do freeze meats, which makes basically any meat safe for my dogs.

You can get the meat at Wal-mart. Buy the highest quality meat you can afford. A lot of butchers/farmers/hunters/suppliers will sell very high quality meat for low prices in bulk. Since Reggie requires so little food, you could even consider feeding pre-made Raw (check out Primal, Bravo, & Farmore).

Definitely do lots of research before hand! Until you make a final decision about feeding Raw, I highly recommend you switch her kibble to a better quality. Innova Evo & Timberwolf are great kibbles that are the closest you can get to feeding raw, in a kibble. Feeding a premium kibble is much, much healthier than feeding an unbalanced Raw diet. =)