Good Diet?

[Bentley9999]

Hi There,

Just after a bit of re-assurance...

Got a bit worried the other day as we took Bentley to a different Vet and they basically went off at me for feeding him a raw diet and that "it doesn't contain enough calories for a puppy and does not have the right amount of nutrition etc."
I know vets tend to be rather uneducated on raw dieting or more biased towards the processed food they are paid to sell but I just wanna check up to see what others think of the diet Bentley has been on for the last 4 months (BTW he seems to be doing very well on it from my perspective.. including in the poo department )

Each day roughly contains:

- 1 chicken frame (roughly 250g - half of that being bone)
- 120g of Organ (not too much liver, mostly kidney etc)
- 800g of meat (usually shredded beef or minced chicken/pork/lamb etc)
- 1 fish oil capsule (1000mg) or a teaspoon of coconut oil
- once a week i will include sardines and an egg or two (including shell)

Do you think there is anything i should be modifying? I just don't wanna affect his overall health by not including something or giving him too much of one thing.

 

[musicdeb]

Remember, most vets do not promote raw diet because they are trained to and paid by dog food companies to push their food.

What is Bentley's expected weight? He should be eating 2-3% of expected weight. He should eat 80% meat, 10% meaty bone and 10% organ meat. If his expected weight is 150lbs = 68kg, he would eat 3 lbs of food per day (150 lbs X 2%). He would then eat 2.4 lbs of meat, 3 ozs of meaty bone and 3 ozs of organ meat.

 

[DennasMom]

Your ratios look good (80% meat / 10% bone-in-the-frame / 10% organ). About 1/2 the organ should be liver (over time, like every week or month, or so). And it's good to mix it up, like it sounds you're doing with the kidney and other stuff.

Are the sardines in a tin or raw? (we get raw ones here... either from a buying group, or at the Asian grocery). Tinned ones might be high in salt and processed oils (i.e. cottonseed or soybean oil), which might not be preferable. But, I'm sure Bentley loves them, so that wouldn't stop me from giving them occasionally.

And, the eggs are raw, too, right? (best for nutrient availability).

Sounds like you're doing a great job to me. Even with a good mix on protein sources - which also provides better nutrient coverage.

Not sure why the vet is worried about calories... is Bentley underweight?? Leaner is better... but you don't want to starve him.
At 1170grams total (2.6lbs), that seems about right to me. It's a little less than what Denna eats (she's 150lb, 2yr old EM, and gets just under 3lb/day).

Did the vet have anything proactive to suggest - i.e. body condition issues, joint/bone development issues, etc? Or was it just a knee-jerk reaction to a "raw diet"? I'm sure he's been taught that "home prepared meals" can be lacking in nutrients... and my vet did say the same thing - she's seen many puppy development issues from a poorly designed home-prepared diet... but from what you list above, you're right on the mark for nutrients, per the "whole prey model" diet.

Good Job!!

 

[Bentley9999]

Thanks for the reply. Feeling better about it already

He is not underweight much at all. His last rib will show through but his still got a good amount of weight on him.

Sent from my GT-I9505 using Tapatalk

 

[krisx]

don't let vet shake you up. i know the feeling, mine tried it with me, more than once. right after they tried to sell me large bag of expencive c*ap. lol

if you still having second thoughts, here is a few simple questions.


how old is dog as a species?
(canis lupus familiaris)
>around 30 000 years if you count the intermediate stage between wolf and dog.
>around 15 000 years is you count dog being a real dog, domesticated.

-how old is mass produced commercial pet food?
>60-70 years?

now if normal, real food (those real brainvashed people are going to call it 'people food') is so wrong shouldn't dogs be extinct by the time commercial pet food appeared?

and in that 60-70 years are dogs healthier or sicker?

.....and if you really want to know what goes into that large, expensive bag of c*ap watch this dude, i dear you!
[video=youtube;g9DTzDfYMxo]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g9DTzDfYMxo[/video]

just don't do it on full stomach....


want more?
why bone meal? why meat meal?
why not bone and meat??

now about your specific numbers, cant help you much, because i follow 'the way of BARF' lol
so i give much more bones of various tipes...and shapes and sizes.
i also give fruit and veggies *oh the heresy* hahaha

 

[Cliff]

I think some vets are against raw only due to some people not taking enough time to learn about before switching their dogs to raw. Others just don't, or haven't taken the time to understand it either. Just my opinion and experiances.

My vet has been feeding raw to her own dogs for many years now and she was a great help to me when we first started looking into feeding raw

Sounds like you certainly have taken the time to learn what your doing before you started