DennasMom
Well-Known Member
Here's my notes and a sample menu from our house:
I put together a week's worth of food at a time to keep ready to feed - that way I can keep the meals balanced, but have leeway to mix things up during the week (feed more/less some days, etc.). One week's worth of food is about 21lbs total (only 1.7% of expected adult weight of 185lbs). Based on the 80/10/5/5 whole prey model (meat/bone/liver/other organ) that becomes:
We add in a few salmon oil pills each day and coconut oil for Omega 3's and other goodies on occasion, like chicken feet, rabbit heads, beef gullets, etc.
I buy most meat from Costco (verify it's unenhanced; <100mg sodium/4oz serving) or the local grocery store on special, and am averaging $2.00/lb all-in. (pork and beef are our mainstays - I'm still trying to determine sensitivities to poultry... extra salmon oil seems to do the trick to keep the skin from itching when eating poultry... so totals should go down as I add in more cheap poultry)
So far, it's probably 1.5-2x the cost of kibble, but I'm paying a little extra to add variety, which is fun (our coop offers mutton, llama, emu, bison and venison, regularly throughout the year). I love that I don't have to drive all over town looking for the last bag of same-brand kibble (I always seemed to wait 'til the last minute to get another bag). No worries when all the recall notices come out, either, which is also very nice.
Starting the puppy should be waaaay easier than the adult dog. The puppy's systems are getting geared up for "real" food anyway, while the GSD's system will need to shift gears and start over with the new stuff. But, once on raw, his system should be much more flexible and able to handle anything you can throw at him (literally!).
I'm not a fan of compressed rawhide, but I don't see any reason why being kibble-vs-raw fed would make a difference on that. If anything, I would think he should be able to digest it better after his stomach acids gear up for raw.
Treats - we used dehydrated beef heart (you can also 'fridge dry'), and dried apple and sweet potato bits in classes. Mixed together, the fruit & veggies help the heart go further, so you can treat more often without over-doing the protein and causing loose poops. I'd avoid using freeze dried or dried livers when training for that reason... too easy to over-dose the liver and cause cannon butt.
Deer antlers - you can make them more interesting by soaking in warm chicken broth for a few hours. That worked for us, at least for a few days. Then they were 'boring' again.
I also slather them with coconut oil or peanut butter to make them interesting, but that doesn't last as long as the broth-soak did.
As for the whole RAW experience... it took me a few months to get my system down - and I have a whole spreadsheet tracker to calculate out my meals (I plan on turning that into a website menu planner one of these days). Now, it's really easy, since I know how much bone Denna can handle (much less than 10%), and I also find it fun and satisfying to know my fur-kid is eating "real" food with minimal processing (which we're trying to do for our human family, too).
I put together a week's worth of food at a time to keep ready to feed - that way I can keep the meals balanced, but have leeway to mix things up during the week (feed more/less some days, etc.). One week's worth of food is about 21lbs total (only 1.7% of expected adult weight of 185lbs). Based on the 80/10/5/5 whole prey model (meat/bone/liver/other organ) that becomes:
| Weekly Totals: |
| 12 lbs boneless meat (beef or pork plus 1-2lbs of green tripe) |
| 7 lbs poultry or pork ribs (based on 30% bone-in, this becomes ~2lbs bone and ~5 lbs meat) |
| 1 lbs liver |
| 1 lbs "other" organ (normally beef or pork kidney) |
We add in a few salmon oil pills each day and coconut oil for Omega 3's and other goodies on occasion, like chicken feet, rabbit heads, beef gullets, etc.
I buy most meat from Costco (verify it's unenhanced; <100mg sodium/4oz serving) or the local grocery store on special, and am averaging $2.00/lb all-in. (pork and beef are our mainstays - I'm still trying to determine sensitivities to poultry... extra salmon oil seems to do the trick to keep the skin from itching when eating poultry... so totals should go down as I add in more cheap poultry)
So far, it's probably 1.5-2x the cost of kibble, but I'm paying a little extra to add variety, which is fun (our coop offers mutton, llama, emu, bison and venison, regularly throughout the year). I love that I don't have to drive all over town looking for the last bag of same-brand kibble (I always seemed to wait 'til the last minute to get another bag). No worries when all the recall notices come out, either, which is also very nice.
Starting the puppy should be waaaay easier than the adult dog. The puppy's systems are getting geared up for "real" food anyway, while the GSD's system will need to shift gears and start over with the new stuff. But, once on raw, his system should be much more flexible and able to handle anything you can throw at him (literally!).
I'm not a fan of compressed rawhide, but I don't see any reason why being kibble-vs-raw fed would make a difference on that. If anything, I would think he should be able to digest it better after his stomach acids gear up for raw.
Treats - we used dehydrated beef heart (you can also 'fridge dry'), and dried apple and sweet potato bits in classes. Mixed together, the fruit & veggies help the heart go further, so you can treat more often without over-doing the protein and causing loose poops. I'd avoid using freeze dried or dried livers when training for that reason... too easy to over-dose the liver and cause cannon butt.
Deer antlers - you can make them more interesting by soaking in warm chicken broth for a few hours. That worked for us, at least for a few days. Then they were 'boring' again.
I also slather them with coconut oil or peanut butter to make them interesting, but that doesn't last as long as the broth-soak did.As for the whole RAW experience... it took me a few months to get my system down - and I have a whole spreadsheet tracker to calculate out my meals (I plan on turning that into a website menu planner one of these days). Now, it's really easy, since I know how much bone Denna can handle (much less than 10%), and I also find it fun and satisfying to know my fur-kid is eating "real" food with minimal processing (which we're trying to do for our human family, too).
