Those of you who have been here a while know that I lost my beloved dog, Ashke in 2009. My family and I have been searching and waiting for the next great dog to come into our lives. On our way back from visiting family in California we picked up this little beauty. My 5-year-old, aspiring-Jedi-Knight-son, said he knew this was the one, because he dreamed about her.
Meet Natasha, a three-month old Silken Windhound puppy.
Tasha had been partially raw-fed before we got her. When we got her home I started offering her large chunks of whole raw food. She loves it! I left down a bowl of grain-free kibble that she had been eating before, so that she could transition to raw slowly. The same bowl of dry food is still sitting on the floor.
I am feeding her “whole-prey-model” diet, which means feeding large pieces of meat, meaty-bones and organs, to simulate what a wolf would eat in the wild. So far she has eaten: Chicken – quarters, backs, necks, legs, breasts, liver, giblets, and bones. Pork – meat, heart, and meaty-bones. Beef – meat, tongue, and bone marrow. Turkey – necks and giblets. I plan to get her some more unusual organs, tendons and miscellaneous animal parts to provide her with a full variety of nutrients.
Here are some pictures of Tasha enjoying her meals:
Hi Lisa – so glad you got your new family member. We have fed our dogs raw fora few yrs now and they are so much better for it. I wanted to suggest that maybe raw pork is not that great for them? I recall reading many times and TSW confirmed that it is really ahrd for them to digest and we should avoid feeding them raw pork. I am not sure if the recommendations have changed since we did our research on it. Just wanted to let you know what was said then about it.
Have fun with her!
Julia
Thanks for your concern Julia. I talked with Teri Sue about it too. She said her concern was trichinosis. She didn’t say anything about digestibility. Several of the raw feeding lists that I am on say that trichinosis is not a concern with domestically raised pork. They recommend feeding pork as the bones are edible, it contains a good amount of fat and it is an inexpensive meat. They say that many people feed too much chicken because it is the cheapest meat you can get at the grocery store, but that it is not a species appropriate diet for a dog. In the wild wolves eat mostly red meat, and are able to catch very few birds. Deer would be a very species appropriate meat, but so far I do not have a source of venison.
I decided to trust the experienced raw-feeders on the list and give Tasha some pork. I am trying to vary her diet much more than I did with Ashke (who ate primarily chicken). I do not plan to make pork a large component of her diet, but will probably continue to give her some.
My main reason for posting about my experiences with this is to let people know that it is relatively simple and easy to feed raw to your carnivore companions.
Thanks,
– Lisa