Probably chicken, turkey, then rabbit. They are all pretty lean.

You and Connie have everything back to working well, so don't let me mess you up.

I'm sure she'll see this post, or you can ask her about rabbit.

If you are getting your pup meat, bones, and organs in approx. the proportions that they come in a prey animal, then they will get all they need.

The only things I would work on are organs, like Connie said, and fat. All introduced slowly

Your current plan of moving foward sounds perfect. Don't change a thing.:smile:

 Quote: MeganMcCallister

I'm going to try to give it with the skin and fat.

Just wanted to reiterate adding fat and skin slowly.

Where you have been removing all the skin and fat that you possibly could, instead pull the skin off and leave some of the visible fat. After a few days remove the skin, but leave all the fat. Then leave all the fat and some of the skin that you had been removing. Etc., etc., etc.

Everything gradual.

 Quote: michael_wise

 Quote: meganmccallister

I'm going to try to give it with the skin and fat.

Just wanted to reiterate adding fat and skin slowly.

Where you have been removing all the skin and fat that you possibly could, instead pull the skin off and leave some of the visible fat. After a few days remove the skin, but leave all the fat. Then leave all the fat and some of the skin that you had been removing. Etc., etc., etc.

Everything gradual.

While Connie was helping me through PMs I asked if maybe I could give some pork neck bones b/c I was worrying about the meat to bone ratio. Her reply was "STEP AWAY FROM THE FREEZER!!!". That reminded me I need to go super slow .

The quarters still have some fat on them. I got all of the big chunks, but didn't try to surgically remove every teeny bit. Hmm, that might have been why it took so long to get his stool to were it needed to be...

Hopefully though I won't have to skin too much of the next bag :yuck: .

I just gave him his last leg quarter for the day and another teeny piece of liver. I hand fed the liver, and tossed the quarter into his crate. The leg was .5 lbs. I heard a couple bones cracking, and he was in there maybe 10 minutes then he started whining (I feed him in the crate w/ it closed to keep from having chicken particles through out the house).

I went in there to check on him, and it was gone. He's had to of swallowed it something, because he's never ate one that fast . Maybe he's getting the hang of it now, but that really suprised me!

This morning I forgot to give Ike his teeny piece of liver with his 3/4lb leg quarter.

A little bit ago he had no so great runny poop.

I'm going to back off of the liver and try giving it 1x a day instead of with every meal.

Or would every other meal be ok?

Do you think Ike could possibly have something like this:

 Quote: Sharon Eliot

She had extreme itchiness on her thighs, rump and behind her elbows, where she would scratch and nip constantly. No fleas that we or the vet could find. The vet thought there was a small possibility of sarcoptic mange, while the breeder said it was new fur coming in that was causing it. We ended up putting Revolution flea/tick/mite drops on her and the itchiness went away after 2 1/2 weeks.

For everyone else, Ike has been itching and biting himself sporadically like crazy. His paws and ears both look normal. It's like he's biting fleas, using only his front teeth. He hasn't done this very much in the past two days though. In Natural Nutrition for Cats and Dogs by Kymythy Schultze she talks about going through a detox phase. Could he possibly be going through that?

How much does Ike weigh?

17.2 lbs on Saturday night.

 Quote: MeganMcCallister

17.2 lbs on Saturday night.

What are you expecting him to weigh? 65-75 lbs.?

I'm trying to get an idea about how much he is being fed.

You said that he doesn't always finish his meals. With that in mind, how much do you think he eats per meal when he is fed 3 times a day?

Yes, 65-75lbs is what I'm guessing the end weight will be. The mother was very small, I'm guessing in the 50 lbs range, but the father is supposed to produce big Malis in the 80lbs range. He was the smallest in the litter, so that leaves me to guess he will be in the 65-75lbs range.

His chicken leg quarters have been in the 0.5 - 1lbs range. So he probably on average eats 1.5lbs a day. Now that's just a guess. I didn't get the scale until Sunday.

ETA: Also if he hasn't been finishing one of his meals, then I give him the left over part for the next meal.

And thanks for helping me Michael .

If he gets a big quarter in the morning, then I try to find a smaller one for the next meal and vice versa.

For a few days, weigh what he eats to make sure that you are staying around 1.5 lbs. Doesn't have to be exact, but at least close.

For the organs, he will EVENTUALLY get a little over 2 oz. a day.

For now, though, I would start at about 2 oz. a week. Just to be safe, slowly building up from there.

Even though that is a long ways from what he should be getting, it will not hurt a thing to start that small. Heck, if you have to you could go even smaller.



FOR LATER:

Right now it sounds like you only have liver available, which is fine, but in the meantime look for some other organs. You will probably be able to find kidney somewhere. You may have to ask the grocery store to get it for you.

Don't worry about that right now, though. Just wanted to throw that in for future reference.