I feed my dog with Taste of The Wild (TOTW)kibbles.

30Lbs TOTW cost me around $45 with tax. can feed my dog for 1 month.

Yesterday, I called some butchers in my area and they sells scrap meats for $1 per pound.

If I buy 30 Lbs scraps ($30), do you guys think I can feed my dog for a month?

Can you feed a dog on scraps for a month? Yes.

Is it likely that the scraps you're able to acquire in bulk boxes of 10lbs will be balanced on their own enough for a quality diet? No.

Is 30 lbs enough? I don't know. 3-5% I believe is what most of us shoot for a day per our dog's ideal body weight.

If you want to take the raw dive there is the right way to go about it. Personally until you research the gills out of it I'd stick to kibble.

I agree with Melissa can't see feeding your dogs scraps for a month being a healthy diet, if it's like the scraps from my butcher there's no bones in it just meat and fat. There's alot more involved in a RAW diet than just meat, until you understand it completely stick to the kibble.

I read on: http://leerburg.com/diet.htm

An example of an all natural diet to feed your Pet:

A list of ingredients to feed in your kennel:

* Raw Meat - Any raw muscle meat will work, I feed turkey hamburger because of price but normal hamburger is also just as good.
* A raw egg 3 to 5 times per week (with the shell)
* Turkey necks, chicken necks or chicken backs
* Chopped Veggie pulp (carrots, cauliflower, celery, green beans etc)
* Kelp and alfalfa - the fine powdered type
* Powdered vitamin C
* Essential Fatty Acids
o Cod liver oil
o Salmon oil OMEGA 3 - VERY IMPORTANT EVER DAY
o Flaxseed oil
* Glucosamine Powder (99% pure)
* Vitamin E - EXTREMELY IMPORTANT - YOUR DOG MUST HAVE THIS !!!!


I give my dogs Omega / Salmon oil, vitamin E, and Glucosamine on daily basis and eggs cpl times a week, so I just need to add Vitamin C and kelp / alfalfa then...

am I right?

or is there's any other page I need to read?

Daniel,

You should also read this: http://leerburg.com/diet2.htm for a more detailed example of a weekly raw diet menu. What is missing from your list is the variety of protein sources you need to provide, including organ meats. Turkey hamburger and chicken backs alone will not be a well-balanced raw diet.

To answer the question in your original post, thirty pounds most likely would not be enough to feed two large dogs.

But with finding the right deals you would be able to feed raw for the same or less money than the kibble. If you are interested in raw feeding you should check out the books offered on this site. Raw feeding isn't complicated, but you do need to understand the basics before you start.

You need to find out what's in the box of scraps, specifically. It very likely does not contain enough to make the basis of a diet. Hunt up a source for chicken parts to go with it and you'll be a lot closer to making a raw diet. It's about bones as much as it is meat.

How much do your dogs weigh?

You can't compare the weight of raw and kibble like that. Raw food is mostly water. By weight, you'd likely feed more raw than kibble. But you have to start with the weight of the dogs, not a comparison to the weight of kibble.

Feeding raw's not hard. We'll help you if you want to switch.

If you'll just return to kibble when the good deal at the butcher runs out, you might as well stick with kibble now.

There's no good argument for going to the trouble to switch the dog for a month, just to switch back. In fact, I can think of many great arguments against it.

To include 30 lbs not being enough to last a month.
I have a GSD that weighs less than 60lbs-

30lbs of meat would last us about two weeks.

Also- it's a box of scraps. Presumably, multiple meat sources. If you're starting raw correctly, you'd be starting with one specific meat source ONLY, and feeding that for a couple of days, and the slowly adding in variety. Properly done, it would take a month to really be feeding a well rounded raw diet.

If you're interested in starting raw, you need to investigate alternative sources of meat beyond a scrap box from the butcher, and stock up on those. Something like a scrap box would only make sense for someone who was adding to a other meat sources-

A scrap box alone isn't a source of a raw diet.

Am I the only one that thinks scrap meat at $1 a pound isn't even a good deal to begin with? You should be able to get chicken backs and necks for less than that. I pay 50c a pound for mine by the 40lb case. I have to request it from the grocery stores meat department but it arrives in 2-3 days for me to pick up.

Other protein sources might be a little pricier but you can pick up meats that expire that day etc for your dog and freeze them. I have seen dogs eat some meat that I didn't even want to smell with no problem.

You said a 30lb bag feeds him for a month and there are 120 cups of food in a 30lb bag of totw, so I assume you are feeding him 4 cups a day. This is the recommended serving size for an adult dog weighing 80-100lbs.

Your dog should be eating 2-4% of its weight a day if you feed raw so thats about 2.5lbs of food a day. So in order to be able to make raw cheaper than totw you would need to have an average cost for your meats to be under 60c a pound. This is definitely doable if you live in an area where you may be able to find people who hunt etc and have extra meat.

"Am I the only one that thinks scrap meat at $1 a pound isn't even a good deal to begin with?"

I do agree that I don't want to pay $1 a pound for random butcher scraps.

But it's not a good deal for me, period, even at half the price. I'm not going to base a raw diet on butcher scraps with completely unknown bone and meat content.

As many have pointed out, Daniel, the basis of the diet is RMBs. It can't be unidentified scraps because of the important bone/meat (Ca/P) ratio.

Number 3 on the list you posted is the crucial backbone (haha) of the entire diet. Yes, you need muscle meat too, but that's easy and varied. Number 3 (like chicken backs) is what you buy most of and what the dog gets his vital calcium from.

I'd seek out my best price for the basis of the diet first: chicken backs would be a great beginning.