The movements have been quite varried, especally the first few days after the switch.
I thought I knew what to expect, small really firm with a bit more effort to expell.

the crumbly ones 2 of the dogs(pisa & delilah)really have to work at,and I'm thinking a bit of constipation is not far behind.

I'm feeding chicken backs or ground backs and necks at night, and a mix of veggies and beef in morning.

should I add some more meat to the backs, like a thigh to help soften things up?

More muscle meat, IMO. And I would make that adjustment today.

More details, because we don't want to go from too hard to too soft. What was breakfast? Beef what?



eta
Was there any time when they had formed logs (not round, but logs), easily expelled, on their new raw food?

Edited by Connie Sutherland (12/03/2011 02:53 PM)
Edit reason: eta

lean hamburger and about 1/3 pulverizd veggies(8kinds) mixed, the other morning, same with some discount steak

not all the poops are crumbly, usually morning, then to round rabbity for pisa and like ping pong balls for delilah, then usuall logish for the evening movement.

with bridget she has logs, and a couple seemed to have the white color of a bone poo half way, then dark(beets in mix) I thought bridget would be the problem pooper and the other two would be fine.

 Quote: Connie Sutherland

eta
Was there any time when they had formed logs (not round, but logs), easily expelled, on their new raw food?

delilah was soft couple first days, then nice logs, now the crumbly morning poop

This one's easy. More meat, less bone.

Ok, so a thigh added to a carcass ? or a chunk of beef

If the carcass weighs 1 lb, 2oz meat (thats 1/8) added,

or just keep adding a bit each meal till poop is nice ?

 Quote: Dave Owen

not all the poops are crumbly, usually morning, then to round rabbity for pisa and like ping pong balls for delilah, then usuall logish for the evening movement.

with bridget she has logs, and a couple seemed to have the white color of a bone poo half way, then dark(beets in mix)

OK, then, I would guess from that that the evening meal is too much bone. You want to add more MM.

I would add some muscle meat to that meal and, if you can, I would change it up so the two meals have MM rather than one with all MM and one with all RMB.

You don't want pellets or ping pong balls -- you want all logs.

Luckily, on raw, with the "rapid transit" of real food, you can gauge the result of each meal. You are seeing in the mornings that the meal from the evening before was too high in bone (or low in MM .... same thing).




Also, just an aside, when you say "lean beef" ..... it could be that less lean will be better. (Dogs don't have the coronary artery issues that we humans have; also, it's not the fresh raw fat that "comes on" raw meat that triggers acute pancreatitis, either -- it's generally a sudden load of cooked, as in holiday leftovers or dumpster-diving, or rancid fat that causes that kind of problem. So a little more fresh raw fat, some extra water poured over the food, and adding MM are all good ways for a healthy dog to avoid those dry round poops. If a bit of fiber is needed, that's easy to add in the form of something like plain canned pumpkin, but the tinkering with added MM is usually the answer, IME.)

Thigh will have more bone in it.

I would gradually add more BONE-LESS meat to the diet until the poop is seasoned to your liking.

 Quote: Tracy Collins

This one's easy. More meat, less bone.

Yeah. What he said.

 Quote: Dave Owen

Ok, so a thigh added to a carcass ? or a chunk of beef

If the carcass weighs 1 lb, 2oz meat (thats 1/8) added,

or just keep adding a bit each meal till poop is nice ?

As Michael mentions, a thigh is adding more bone. Adding more boneless meat is what you want here. If you do this tonight, you should be able to avoid real constipation (and you want to avoid it rather than fix it).