No hijacking here I think Robinn can learn from our stories.
I know what you mean with the loose stool, Yaggo never had a normal solid stool until I went raw 100% and my vet had told me all kinds of things and test to do after we had spent almost $600 of tests, Xrays , change of kibbles, blood work, and nothing had worked or told us what it was.Until the day when my 2 year old became more manageble and gave me more time to do raw.I went ALL raw.
I talked about that to my club members (the stool story) and thought they would think I was crazy but then some of them went Raw too and now , we talk about it everytime we get together!
RAW RAW RAW

 Quote: Angelique Cadogan

.... RAW RAW RAW ....

Angelique, our vet almost put us through those tests you mentioned.
However he saw so many cases of shepherds with the same digestive problems without ever finding anything on the tests, that he told us that it's just a "common shepherd thing" and that there's nothing we can do.



Raw raw raw indeed!

Well...I did it! I fed the Levi raw chicken necks tonight with his veggies and salmon oil. He loved it! I am a little ashamed to say that I was terrified to do so and ended up hacking up the chicken necks with my cleaver. He seemed to totally love it and didn't have any issues at all. All I kept hearing was the vet saying that he would puncture his intestines and die a horrible death. Even as I write this I am still freaking out that in the middle of the night he will wake me in agonizing pain!!! I would never forgive myself if anything happened to him. I've only had him a week but he is the best dog I have ever had. He is so smart and so loving and so devoted to me at 10 weeks I just can't help feeling a little bit like a new mom with him. Still, I can't deny the difference that I have seen with my older dogs within one month of feeding them first ground raw w/kibble, then ground raw w/veggie and now chicken backs w/veggies and salmon oil. Heaven help me that I am doing the right thing by this little guy. Your support really matters, thanks guys!

Next time you hack up the necks, take out some of the bone and smash it by itself so you can see how un-scary the little bone pieces are. No shame in being scared. I started about a month ago and would be lying if I said I wasn't. Very few people here have grown up in a home that fed like this, so the concept is kinda hard to grasp. I didn't know raw feeding existed until I found this site. Every different kind of bone that I have fed I broke to see what it would look and feel like when my dog ate it. I say whatever makes you feel at ease then go ahead and do it.

Gah!!! Don't don't DON'T feed the raw in hacked up little chunks!!! That is the WORST way to feed it. Either grind it or preferably feed whole pieces. Chopping into chunks is just about begging for improper chewing and can (and has) led to choking and impactions...

The rule of thumb is, feed the piece of meat that is ideally bigger than your pup's muzzle to encourage proper chewing. Otherwise, GRIND to a fine mince if you can't stomach the idea of a whole piece. The mince isn't as beneficial, but it is at least safe. Chopping is DANGEROUS, so if you're not comfortable with just giving the pup an 1/8 of a whole chicken, then GRIND properly.

Good luck!

 Quote:

Just curious Molly, but how much experience have you had raising dogs on kibble vs raw?

I do not feed raw. I fed raw once, to one dog, for a test for myself - and the results were terrible (worst coat he's ever had, constant shedding, dull grey coat with no shine). So I switched him back to kibble and never switched my other dogs - they all have coats and health records that I WILL put next to any raw-fed dog and they will stand equal or above them, I am positive. I can see if a dog has pre-existing health problems (allergies for instance) that raw can benefit - but for healthy dogs, good-quality kibble with no corn or wheat, works excellent.
That said, my experience with raw-fed puppies comes from seeing puppies at the vet or hearing about them being 'clogged up', impacted - with major gut problems due to bones in their guts that they cannot digest. These problems can easily be fatal! So IMO this is much more risky to the pup than not allowing them to get used to real bones from an early age. Judging on the problems I have seen and heard of (with puppies eating raw and raw bones especially) I do not recommend feeding young puppies raw bones. The benefits do not outweigh the risks, IMO.

molly

I agree with Jennifer on not feeding little chuncks of bone.

If you're worried about the pup not chewing right, but you don't want to grind everything up, the best solution is to smash the bones with a meat cleaver or something until they're all flattened and no sharp edges are remaining.
Obviously you would do this on the softer non weight bearing bones.

I did this with pork riblets when my pup was too small to chew them up. If you hack at the riblets for a bit with a cleaver (don't hit so hard that you break off pieces, just hard enough to open up the bone), they get mashed up, without breaking into pieces (you end up with one very red and very flat ribblet ).
The pup can then chew on the flattened riblets and it's easy for him. There are also no little pieces or sharp ends that could hurt him.

Of course that's a lot of work and you'll end up covered in blood, bone and meat blobs from head to toe... but little puppy will be so delighted and it will all be worth it

Lol, Molly - one dog is not much experience!
Maybe you should read how Ed and Cindy feed their dogs and pups... you may reconsider.
As for puppies getting impacted from too much bone, I guess that could happen when people follow the BARF ratios of 1/1 meat to bone (completely ridiculous if you ask me).
If people would just feed what the dog is designed to eat (what wolves eat in the wild), they would feed more meat and organs and less bones and we wouldn't hear of those problems anymore.

oh great! Now I am really scarred. I didn't think chopping them up would be worse!! GEEZ!!