Chad, are you familiar with Oregon Tilth? When I speak of Organic, I'm speaking of Oregon Tilth Certified. They have very high standards. You can read them on their publications page, if you have Adobe Acrobat.
http://www.tilth.org/index.html

I was not familiar with org. I checked out there web-site but couldn't find the complete Act for food regulations. The organic act still allows for the use of non-prohibited drugs and antibiotics - I couldn't get to the parts of the Act that would list what these are. There are probably substantially less anitbiotics residues in this meat, but chances are there are still some. Do they sell meat with this cert. outside of OR?

As regards possible mineral or other deficiencies, Chad listed (in a private email to me) three not-very-expensive blood panels that could be done every 6 months to a year if you were really worried about this. I'll probably have this done at least once, just to make sure. Chad, how about posting that recommendation here? Might even change a vet's mind about BARF if he or she saw "scientific" evidence that it was working.

(It's ironic that one possible reason why many vets don't support BARF is simply because they don't often see BARF-fed animals because the animals are so healthy!)

I was able to transition my dog to raw in about a week--he's a year old. I just got a second dog, and she has taken about the same amount of time. So for me, that year/week rule of thumb seems to hold.

Shandar, I have never heard that "antibiotics shut down the immune system for 6 months." What's your source?
From what little I know about the action of antibiotics, I can't see why they'd have that kind of effect on the immune system. For that matter, if your immune system shuts down, you die, so I assume your statement was hyperbolic. Is there evidence that antibiotics _weaken_ the immune system--and not just by preventing challenges that would exercise it?

The tests I mentioned:
Plasma minerals - Looking at Ca and P levels will give you an indicator of bone status, levels of trace minerals also very help full. Ideally, analysis by inductively coupled plasma spectrophotometry (this method is often used in soil and water analysis since it can detect many different minerals in a single sample run, and has a sensitivity greater than 1 ppb for some minerals.

Plasma Urea Nitrogen - Can be used as an idicator of amino acid status of the animal (diet).

And I'll have to apologize, I don't remember what the third test was.

This is a really great discussion. I am learning a lot. Dave, thanx for bringing up the blood tests. That makes it even less scary....

Chad, read the OTCO Standards Manual, on the Publications page. This goes beyond the Act and into specific Oregon Tilth standards. I'm sure you'll still have some unanswered questions, but this should give you more info. Yes, there are farmers and ranchers outside of Oregon who are OT Certified.

Dave,

I know from people that in patients on long term antibiotic therapy the WBC's will cease to go to a Specific site of infection. The remainder of the system stays intact. I think part of the issue is that as the infectious bacteria start to die out the WBC's no longer need to phagocitize the bacteria to neutralize it. We see this in patient with chronic infetions that have been on long term (>3 months) IV antibiotics.

Richard, that's interesting. I assume that such an outcome is not likely in the case of the usual 7- or 10-day regimen of oral antibiotics.

No, it happens with several week courses of IV antibiotics.

OK, they are now on entirely BARF for dinner, but still doing the Solid Gold dry kibble for breaky.
I'm just wondering how much I should be feeding them, and what proportions I should use for the meat, veggies, eggs, etc?
I've been adding yogurt with acidophilus; does this have any benefit, or should I just drop that?
Also, if I'm still feeding kibble for breakfast, do I need to use supplements?
And, what is the molasses and the kelp powder for?
Just have lots of questions. Thanks for all the help! I didn't think it was possible for my dogs to love me any more than they already did, but I think they actually might, believe it or not!
I'm also planning on getting a food processor so I can make bigger batches. I've been chopping and grating by hand.....