I gave her some pumpkin mixed with 1/2 of a sausage link left over from breakfast (it was greasy and she wouldn't eat the pumpkin by itself.

Last nite I gave her some mackerel (thinking oily again and I am out of ground turkey) and some pork with bone. Earlier she also had left over steak treats for training.

This am, she finally pooped a little. Still just a few little poops, but she didn't seem to strain.

For breakfast, I gave her a little mackerel and chicken wing. She ate the mackerel but not the chicken wing.

Is it possible I am offering her too much? The other day she didn't eat her am wing and I put it away until the evening meal.

Or do you think it is her body adjusting to the raw feed and she won't poop a much, now?

Well, there is definitely much less poop on raw. There is much less unusable stuff going in the front end.

I would want to see a little log more than marbles, but not straining is good.

I'd watch her "figure" and weight much more than the ounces fed.

You're doing great.

It is marbles.

Do you think I should give her the mackerel (smaller bones) for a few days? Is that the same as muscle meat?

Just a quick ps.

Due to the weather she hasn't had many walks, either.

I have been giving her more time to run thru the house. Could this be part of it?

Mackerel is still bony..... nice for the usual feeding, but right now you might want to give a couple of no-bone meals and get the poops normal.

Exercise is good for peristaltic action (poop-moving), but has only an indirect effect on the poop makeup. (That is, non pooping, from no exercise or whatever, can cause poops in the system to become compacted and hard.)

I'd revert to some boneless poultry for today and see if that returns the poops to normal.... and you had success with adding olive oil, too, right? No harm in that, IMO.

The poops will often tell you whether the diet is too bony or not bony enough.

Do you think I could cut the meat off the chicken? Does it need to be ground? You can see I am trying my best to not have to go out in the snow today.

I have a whole chicken in the fridge and I could thaw and take just the meat.

Also, we are playing fetch the ball with treats today. Maybe that will help with the lack of exercise the past few days.

I'm really starting to hate winter.

I think cutting The meat off would be fine. I would also go with just muscle meat for a few days. It is almost funny to me to see my 90#GSD poop what he use to do as a puppy on kibble or less now that he is on raw. Good luck.

Thanks, Mitch.

I guess I'll thaw the chicken and cut it off the bone.

The things we do!

I have resurrected this thread since the pup is almost over the heat and I am still experiencing feeding problems.

I have gone back and re-read all the posts and she started out real good with the raw feeding.

But now she doesn't want to eat food with bone in it.

So I am going back to ground turkey and adding things until I can hopefully get her to eat bone-in again.

I don't know if she is being a picky eater or what.

So, tonight, I mixed up about 2-3 oz ground turkey, fish oil, vit E, 1 pulverized egg shell, 1 teaspoon yogurt and 1 teaspoon squash.

Is this enough supplements?

I am worried mostly about the bone/calcium replacement.

I haven't been able to find any powdered calcium or bone meal in the whole danged town.

I bought some calcium tablets (500 mg) to pulverize but don't know how much to give her.

What amount of calcium supplement do you give. Also, I don't go thru a lot of eggs but how much egg shell per pound?

Thanks

I give OTC calcium that I buy at GNC. I think they have bone meal as well.

Have you tried grinding with bone in or cutting the chicken into small chunks with kitchen scissors?

Some dogs can be a little difficult to switch to raw feeding.

You might want to think about getting some THK and start with that and the recommend amount of fresh meat to add in and then gradually phase it out.
With a dog your size, the THK would last you quite a while.

Thanks for the reply, Carol.

We don't have a GNC (crappy small town but I love it unless I need something other that milk, bread and one-a-day vitamins).

That's why I got the calcium tablets. My theory was that I could grind them but I don't know how much dosage.

I have tried grinding the chicken but not the bone. I don't know if I have anything that will grind bone. I am starting to think she doesn't want the chicken. I also tried cutting it up into chunks, too.

She switched right away pretty good. Then when she went into heat, I started having the feeding problems, so I didn't know if it was the food or the heat, but now that she is better that way, I am just working on the feeding.

I gave her sardines yesterday pm and she seemed to like them. I offered her the rest of the sardines mixed with ground chicken this am and she just picked out a little of the sardines.

So tonight I gave her the ground turkey mixture.

At some point in time I will probably have to try the THK, but for now I would like to get her eating RMB's. The THK comes in large quanties (for a small dog, she only eats 4-5 oz per day) and I don't want to spend that much on it until I know she will eat it.

Although, it does look like I am going to have to order everything from this web site or some web site because it is even difficult to find meat with bone here. Looks like almost everything comes pre-packaged. I mean, not even a Tbone. I found some danish baby back ribs I thought I would try this week since they have a smaller bone, but it still looks a little large for her.