Hi,

I was reading another thread regarding raw diet and thought I'd post and see whether anything needs tuning up in my dogs daily fare, or maybe get some suggestions on different food items.

Dog stats:
- 70 lbs
- 3 to 5 miles of walking per day
- occasional jog, beer at the pub or other fun stuff
- fed once per day in the morning

Here is a typical daily meal (appx 1.5 lbs total)

Meaty bones
1 x Bone-in chicken breast +
2 x Chicken necks or 1 x chicken back +
1/4 to 1/2 lb ground chuck or occasionally ground turkey or sardeens

I sometimes just use all backs and necks instead of a bone-in breast.

Other
1 x egg w/shell
3 x pumps Salmon oil
2 x vitamin E gels
1 x tsp vitamin C powder
2 x tsp kelp/alfalfa mix (appx 3 times per week)

Things I have not fed:
- Pulped veggies
- Pork
- Organs (he gets some organ meat from the chic backs, correct?)

He needs to lay off the beer. Dogs are rowdy drunks.....animals.

I'd probably add pork in the rotation. Since it is new, start small.

Organs need to be added. At least some liver. Other organs when you can find them. Definitely start small with those. Too much can trigger diarrhea.

There are some organs on chicken backs, but not enough for your dog. Maybe a ferret, but not your 70 lb.er.

For veggies, I'd also try to toss some in there every now and then.

They can come in the form of vegetable matter stuck on tripe, pulped veggies, previously frozen veggies, baby food, or your leftover scraps.

They are a TINY part of the diet. That said, they are still part of the diet, IMO.

My dog's veggies come from my leftover green beans, squash, okra, or whatever else we might have.

I don't make a big fuss over them, but do feed them when they are there. It ain't gonna hurt nothin'.

I agree with Michael that the 2 things that I'd recommend are to start including organ meat regularly, in small amounts--and to continue to aim for as much variety as you can in the protein sources. Different parts of a chicken aren't really variety; chicken's chicken, more or less.

It's perfectly fine to base a diet on chicken (I do)--but then try to rotate in a variety of other meats that you can find, even if they only get something "exotic" once in a while. Pork's an easy one--cheap and readily available. Other things you can probably find include venison, rabbit, duck, goat, mutton, lamb, bison, quail, tilapia, goose---you get the idea.

I'm not saying your dog needs to eat all these things on a regular basis---but a nutritionally complete raw diet has variety as one of it's foundations. My dogs get free venison seasonally, and I've been able to find a good source for duck necks--so these things are out there, and don't have to break the bank. All these meats are more expensive than chicken...but you don't have to feed your dog lamb chops. As an example, there's a lamb farmer that brings his products to one of the local farmer's markets. I asked him about all the parts he's not selling--tongues, hearts, necks, etc. And now he brings me those items. He's happy to make a little on his waste; my dogs are happy to eat lamb. They don't care what part it is.

Even if you could regularly rotate the 5 easy things: chicken, turkey, beef, pork, canned fish--that would be great. An occasional raw egg adds another protein source (or if you want to feed eggs more regularly, just cook them. They're still a fine protein source even when cooked.) And yogurt is yet another protein source.

Michael & Tracy - Thanks.

My local grocery store has a good selection of beef and poultry parts so it should be easy to start incorporating some variety into the diet.

Questions:
- Chicken feet ok?
- Gizzards ok?
- For pork and other red meats, do you feed bone-in or boneless?
- Is one raw egg per day too much?

Chicken feet are good--- my dogs love them. But there's not much meat on them. Just a crunchy treat.

Gizzards are a very cheap source of muscle meat. Mine eat lots of gizzards. But, again, since it's also chicken it's not really a different protein source if most of the diet is chicken RMB.

Pork neck bones and ribs and shoulder are generally consumable by a larger dog. But mostly, I use beef and pork as muscle meat (no bones). There aren't any or many bones on a cow that most dogs can consume. Since it's so easy to provide RMBs as poultry, I find that the "variety" usually comes from the muscle meat.

Chicken feet are fine, but remember they are ALL bone. You'll have to play around with meat to bone to get it right with those. I'd probably keep them as treats unless they ate really cheep.

For pork, bone in or out is fine. Pork ribs are good, but can be a little small for a large dog, IMO. Feeding a larger portion of the rack vs. individual ribs corrects that problem.

Otherwise, it is fine to mix boneless pork with a boney meal like chicken backs or necks. Once again, you'll have to play around a little to get the meat to bone right for your individual dog. Start small and gradually add meat to the meals until the poo meets your standards.

Gizzards are good, too. Feed in muscle meat proportions.

I'm not sure about the eggs that often.