I am certain that corn should not be the primary ingredient in my dog’s food but the higher end dog chows without corn are very expensive. And I’m not convinced that prepared dog chows are made with better ingredients than the whole foods I can prepare at home. I was hoping to make this in batches and freeze individual servings.
1 whole chicken or turkey (pressure cooker for speed and efficiency)
1 cup brown rice
1 can pumpkin
Debone bird. Discard skin, or leave on? Chopped coarsely, or ground? Do I grind a little bone for added calcium?
What else can I add? Chicken bullion for a little salt? Green beans? Carrots? Fish? How do I make gravy like that in wet canned dog food?
Crunchy dry dog food helps remove plaque, right? Do I offer prepared dry dog food occasionally as well?
I’ve seen both ratios of meat to vegetables, and was leaning towards more meat (rotating poultry, eggs, fish, beef) because I assumed that dogs, left to their own devices, would consume more animal products than veggies. Am I getting that wrong? What do you suggest for calcium?
Dogs will put more effort into getting meat because meat is harder to get. They’re still omnivores, though. And a whole chicken or turkey to a couple of cups of plant foods is pretty extreme.
While we’re at it, it’s probably cheaper to get just dark meat (thighs especially) than whole birds, and your dog won’t mind.
I am not a canine nutritionist, only a dog owner who has played around with some homemade recipes to augment their kibble. I was just noting that dogs do not need as much raw protein as cats. Your recipe was almost all meat.
My dogs have loved anything I made for them, even the veggies when cooked with meat (raw vegetables are another story). They generally get the same things I would eat: broccoli, cauliflower, carrots, and spinach. You can look online for more specific recommendations, but I believe that that selection was considered both safe and generally nutritious for dogs.
1/2 large container oatmeal
2 lb meat (lean ground is easiest)
2 cups veggies (frozen OK)
2 TBSP vegetable oil
Put meat and veggies in pot with 16 cups of water. Once it comes to a boil, take off the burner and add the oatmeal. Cover and let sit until the oatmeal cooks.
This would make about 8 servings for our 55-lb dog – I’d freeze some for later in the week. (She eats twice per day).
Then I’d give a Pet-tab vitamin for anything we missed. She loves it and we seemed to have no negative health issues.
I’ll give that a try, boozilu, and no disclaimers necessary. I have no doubt that whole foods will be a helpful addition to my pets’ diet so long as I change up the ingredients often. Mostly looking for advice on how to make the whole food mixture tasty and attractive to my rescues. I’ve a beloved tortie cat suffering from eosinophilic granuloma, an allergic immune response disorder that requires cortisone shots a few times per year. The effects are awful, but when it is under control her quality of life is terrific.
Thing is, we’ve never discovered the trigger. Wood and tile throughout the house, so no carpet. Few chemicals and no bug sprays allowed here, so it ain’t indoor-environmental. Probably food related, so I’m trying whole food recipes on her and the new dog in order to reduce the absolute crap that goes into most prepared commercial foods. Reading through these posts, sounds like I’ll still have to offer dry foods once per day though.
The main trigger for the eosinophilic granulomas of cats is thought to be an insect bite. Mosquitoes, fleas, any other type of insect. Just in case, make sure the cat is up to date in flea and tick prevention, and minimize the exposure to mosquitoes (they can get inside the house).
Also, some of the major allergens in food are not just the grains, but (at least in dogs) the meat (chicken). So, while a food allergy trial is a good idea, it may be that you end up feeding, in your homemade diet (for the cat), the exact trigger for the reaction. If you want to devote your energy to a food elimination trial for your cat, consult with your veterinarian.
Don’t try to reinvent the wheel with regards to pet nutrition and whole (raw) food. While I’m not a fan of it, if you’re going to do it, stick with some recipe that has bee designed, approved, or referred by a veterinarian (preferably a veterinary nutritionist).
Haven’t asked my vet, KarlGrenze, but I’ll do that. Because both my trusted vets sell prepared products, didn’t trust their unbiased opinion. But hadn’t discovered that chicken was a trigger for EG through my own online research, so that takes me back a bit. Time for vacs and flea/tick prevention, so I’ll do just that. Thanks
Edit time out: I meant to say that in many cases, the underlying reason for the eosinophilic granulomas is an insect bite. While food allergy is also a possibility, make sure that you don’t overlook other reasons.
I’m not sure specifically if they’re the trigger for EG, but it is one of the main triggers for food allergies in dogs. IIRC, the triggers for cats also included fish (which, btw, you shouldn’t feed a lot of that to cats, despite stereotype).
While it is true the vets may be more inclined towards prepared products (so am I, a vet), if you’re insistent, then perhaps they could do a search on the veterinary boards and get you some other suggestions.
If you do suspect food allergies may be part of your cat’s problems, be prepared that food trials are long (weeks to months), strict, and require more effort than just giving the cat a new batch of prepared food. OTOH, you may ask for a referral/consult to a veterinarian dermatologist (which would increase costs), who may better guide you through that.
If the recipe you provided is what you are planning to feed your dog exclusively, I would be concerned about it being out of balance for certain nutritional needs - like calcium vs phosphorus ratio or certain vitamins.
Have you considered feeding raw? There are complete prepared diets or supplements to ground meat like Urban Wolf. Raw bones or chicken backs and necks that your dog has to crunch up are much better at removing plaque than kibble.
You should be lazier, like me and most of my friends.
Cut raw whole animals into pieces appropriately sized for the intended’s jaws
Feed chunks to dogs (and/or cats), bone, organs and all
Result: healthier than average, long-lived pets which get all the nutrients and calories they need from bones, muscle, organs, and fat. Dogs (and cats to a lesser extent) can survive eating all sorts of crap due to thousands of years of eating our shit and garbage when they couldn’t get anything else, but their digestive systems are still primed for a carnivorous diet and adapt nearly effortlessly, even after many years eating a grain-based diet. Exibit A: my Kea, who is turning 15 soon and acts like a pup half her age. 6 years ago before I started raw feeding she was obese, ill, and half-crippled - all from feeding her what our vet advised. Now she’s thin, muscular, hale, and loves to run again.
Even bird bones,** rhubarbarin**? Everything I’ve found claims that bird bones can splinter and perforate the gut. I’d rather go as natural and normal as possible, because that’s how I eat. Whatever I crave: I consume. Raw, cooked, in between, and I’m fairly healthy. How do I learn which animal parts to cook, and which to offer raw?
Cooked bird bones are indeed dangerous, they splinter easily and can cause injuries to the mouth and serious internal problems.
Raw bones are totally different. Occasionally my dogs have vomited bones that have been in their stomachs for a couple hours (they swallow them in quite large pieces), and they are like soft rubber after just a short marination. Dog stomach acid is strong stuff. Personally, I don’t feed any pork bones but ribs because they seem to be naturally very sharp and brittle, and I don’t feed my big dog large, weight bearing bones (like cow legs etc) because I have heard of dogs chipping teeth trying to bear down on them. But I feed my dogs and cats a lot of raw turkey, duck, and chicken bones, they crunch them up and swallow them.
I have raw-fed my dogs and cats and several fosters for 6 years, and have many friends that have been raw-feeding for nearly as long, none of us has ever had a single issue related to raw feeding. Zero injuries, no food poisoning.
All animal parts should be offered raw IMO. Cooking makes bones unsafe and degrades or destroys some of the nutrients in meat and organs. This is important for the cat if you are not feeding her processed food, because cooking meat destroys taurine, and cats need adequate taurine to live (processed cat foods are fortified with taurine after cooking). I sometimes feed my pets eggs, and I usually give them to them cooked; raw egg whites interfere with the absorption of some B vitamins. Not likely to cause serious problems unless you eat a ton of raw egg whites, but they like their eggs scrambled best anyway.
If you are going to feed them vegetable food, it should be cooked, because that will make it more likely they will get some nutrition from it. Non-animal food just comes right out the other end of my pets even if I chop/grind/puree (it’s easy to tell when you’re familiar with raw-fed dog poop), so I don’t bother any more. I experimented a bit with cooked food and recipes before I went raw; I started raw-feeding and stuck with it for many good reasons.
