Species Appropriate Raw Feeding
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I wanted to address something that has become a big part of my world, and it’s something that I would NEVER have done prior to late 2014. Feeding my animals raw. There is NO way I was ever going to feed my dogs raw. Not a chance.
In my head I was picturing myself butchering, and putting it all together. The bacteria and salmonella that I’d heard about scared me for my young childrens sakes. I didn’t want to be kissed by a dog that had just eaten raw food!!! I was certain that if anything, it would be very dangerous.
Fast forward to the Fall 2014. I did it. Yes, I started feeding raw.
It was instigated after having paid $1300 for a dental on one of my dogs Niko. I had 3 little dogs at the time, and I knew i didn’t want to pay that ever again. Hence, raw became my only option to avoid that down the road. Plus, if I was willing to drop $1300 at the vet, how much raw would that buy me? My dogs would be set for years! By now, I had begun to extensively look into raw, learning the health benefits, and how with feeding my dogs and cats a species appropriate diet, I could possibly add years and years to their lives! I almost felt bad that I’d waited so long and allowed the ‘fear mongering’ out there on Dr Google dissuade me from feeding raw. Plus my vets didn’t encourage it whatsoever.
I didn’t understand it then, but I came to see that healthy pets, equals less for the vets. Hmmm. It began to make sense! And all that about not wanting to be kissed by a raw fed dog? But yet I was completely ok with them kissing me after cleaning themselves in their Netherlands? That never even crossed my mind!!! I did not know that dogs actually have very clean mouths, in spite of what they lick and eat.
Now, I’m going to start first by saying this, nutrition is key in our animals lives for health, longevity and wellness. Dogs and cats are carnivores. Meat eaters. Like the wolf. They will thrive on a species appropriate diet. (You wouldn’t feed an owl carrots and wheat and expect it to thrive, it wouldn’t even survive on that!) So we HAVE to feed them according to what they are. Carnivores. Meat.
Sadly, the kibble world has taken over, and people have believed for generations that kibble is healthy or ‘good’ for dogs. Feeding our dogs an empty diet with starches and emptiness, has become the norm. Because that’s what the commercials tell us. Kibble is good. And unless we educate ourselves on nutrition for animals, we won’t know any better and follow the masses who feed kibble. (I always say ‘if kibble is so good, why don’t humans eat it???!!!’)
There are five big No No’s in pet food. Corn, rice, potato, wheat, and tapioca. Peas can also be a No No, unless they are preceded or followed with garbanzo or lentil beans. Then, the carbs of the peas get ‘cancelled’ out. But if there are peas on their own, it’s a starch.
Starches become sugar, sugar becomes yeast. Yeast is the #1 contributor towards health issues and conditions. Allergies, auto immune, digestive, fur/coat/shedding, mobility etc etc. From A-Z, yeast is a contributor. And yet, starches have a huge role in pet foods. Meats don’t. Even meat ‘meals’ aren’t dried meat as we may have thought.
https://truthaboutpetfood.com/
Truly, we have been SO very deceived by the pet food industry and the marketing behind them. To get a really big eye opener to what this all entails, I suggest to watch Pet Fooled on You Tube. It’s a documentary about the farces in the pet food industry. You will learn things that will change the way you feed your current pets and future ones. And, have an understanding of what a species appropriate diet is all about. It’s actually very disheartening to see what all goes on and is allowed into our pets foods, being terribly deceived. Pet Fool’d is definitely worth the watch.
https://youtu.be/5XC1rUWWnxI?
Feeding our loved pets a ‘clean’ diet, will make all the difference in their health, longevity, dental, and well being. To begin with, a raw fed animal will absorb 90% of that nutrition. That’s a drastic change from what they receive on a processed/commercial diet. We have all had the dogs and cats who are constantly begging for anything you might be eating. Following you around everywhere hoping to get something. And it makes sense as to why they are doing it. They are always hungry. And not only does this affect their physical health, but also their mental health. Being in a constant state of hunger, drastically affects their brain too. Dogs that have anxiety, oftentimes it’s literally just hunger.
We know how we get when we are hungry, our moods can be considered ‘hangry’ and we are not pleasant to be around. But as soon as we get some nutrition into us, it all changes. This is exactly the same for the animals. The old cliche saying of ‘feed the body, feed the mind’ is very applicable. When having an absorption of 90%, it then begins to change the animals completely, and usually you will see the changes within a day. And, after about 5-6 days of only getting raw, the bowel movements will have changed over to only 10% coming back out. One of the biggest call backs I get from people is that they are worried that their animal is constipated, due to only a small amount coming out, and usually dry. This is where I always ask, ‘is it about 90% less of what it used to be?’, and of course, the answer is yes. The other concern people have, is noticing that there is a lot less water consumption. This, is also completely normal due to the high moisture content in the raw feedings. They will need less water as they are getting so much out of their diet.
How does one change dogs over to raw is a big question I get asked. And the answer is simple, go straight to it. No transition period at all.
The way that I look at it, is that when going to a raw diet, we are going to the ‘good’. Why would we want to keep on with the ‘bad’ (kibble)? We don’t. Myself, having taken in hundreds of dogs over the past 12+ years, I have never had a transition period. From the moment those dogs come in, they are on raw. Which, is crucially important as the only dogs that come to me, are the sick, dying and given up on ones. I’ve had dogs who were immobile for years, dogs whose allergies and auto immune disorders had them scheduled for euthanasia, or dogs who had such horrible digestive issues that nobody wanted them in their homes due to the messes. The most recent, was a border collie who’d spent almost a year of being bounced around from foster home to foster home, constantly at the vet, and was unable to have solid bowel movements, and left terrible explosions of messes. He arrived to me on a Sunday; and had an appointment for being crossed over on Thursday. The rescue he was with, could not afford the endless vet bills, with no end in sight. He came to me as a last resort.
I immediately started him on a raw diet, Nzymes regimen (granules, OxE drops, Blackleaf and BacPak) and colloidal silver. I only endured one day of the explosions in my house, and by Tuesday, he was beginning to have solid bowel movements!!! It all changed that drastically. He didn’t go to his appointment that Thursday, and instead, I was able to adopt him out that Friday. He is still to this day doing fantastic, and remains on the raw food regimen.
What I have seen with these very sick and unwell dogs, having at the beginning in 2013 and 2014, only used kibble, I NEVER saw the drastic turn arounds and changes as I did when I began feeding raw. It is night and day difference. Which truly proves, that when we feed these animals a clean, balanced species appropriate diet, we can change their outcome and longevity very quickly.
Now there are times where the dogs and cats don’t want to eat raw. They don’t know what it is, and are apprehensive to try. But this is where the ‘tough love’ approach comes in. When it comes down to it, we know what is best for them, and we have to persevere and not let them ‘win’ so to speak and cave and put them back on the processed kibble. The longest I had a dog not want to eat, was 5 days. He refused to eat. He wouldn’t even give it a try. But, everyday I’d put his bowl down for him, and when all the others were done eating, I’d pick his bowl up, and we’d try again the next day. I was not worried at all that he went that long without food. He was a very overweight black lab, and could afford to lose some pounds. Plus, I know, when they get hungry enough, they’ll eat. And he did. On the 6th day, he took a sniff, a couple of little nibbles, and then he devoured it! I had zero issues trying to get him to eat after that. He too, to this day is still a raw fed pup.
So, if there is resistance with changing over to the raw diet, just have patience. You can pretend to eat from it first, and then offer it to them. You can also lightly cook the meat, (in a frying pan NOT microwave) and then every few days cook it less and less and before you know it, the dog will be raw fed and not even know it!!!
Dogs are much easier to transition, whereas cats can be more of a challenge. But this too, can be achieved.
Cats, need to get 85% of their moisture from food. Regardless of how much water they drink, 85% has to come from their diet. Otherwise, they end up with the #1 health issue in cats, which is UTI’s and stones.
This is as a result of endless dehydration from kibble. The vets won’t tell us this, as again, there is no money for them with healthy animals. But to change them to raw, all that is needed is a good quality wet food. Start off with feeding one can of it, and then for the next can, take out a 1/4 of it, and replace it with raw meat. After two days of this, take out 1/2 of the can and replace the 1/2 with meat.
After a few days of that, then take out 3/4 of the canned food, and use the raw meat. By the time a week rolls around, that cat could be 100% raw fed, and not even care that their food has been transitioned over. Of course there are cats who are terribly fussy and picky, and the transition time may need to drawn out longer, but they will adapt. Sometimes patience is key. You know what’s best, and that’s again where the tough love approach will win in the end.
Lastly, please keep in mind that just as with kibble/processed foods, there is good, and bad raw foods available. There are some raw food companies who cut corners and do not use human grade meats in their foods.
They may claim that their food comes from a ‘human grade facility’ but that is NOT the same as human grade meats. All that means is that they are using the ingredients not fit for human consumption from within their facility. But in saying so, there are many, many raw foods available companies that are federally regulated and abide to the 9’s with the food they are producing.
If you see that the company is federally inspected and certified, then you know it’s a top notch one. However, if you would rather make your own raw food diets for your animals, then that is easily done by going online and searching for the BARF diet (Biological Appropriate Raw Food).
You can easily follow those recipes to ensure you are giving a balanced diet. A balanced diet consists of meat, organ and bone content. And what may seem like a daunting and overwhelming task, will become easy in no time. I remember thinking that I would never find this easy, and now, I can’t imagine any other way and it is super easy. Plus to see right before your eyes, the drastic change in their eyes, coats, energy, stamina, and their overall health, is SO rewarding. To watch the dogs sing and dance in anticipation for you to put that meal down for them, to hear them devouring it, is truly music to my ears, and is my favorite part of all. There is no way I’d ever go back to the processed emptiness of kibble.
This will be a journey that will have no regrets. I only wish I had done it sooner and not allowed the fear mongering to get to me. I allowed the vet to scare me about the bacteria, salmonella and E. coli. But what they conveniently left out? Was that you only need to worry about such if you feed rotten meat!!! However even with that, a dog could be lost in the woods and come across a rotting deer carcass for example, and eat from that, filled with maggots and whatnot, and have no issue at all. Carnivores. Their bodies are adept to such. And, I have over the years forgotten about food thawing outside in the summer, and it’s gone rotten. I refuse to lose 5lbs of food, and I still fed it to my dogs, and you know what happened? Absolutely nothing. Nothing made them sick, or any digestive issues at all.
So again, the fear mongering is nothing more than to try and scare us away from feeding our carnivores a species appropriate diet! The benefits alleviate any hesitation or concern. What you put in, you get back out. And for weakened, unwell animals, giving their bodies what they truly need, the rewards are worth it.
For dental health? Teeth will become clean and plaque and tarter will dissolve. I have an 11 year old Chihuahua who has been raw fed since she was 8 months old. Her teeth are white like chiclets, and I know I’ll never have to spend a dime on dental work for her. I have taken in dogs who had terrible teeth, loose and rotting away. For them, I’ll use frozen chicken backs, and usually in a short period of time, because of the gnawing on those chicken backs, those teeth will have fallen out. To ensure no infections, they’ll also get colloidal silver right in their raw meals to help combat that. But I’ve had foster dogs who have come in needing thousands of dollars in dental work, and I have yet to ever spend a dime on it. Simply with a few months of raw and chicken backs, it all takes care of itself.
If you need or want any help with choosing a raw diet for your pets, please don’t hesitate to reach out. I will be more than happy to assist you in making this transition for your loved pets.
Brenda J
Don’t Stop Believing!!!