Your dog is a carnivore, a meat eater and not designed to eat corn, wheat, and whatever else they put into dry or canned dog food. Corn is man made, not natures own – and humans haven’t evolved to eat it, let alone dogs, so why are so many vets pushing corn as a good protein source for dogs?
Feeding raw used to be easy, basic meat, bone and organs, that’s all. However, with the popularity of raw feeding exploding, many people are trying to lead the way with opinions about how to feed raw. This is near causing a war, and it’s hurting dogs and their owners. I couldn’t imagine trying to dip a toe in to learn it now. Lets get into it.
Prey Model Raw is exactly what it sounds like. The dog eats whole prey and nothing more, well, that’s what it’s supposed to be but now equates more to B.A.R.F feeding. When we say whole prey, you’re not expected to feed your dog an entire deer in the back yard. The proteins are chopped down to 80% meat, 10% organs and 10% bone. And all balanced out over time. Stop freaking out about having balanced meals in every sitting, it’s not possible.
https://perfectlyrawsome.com/raw-feeding-knowledgebase/prey-model-raw-diet-pmr-adult-dogs/
B.A.R.F – Biologically Appropriate Raw Food is similar, but tacks on supplements and vegetables into the dogs diet. Dogs tend not to digest raw vegetables, you can cook and puree them to give the animal some benefit. I feed veg mostly as a filler.
https://rawbistro.com/blogs/raw-bistro/barf-diet-for-dogs
Some of the issues we are seeing now is supplements, and this is where the confusion lay – and it’s getting a little dangerous. Supplements are just that – supplements for anything missing in the dogs diet. However, most owners have never pulled a blood test to check the dogs levels, but lets feed it anyway.
Kelp, to feed or not to feed. Yes, Kelp contains iodine, but you probably don’t know exactly what is in the kelp you’re buying. Kelp harvested worldwide contains different levels of iodine, some low, some high. But why are people feeding kelp willy nilly – when they don’t even know if the dog is deficient in iodine? That’s dangerous and foolish. Too much iodine can damage your dogs thyroid – and the thyroid is one of the most important organs in the body.
Liver. The bane of my existence. I watch trainers and owners shovelling liver into a dogs mouth and it drives me batty. Liver is high in iron and vitamin A. High iron can lead to what’s called hemochromatosis. Vitamin A load can create what’s called hypervitaminosis A. Both can cause irreversible damage long term.
I’ll be editing this article later to add more – but people really need to read and understand that you can love your dog to death – or injury.