raw feeding has become hard!!!! dont want to give up!! Questions

hi guys

ive been feeding my jrt on a raw diet since he was 8 weeks, old, and he is now 10 months, but lately, its been very hard to get him to eat his food.

i was using basils beef
and he was doing ok, but went off it, and now im trying him on natural instinct working dog beef mix, as well as lamb lites, turkey necks, and lam necks, but still no joy

he is loosing weight, but seems happy and lively!!!!!!!!!!! full of energy.

is there any fish oil that dogs love the smell of, so i can encourage him to eat???

squeezeing out sardine oil from a tin of sardines is not practical, i was hoping that there where enticers available off the shelf?????

any help appreciated

To be honest, those pre-prepared foods are not what I call raw feeding. This is what taught me about me about raw feeding - my previous dog [who had been on kibble] decided that this was Food - and my current puppy was slowly weaned onto it after she was bottle-fed and then fed on baby food.

http://www.dogsey.com/showthread.php?t=137215

Today she will be having a frozen chicken wing for breakfast around 10am [bought fresh and frozen by me] and this evening she will be having ox lung and mixed vegetables, in a "soup" of supplements. She is 18 months old, a cross Dachshund/Minpin, and weighs ~6 kilos. No fat on her at all but with muscles that look like she is on steroids.

If you are worried about "squeezing sardine oil from a tin of sardines" why not just mix the sardines and oil in with his food?

Wanting an "enticer" off the shelf - why would you want that? Most dogs love coconut oil - it seems to be like crack cocaine to them - and it has many health benefits, but tinned sardines are just as healthy and far cheaper!

Hi I have 6 JRT's & 1 of them is a vegetarian will only eat veg & fish sometimes he will go 3-4 days without eating & the other 5 won't eat raw food full stop, I have to part cook it in gravy first, they have different dry food every day (pedigree, butchers, pro plan, wagg, laughing dog, barking heads) as they do get bored of same food every day.

All dogs [and cats] are different. Kat had tinned food and she did not care what flavour but when the brand was changed - still same labels, she went stark loony bonkers.

Little One, my Lexi, only had kibble - same one. As did Pereg until I changed her to raw. And she knew which refrigerator and/or freezer everything was.

Tikva? Like Pereg, I alternate her morning bone meal and apart from the vegetables, also her evening meat meal. Not that she would care. Food is FOOD. Like gimmee gimmee gimmee. Kibble is much easier to feed, just tip some into a bowl, but I must be a masochist wanting to feed raw as I learned it from Tamimoor on Dogsey.

Just to add to the above - there is no way I would go back to feeding kibble or any other type of food. One of the advantages is that whatever poultry/meat/fish I buy for Tikva, and for Pereg before her, means that we both eat the same. It is just that I cook mine and she has hers raw!

No dog I've had besides Nigredo would eat raw. My previous dog would eat raw ground beef every now and then. Usually, he didn't want it. I MIGHT be able to afford raw for my 90 - 100 lb dog if I loaded it full of veggies. But then, not only will he not eat veggies, dogs are not plant eaters and I firmly believe that isn't a proper diet. I will only feed prey model raw and don't own a dog small enough for me to afford it.

The other dog that lives here is 13-14 years old and aside from mammary tumors linked to age and not spaying, has not had any health issues. My last dog lived to almost 16 with no health issues at all until his final year on a diet almost exclusively Pedigree chicken canned food as that's all he'd eat, plus apple, blue berries, and other sweets he wasn't supposed to have. He'd pick over that, refusing it sometimes and was skinny his entire life.

My cat was 11 before she disappeared, and had urinary issues. They resolved with grain free cat food. No other issues. The other cat is 17-18 on nothing but regular cat food and has almost no health issues. Mild asthma that developed a year or two ago. No cat we've had except my most recent kitten will touch raw.

I would first establish whether his lack of interest in food is due to the food he is offered or simply he has other things on his mind? Like adolescence! Full of hormones, newly discovered confidence, pushing the boundaries.....

Best feeding enticer is hunger. Cheap, easily available. Have you tried it?

thanks for all the replys guys

was at the vets yesterday, because rex wasen't his normal self, slow, un intrested, getting sick, he has since perked up, but the vet said that he had gastro enteritus, with was due to the raw feeding.
he has been placed on prescription food made by hills, called id, and some other probiotic paste for the next week, to see how he gets on

if he still seems off, then they will have to do blood tests for pancreas problems, (witch the vet said was highly unlikely!!!

but its now looking like raw food does not agree with rex

can anyone recommend a tinned dog food off the shelf, that would be safe to feed my dog, as all the bad press these dog foods are getting is putting me off just about everything

There is Lily's Kitchen which are organic but cost significantly more than other brands, or you could try Original Chappie, which lots of kennels and vets recommend for upset tums. I don't use tins often, but my own standby is the original Butchers Tripe, - the loaf, not the gravy varieties. Cheap as chips but I have never come across a dog that didn't love it.

http://www.dogfoodadvisor.com/dog-food-reviews/wet/

Interesting. Hills Prescription Diet I/D Canine Digestive Care canned dog food is not rated due to its intentional therapeutic design.

Barking head do tin dog food as well as dry food.

thanks caroleC,

Do you think i can have the chappie for upset tums as his everyday food, or just to get over the upset tum period?

cheers 6jrts, would this food be ok as a food for life???

thanks gsd, good info there

At one time Chappie was used as a basic food as it does have coarse cereal in it, and so could be classed as complete. These days, there are better quality foods available, and I think most people use it to get over a digestive problem. I don't think I would use any of the tinned foods on their own on a permanent basis.
Have you thought of trying Jack on one of the wet tray foods? There are several brands available, and lots of different meat and fish varieties. Chicken allergy is not rare in dogs, so if you think there is a possibility that this might have been a problem, try choosing a protein source which is new to him, such as salmon, duck or lamb.

what breed is Rex?

For sensitive tums I'd give Butchers a try. It's a good food, decent price and seems to be good for a lot of sensitive digestions.

If allergy related, you'd need to find which ingredient he's allergic to. An elimination diet works well for this. With my girl, a sniff of chicken and she's ill.

Just thinking. If Rex has been on this ready-prepared "raw" food and your vet says he now has gastro-enteritis at 10 months old - sorry but it seems that your vet just wants to sell you the food that he is paid to sell and which he gets paid by the food company to promote. The majority of vets have very little nutritional knowledge and what they have depends on which manufacturer of "prescription" foods have given them the very little knowledge about nutrition during their training.

For a ten-month-old dog who has been fed on the same food since he was eight-weeks-old to suddenly develop gastro-enteritis... I would wonder why my vet was saying it was because of the "raw" food you had been giving him.

Yes they have different food for puppies to senior dogs which can be used everyday, I have their Salmon dry food for 1 of my dogs

Naturesmenu do a range of grain free tinned food called Country Hunter, which I will feed one of my dogs if he comes out of boarding kennels with a poorly tummy.