can add ground beef with kibble. - Page 1

currently my feeding for my gal which is 10mos. :

i feed her royal canin with hokamix and atleast two times a week i mix with yogurt and eggs with shell.

other times it will be mixed with hokamix and innova canned like two tablespoon and water to make gravy.

But i'm thinking to add vertex/hokamix/salmon oil and little bit of  raw ground beef every meal with her royal canin kibble.

would this be fine.

as i think just to completely be in barf diet would be hard for novice like me so i thought to do this way at the start or i should be better off not giving raw ground beef.

also, i feed her knucle bones ones a week and she will have loose stools. i introduced to her when she was 6mos old and until after 4 mos past still the same.

should i stop or keep on introducing her raw knucle bones?

would be glad to hear any comments.

thanks

If you are feeding a complete kibble your dog will not require anything else and you can actually cause more trouble by over feeding nutrients.

The upset stomach you are getting is most probably a result of the fat content in the knuckles.

The raw diet is not hard to do and there is lots of information out there on the web including on www.barfworld.com however you really need to decide one way or the other.  Some GSD's are prone to being very intolerant of high fat levels and for this reason you need to be consistent in what you are feeding otherwise it can lead to further problems.

Be careful feeding a raw food with or after a kibble:  Raw digests much faster than kibble and can cause a blockage if fed incorrectly.

BARF diets include species-inappropriate foods and are mostly ground up and mixed.  Look into a species appropriate raw diet that is very simple.  Here are the receipes that you'll need:  http://rawfeddogs.net/Recipes.

My favorite recipe for starting dogs out with raw is to buy a  couple of 10 pound packages of chicken leg quartes from WalMart and then feed the dog chicken only for a couple of weeks until I'm sure there is no intestinal upset.  Then I start with little bits of another food an gradually increase that until I'm sure the food can be handled and then I start a new food.

Knuckle bones are too large for dogs and regularly cause broken and chipped teeth.

Runny stool can come from:  Too much food or too much fat.  This occurs in any dog,

I urge you too better understand raw feeding before fearing the difficulty.  Raw feeding is easy and the increased health of dogs will far outweigh what can be provided by kibble - no matter what the cost.

 I started with raw food a couple of weeks ago after trying some of the most premium brands of food to no avail with one of my young dogs. Right down to the dehydrated stuff. Finally after spending a couple hundred dollars at the vet to once again try to rule out parasites, I just went to walmart and bought chicken leg quarters and handed my dog one and we're not looking back. He has FINALLY gained more weight and his stools are better then ever. I HAD 2 raw fed dogs for a couple of years but my mom at that point was the one feeding them, so I am having to do more research on my own. But I already knew the benefits etc. I have my 2 young dogs on it (my older dogs stayed on their premium kibble...if it aint broke don't fix it ya know?) and they look great. Wish I had just jumped sooner rather then fuss over it. 

I have tried a bit of beef, and some liver as well as eggs and yesterday we tried some sardines. Having a hard time finding some stuff, I don't have a spare freezer yet so can't do much bulk, most of it I get from walmart as well as any market that carries something. Lately I've been getting whole fryers and having them quartered and feeding those to my boys which they handle just fine. I also add vetraceuticals (those that know me know that I posted on this before) because I love the stuff. It's got the kelp and alfalfa, coenzyme q10, spirulina, probiotics etc already in it and they were doing MUCH better when I added that to the kibble, but I wanted even better then they were so switched to raw as well. I'm so pleased I just did it. (as Nike says "just do it"). 

From what I understand adding stuff to kibble that's not formulated to go with it can have more negative effects, ie throw off calcium/phosphorous ratio etc. If were going to go that route might as well get a raw diet "starter" and go from there. Honest Kitchen makes that Preferance...if wanted to mix but concerned about the switch maybe just start with that. 

thank you all

eventhough if i add like two tablespoon to three per meal with ground beef would make a difference.

i thought instead of using canned food just to wet her kibble can i use ground beef instead?

or should i just leave it to kibble completely?

kool - it would be best to go all raw and avoid the kibble. 

It has to be one or the other.

I have been adding natural ground beef in my dog's kibble for almost a year now.   But I supplement with Canine Complete. Have never had a problem.  To me that is the perfect way to introduce your dog to Raw.  You will see how much he loves it then you can gradually make the switch.  The other thing ground beef is real easy for him to digest.  When I first started it he would inhale the ground beef and pick at the kibble every now and then,  So I continued to add more raw meat over time.

I use ground chuck instead of the ground beef because it has less fat....to start off a new pup....then later after 6 months on raw  you can go to the normal hamburger kind......less fat is better on kidneys and pancreas to start a young dog on...

Ideally the raw food is going to be big, not ground.  Ground foods offer no physical, mental or dental benefits.  In fact, ground foods may actually get caught between the teeth, which may lead to decay and offensive odors.

To offer the animal the best challenge, serve large cuts of meat that the animal has to figure out how to eat, work to consume and earn the benefits that come from eating something large (physical and mental challenge and cleansing of dentition).

I'm on dog number six converting to raw and have always used a rapid change over with chicken leg quarters (WalMart - $.47/lb).  This has offered no digestive issues.  One dog complained for a day, but then realized the chicken was food and has never looked back.

I feed ground for two reasons:  We layout hamburger to fix for us and something happens where we forget about it, so it goes to the dogs or I get a ground mixture from the butcher that is used as a filler when feeding larger cuts of meat.