Doom Nuggets: The Cereal Killer - Page 2

A stool culture WAS done, and I had Camplyobacter jejuni,  a bacteria which is very very common in raw chicken. It is one of the most common causes of food borne illness, and is a reportable disease. I had to give Health Canada all the info on the restaurant where I ate, and have a second culture done before I went back to work to prove that I was free of the bacteria. (I was working as a nurse at the time, so it was very important that I not pass this bug on to my patients.)

Chickens are processed at a young age, that's true. However, I believe the cooked bones are softer than the raw ones. I can easly crunch the ends with my teeth. I don't try it with the raw ones for obvious reasons (see above) but having deboned raw chicken, I know that they feel harder, and are difficult to separate from one another.

One of my GSDs ate a cooked chicken leg bone someone had tossed on the ground. The next day she seemed to be in pain, so I took her to the vet. The x-ray showed no sign of the bone, but the vet found she had a serious problem with arthritis in her back, and that was what was causing her to be in pain. I never saw the bone pass in her stool, so I assume it was completely digested!

Again, anecdotal evidence...my dogs frequently steal cooked chicken bones off my plate or from the garbage if I'm not careful, and none of them has ever had any ill effects from it. I wouldn't bet on the same thing happening with bones from
a mature chicken, though. Once the growth plates on the bones are closed, the bones become much harder.

As for you talking about 'informed people' knowing better, well, I'm afraid you'll find your average dog owner hasn't a clue about dog nutrition.    I'm sure many don't realize that a wild wolf eats far more than the muscle meat from its kill. When Farley Mowat wrote his famous book about wolves, he found that during the summer, the wolves ate mainly small rodents like mice and lemmings. These were gulped down whole. Since lemmings and mice are herbivores, the wolf was getting its vegetables second-hand. But those (like yourself) who have REALLY taken the time to study raw feeding know this, and either include veggies in the diet, or feed tripe...

As for that dessicated duck bone, drying hardens bones, and makes them likely to splinter. Cooked bones are soft. I am currently feeding one of my dogs Merrick's Wingdings, which contains whole chicken wings, gravy and vegetables. The bones have been softened by a special cooking process, so they pose no risk.

I am glad we can talk about this in a civil manner, though I know neither of us is likely to change our minds....

um...you're not a dog, hence the bacteria you were sick from would more than likely not affect a dog in the slightest.  not sure what one has to do with the other.

secondly, cooking and drying does the same thing to bones.  it's a heating process, and it makes the bones dry and brittle.  if the dog just likes to chew and crunch into little pieces, no, he probably won't be affected, but if you give a whole cooked wing or leg to a dog and he just chomps once and swallows, the bone may (not will, but may) splinter in sharp pieces and cause harm.

again, you chewing on the bone is not the same as a dog chewing (because dogs technically don't chew, they chomp and swallow).

and informed people are just those people that research, ask questions, pay attention, and want to be involved in changing their dog's diet.  not someone who hears raw feeding, and gives a stripped marrow bone to an aggressive chewer.  most people will ask for advice when or before starting a raw diet.  

but that's why i'm here...to inform the average dog owner.

the little prey animals that the wolf may consume are really too small to carry any real quantity of plant material.  and whatever plant material they carry has already been digested.  a wolf will also eat the tripe of a larger animal, but not its contents (you can contact the wolf sanctuary in nj about this as well), unless there is absolutely nothing left to eat.  when there is nothing left to eat, they will eat whatever is around just to stay alive, grass, berries, poop, etc.

no, i don't feed plant material.  my dogs, and most of the dogs that i have helped switch, do much better without it.  if i feed veggies to my gsd, he will get gunky ears within 2 or 3 days.  he does eat tripe for chewing and teeth cleaning benefits, but there's nothing really in it since it's rinsed.  

Yes, I'm not a dog, but I realy don't care to handle raw meat that contains bacteria which can make me very, very sick. I do eat chicken, but I am careful to wash my hands and anything else it's come into contact with after handlling it.  I don't like the thought of my dog eating raw chicken, then licking my face or hands. [shrug] To ceach their own, eh? 

Some people won't buy turtles as pets for their kids, because they can carry salmonella. Well, turtles don't lick your face, and usually aren't all over the house the way our dogs are. I am not paranoid about germs, but given the crowded unsanitary conditions under which our livestock is raised and slaughtered, I think it's much safer to feed my dogs cooked meat.

 Dogs came from Wolves. end of story 

....and we came from apes!  If you follow that thread of logic, we should be out there swinging from the trees and eating fruits and leaves!

Okay dogs are more closely related to wolves than we are to the chimp, but still natural selection and the changes brought about by man in the different breeds means our dogs have changed a great deal since branching off from the wolf.  10,000 years of being fed tablescraps and raiding garbage piles has caused a lot of changes in the dog's digestive system.

Did you know that there are dogs in China being raised for food that are fed nothing but processed grains?  I'm not saying they are healthy, with nice, shiny coats, but they can live on such a diet.  It would be interesting to see if a wolf could.

we don't need to be swinging from trees to benefit from eating fruits and leaves.  that's where you're missing the point.  of course i can survive on eating mc donalds for the rest of my life, but the health effects of that diet would more than likely kill me.  we aren't meant to eat processed foods either.

i suggest you also educate yourself on the research done by Dr. Weston Price...showing what "agriculture" and processed garbage food has done to peoples' health.

the dogs digestive system hasn't changed.  the dog as an omnivore idea came around in the 1950's when the first pet foods were made.  if they were omnivores, they wouldn't be classified as carnivores.

Dogs are so much like wolves physiologically that they are frequently used in wolf studies as a physiological model for wolf body processes (Mech, L.D. 2003. Wolves: Behavior, Ecology, and Conservation).

when you get down to brass tacks, as you've stated above, it's your fear of bacteria that's guiding your judgement on this subject.

ARG, humans did NOT come from apes, we share a common ANCESTOR with apes.
One of my pet peeves, sorry.

 

Anecdotal ;-) and more related to the OP topic:

My dog had chronic diarrhea for a year and couldn't keep a good weight. We tested for everything. Not EPI, not allergies or intolerance, not parasites or infection (tried multiple drug therapies)...I had tried every highly rated food on the market from evo to wellness and so on. I finally got tired of scraping diarrhea off the walls with a mop and tried the raw diet. He hasn't had diarrhea since and has gained 15 lbs.

I'm bothered by the lack of good scientific research and statistical analysis on both sides of the aisle here.

and...
Wanted to point out something else... If you look at the Iam's nutrition research (and others) you'll see that most companies are concerned with the minimum levels of nutrients that allow the dog to SURVIVE, not THRIVE. It's similar to the studies done on "safe" levels of certain chemicals or substances. The way that organizations like the EPA arrive at their numbers for maximum amount of mercury per week, for instance, is by dosing rats with mercury to find the point at which they don't die. (I know about this research because my parents personally did this in a research lab). That doesn't mean safe. Same with nutrition research for canines.