StephLyn Boxers and French Bulldogs home
Raw Feeding
cut up chicken necks about to be served
Please note: we do not require puppy buyers to feed raw. While we feel it is the best, we understand not everyone can. A high quality kibble such at Taste of the Wild is a very good option.
We are extremely passionate on the subject of raw feeding for our pets. We have researched this way of feeding for several years prior to switching over. We have been feeding this way for 6 years now. We have had such dramatic health improvements with our dogs that is has convinced us beyond a shadow of a doubt that this is really the only way to feed your dog for optimum health and longevity. To date we have been lucky enough to not have any of our dogs die from or diagnosed with any cancers. These are our own personal dogs that live here. We feel this is because the raw diet is a cancer starving diet. It removes the high sugar carb filled grains that are in kibble (at least 50% of kibble no matter how good, is grain), which cancer feeds off. I will list some websites that I feel are good avenues for researching the raw diet, as well as some prepackaged raw foods where the work is already done for you. Immediately below is a write up of what to feed and what supplements you can include. Please note that everyone tailors the way they feed the raw diet to their individual dogs and that dog's health needs. That is the best part of the diet.
a 3-4 week old frenchie pup playing and sucking on a chicken neck
The diet:
We use mainly chicken necks (wings are fine, absolutely no weight bearing bones like thighs or legs unground), ground pork, ground turkey, ground beef, fresh fish (that we grind), lamb neck, pork neck, organ meats (liver, kidney, brains, heart), juiced or ground veggies. If whole bones scare you, you can purchase an electric meat grinder to grind up all the food for you or just purchase prepackaged as its all done for you.
I break their food out in 7 days they get 14 meals (twice a day). I usually feed chicken necks for one of the meals and feed a different meat source for the other meal. The main thing is you don't want to give too much ground meat without bone, only a few meals a week of ground. You need to make sure there is calcium in most of the meals. If you do want to give more ground meat, just save your egg shells, wash them, let them dry and grind them up to a fine powder with a coffee grinder. Then you add in a teaspoon per lb of meat. Organ meat can be fed daily but in small amounts, should be done several times a week minimum. Too much ground meat will give your dog the runs. I do veggies every day or every other day. I use mostly leafy greens - parsley, collards, mustard greens, dandelion, some kale and spinach occasionally (can interfere with thyroid), cilantro, red leaf lettuce, romaine lettuce. I use a couple of these per meal, not all at once and I rotate around. Then I also use carrots, green/red pepper, squash, sweet potato, really anything healthy but only a couple per meal and then rotate.
As far as amounts, feed 1%-2% a day of your dog's body weight. For a puppy, feed them 1%-2% of their adult weight because they are growing fast and very active, they will need a larger amount.
6 week old boxer pup asleep after eating ground up meat and bone
Supplements:
salmon body oil - 1000 mg per 20 lbs
Vit E - 200 IU for small dogs, 400 IU for large once a day
Vit C - I get powdered that is 5000 mg per teaspoon and give a good pinch, you can do 500 mg for small and 1000 mg for large though at times of stress or illness, you will want to increase that amount.
raw organic unfiltered apple cider vinegar (health food store) - 1 teaspoon for small 1 tablespoon for large. if added to meals, once a day. If they won't eat it in their food, add it to their water.
unsulphered blackstrap molasses (health food store) I add directly to the apple cider vinegar, just enough to flavor it and make the vinegar a dark color, it has B vitamins in it.
Honey - raw and unpasturized (health food store) I add this directly to the apple cider vinegar as well. Helps with the vinegar flavor and loads of vitamins.
I will sometimes rotate the salmon body oil with other omega oils like evening primrose oil, borage oil, olive oil. once or twice a week.
kelp is a good supplement, I do it a few times a week.
Most weeks I will supplement 4-5 times a week. I don't do them every day as I don't think the body needs them in every meal.
Prepackaged raw foods:
Here are a couple prepackaged raw foods that I have personally tried and like. They are manufactured on the East Coast, if you are on the West Coast and would like to find one manufactured there, please contact me and I will find some for you.
http://www.bravorawdiet.com/index.html
http://www.homemade4life.com/index.html
Reading:
While I can tell you exactly how to feed and why to feed it, you really should do your own reading. Having at least a couple books to use as a reference guide is invaluable. They go into far more detail about why and how and what for's with feeding raw. You can purchase these at www.dogwise.com .
Switching to Raw - Susan Johnson - VERY good beginner book, easy read
Raw Meaty Bones - Dr Tom Lonsdale (a veterinarian)
The Ultimate Diet - Kymythy Schultze (an animal nutritionist) - I feel makes the diet a bit more complicated then it needs to be but its a cheap book and gives good info, just wouldn't follow her meal plan.
The Barf Diet - Dr. Ian Billinghurst (a veterinarian)
Websites:
http://www.njboxers.com/faqs.htm - great beginner info and answers many questions, tips and tricks, etc
www.rawmeatybones.com - written by a vet who has lecture and written books on the subject
www.barfers.com - good for finding elists on raw as well as FAQ's
www.bowchow.com - informative site and has supplier info for prepackaged raw foods.
http://www.b-naturals.com/ - tons of info
http://www.skansen.com/nutrition/ - top schnauzer show kennel in the world
All photos and text are copyrighted to Stephanie Flores and StephLyn Boxers and French Bulldogs. Written permission must be given to use anything from this site.