[EmberLuvu]

I was wondering, is raw food literally raw, or bloody, meat? I'm very confused on that, I was thinking about persuading mom to let me switch Ember over to a raw diet, and she said she would consider it as long as it didn't have blood in it and was safe for puppies and had nothing like chances of salmonella poisining from it...

So would it meet all the requirements? What exactly is raw food?

 

[EmberLuvu]

Yes Savannah - raw meat is .... raw meat! Dogs are designed to eat raw meats. Think about wild dogs...coyotes, wolves, foxes, etc. Our domestic dogs are 99% same DNA as the grey wolf. In fact, if you took the skin off of a dog and a wolf and compared their insides - they would be identical.

Yes our dogs have evolved into all different shapes and sizes. But they still are a carnivore and they are designed to eat meat. Not grains, wheat, soy, corn. When was the last time you saw a dog grazing in a corn field?

Kibble was created for the convenience of a busy society from the leftovers of the production of human foods in factories. For example, brewers rice is a typical common ingredient in dog food. It is the leftovers, inedible by products of rice produced for humans. Instead of throwing it away, they put it in dog food! Great, huh?!

Brewers rice - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Anyway... I think its great that you are asking questions about dog foods and learning. You are a bright young lady! I'm sure your parents are proud of you. Convincing your parents to feed raw to your dogs may be hard though. You will have to do a lot of reading and researching and point them in the right direction. Even then, what your family dogs eat is up to your folks.

But if you want to do some reading and learning - check out the links in this post....

http://www.chihuahua-people.com/raw-food/49576-you-considering-raw-diet.html

Also here's a good website on what prey model feeding (raw feeding) is and how to go about it....

PMR Page 1 - Chance's Little Website

And keep asking questions! That's how you learn!

Thanks! After reading up on it a bit, we decided that we should just stick with her Instinct dry kibble, it's much more simple and easy. Thanks again!

 

[EmberLuvu]

Instinct is a good quality kibble. Be sure and rotate through the flavors. Feeding one food over and over can create allergies. You might consider adding water to her kibble as dry food is hard on the kidneys. It's like you eating a bowl of cereal without milk! And no, dry food does NOT clean their teeth. That would be like us eating crackers to clean our teeth!

If you choose, you can add some meat for snacks. Just plain fresh meats can be given as treats and are a healthy alternative to the pre-packaged treats you buy at the store.

Yes, I know Instinct is a good quality kibble- I made mom let me read the ingredients before she even touched the bag. LOL!

Really, water to the kibble... hmm... Ember does that herself most of the time, as she has a double bowl and she likes to drop kibble in her water, or splash water into her kibble!

I'm also aware that kibbles don't clean their teeth, which is why we give all our dogs bones. They aren't raw (mom's rule) but she cooks them only for about 5 minutes, they never have splintered... still pretty much raw, only without the blood on the bones. We also gave a free sample of the turkey to Ember, we do feed her fresh meats often.