Wednesday, September 29, 2010
Going Raw
Some people out there will probably not like this idea and will want to tell me all the reasons I’m wrong for doing this and that’s fine, I’ve heard quite a bit and a lot of arguments but I’m doing it anyway.
As I’ve mentioned a time or two, I used to have a dog. A vet I took that dog to had told me, during a visit, that “bones are nature’s toothbrush”. So I went to the store and I would get Pandora soup bones and let her chomp on them. Raw. I did not cook them. The vet said not to cook them.
I also used to work for a vet, for a short period of time, and he said that all the dog and cat food out there is total crap. He said if you were going to go the commercial food route with the cats, get Alley Cat. All the rest was completely worthless. I can’t always find Alley Cat so I try to get food that has meat as the first ingredient. BOTH vets said that food with corn meal, wheat, or some sort of grain product as the first ingredient was no good. Most commercial pet foods are just that.
Now, with these two dogs, I’m going to start feeding a new way. I’m feeding them raw. That means raw meat, raw bone, raw. I’ve done a lot of research on this diet, I’ve read the pros and cons, I’ve read the debates, I’ve read a lot and we are going raw. And because they are going raw, so are the cats.
A lot of people will say things like, “You have to cook the meat, they’ll get ecoli, salmonella, worms” or they’ll say I don’t love my animals or they’ll say “don’t ever feed them bone, they’ll choke”, it goes on.
I will say it again. I’ve done the research. There is no scientific data to PROVE that raw is good or bad except for the thousands of years that wolves have eaten raw food. There’s also the debate that dogs are omnivores, not carnivores. Everyone agrees that cats are carnivores but no one can agree on dogs. Science shows us dogs are carnivores and frankly, The Smithsonian Institute describes them as carnivores so, that’s where I stand.
The dogs are on day 6 of their raw diet. Already their eyes are even shinier and brighter than before...which is saying something considering they are puppies, they do. not. smell. There is NO doggy odor. None. I picked them up, I smelled all around them. There is no smell. Their...deposits are fewer and smaller because they are actually utilizing the food better. Their teeth I can’t really comment on yet because puppies usually have white teeth anyway but we’ll see what happens as they grow in adulthood.
They are happy, well fed and frankly, a lot calmer than before. Sure, they still get lively and playful, they’re fricken puppies, but they aren’t as out of control as before.
Now, about the food. They get a lot of chicken, WITH bones, yes. As long as the bones are NOT cooked, they will not splinter. It’s the cooked bones that become softer and splinter in their mouths. The only thing to make sure is that they don’t inhale the bone, that they chew it. My dogs chew. (By the way, this diet is so much better for their jaw muscles, they get a major work out.) They will get beef with bone, (nothing weight bearing, the bones can break their teeth), turkey drumsticks, turkey necks, gizzards, livers, kidney, lamb, ribs, eggs, some fish, just to name a handful.
All of it will be raw.
“But what about salmonella? Ecoli? Bacteria?”
First and foremost, dogs and cats have a shorter digestive track. That stuff doesn’t stay in their system as long as it does ours. It doesn’t have time to take hold like it does in our system. They may eat, say, chicken with salmonella but it will be shat right back out and as long as you aren’t eating that dog’s shit, you won’t get it from the dog.
Second, they are designed for this type of eating. Yes, we have domesticated dogs but all we’ve done is change their appearance and a bit of their temperament. We have NOT changed their inside anatomy. They have higher acid levels in their stomach, higher than humans. Their saliva has enzymes in it. They do not have chefs out in the wild, they eat their food raw, in the wild. We have changed them a bit but we haven’t changed them THAT much since we have domesticated them.
Third, keep in mind, commercial dog food has not been around that long. It was in the late 1800s that some dude came up with dog biscuits. Then canned food was developed. Then WWII came along and we needed all the metal we could get and pet food was NOT a priority for the war effort. Everyone went back to how they fed their dogs before. After the war, in around the 50s and 60s is when commercial dog and cat food started making a showing. My co-worker, who spent her youth in East Germany, says they didn’t HAVE dog food in their country. There was no such thing. They made their dog food just like people used to do before commercial dog food/faster, more convenient, less expensive to go along with all the other stuff that came out in the 50s and 60s. Go look back and see what people used to feed their dogs.
Fourth, there’s always the option to freeze the meat. Certain types of fish, for example, from the Pacific Northwest, should be put in to the freezer for some time before use. You can do the same with pork, (although things have changed quite a bit since the 80s). Two weeks of freezing will kill the bacteria.
So, the cats and dogs are doing raw. Like I said, the dogs are on day 6 and the cats are on day 4. The dogs have taken to it right away. The cats...some of them are ecstatic about it and now won’t leave me alone and some need a bit of coaxing. They want their candy, their high in fat and crud, dry food. Why on earth they would want that dry food I do not know because it has all kinds of crap in it that if you looked at it in a bowl, not all chopped and cooked and mashed together, you may wonder what the hell you are doing feeding that to your animals. I didn’t know either. I heard talk of it. The two vets I mentioned earlier made hints to it and I’ve heard rumors. It’s not good what they are eating. “Healthy, Balanced” is bullshit.
Anyway, I’ll be talking about that quite a bit as we begin this transition and you can like it, you don’t have to like it, you can share your opinion on the matter, I’ll listen but I seriously doubt I’ll change my mind. The only thing I do ask is that you do not imply or come right out and say, “You do not care about your animals if you do this” because the reason I’m doing this is because I DO care about them.
