RAW beef steaks

[Manchester-Mike]

Hi,

Ive got lexi on orijen now, she was liking it at first and has now become a bit bored by it. Shes having 3 meals a day at the moment, and yesterday she only ate one of them. If i offer her any cooked mince though, blink and its gone, because as a treat i have occassionaly mixed some cooked mince with her kibble to make it appetising.

So basically i think she is telling me, dad i want to eat meat not these biscuits. Im not 100% on it right yet ive got alot of reading to do on it find out exactly what to be giving her, but ive never given her anything raw. Was just shopping in asda and got some small beef steaks. Would these be something you would include in a raw diet, is she ok to eat them? Like i say i haven't really got much info yet but i want to try her with something raw first she if she actually likes it. Would i just litterally take it out of the packet and give it her? Seems odd and scary.

If she did like it, i think we'd be going for a mixture of raw and orijen as i know some of you do. But like i say, haven't got it planned yet, just want to know if i can give her one of these beef steaks?

Thanks

[Manchester-Mike]

They are about the same size as half a peice of bread. Might sound stupid, but would you chop it up into peices or anything? That is persuming she can eat it.

Thanks

Mike, if you gave her a beef steak you would probably be the most important person on the planet to her! Yes she can eat it, and no you don't need to cut it up.. her teeth will do that.

The only 'problem' with mixed feeding is some dogs won't then eat kibble - they'll hold out for the raw.

[Manchester-Mike]

Hi anni, thanks for the reply she loved it just gave it her 5 minutes ago. She kept picking it up chewing it and dropping it, dont think she really knew what to do with it bless her.

She chewed the full thing inside her mouth for a couple of minutes then swallowed the lot, or it seemed that way. Is that what they do? Suppose it would be hard for them to rip peices off? Just worried me i was like oh my god i hope she ain't going to choke on it but she seems fine.

Anyway, shes been lay there looking depressed all day wouldn't even look at her kibble. Shes now wide awake nudging me with her ball to play i think shes happier now.

Originally Posted by Manchester-Mike

Hi anni, thanks for the reply she loved it just gave it her 5 minutes ago. She kept picking it up chewing it and dropping it, dont think she really knew what to do with it bless her.

She chewed the full thing inside her mouth for a couple of minutes then swallowed the lot, or it seemed that way. Is that what they do? Suppose it would be hard for them to rip peices off? Just worried me i was like oh my god i hope she ain't going to choke on it but she seems fine.

Anyway, shes been lay there looking depressed all day wouldn't even look at her kibble. Shes now wide awake nudging me with her ball to play i think shes happier now.

Yum! Yes with raw being new to her she'll learn how to 'eat' it. Because of their teeth and jaw mechanics they can't bite bits off, only slice it into smaller chunks for swallowing. It's normal for them to have a large lump of meat in their mouth and keep biting down on it, bits fall out before they eat it again (lovely table manners).

That's one reason you should give large bits of meat, makes them work at it, so they don't bolt it down and choke. Often they'll lie down and you'll see their neck, jaw and even shoulder muscles coming into action as they eat. She might try and take it to a special place to eat it as it will be high value to her.

I give mine lamb necks and get my butcher to cut them lengthways, so they'll have half each. Plenty of meat and a nice bit of vertebrae inside too - takes them 10 mins to eat that.

[Stuart]

Oh she will have enjoyed that alright,..you can give almost anything to Lexi, varity is the key, so anything from the super market, chicken, turkey, ham hocks, beef, lamb... a lot of people dont give Pork,..and apart from the ham hocks I dont,... dont forget fish, if they are anything up to about a foot long, [ if you know a fisherman] you can give it whole, no need to gut,..if its fish from the shops you may have to find which fish she likes,.. but try and find one as the oil in the fish is very good for them

Remember to add some bone.

[zetstaff]

Hiya Mike, my raw plan failed miserably

The only thing I will say is when I gave Boris raw beef, he wolfed it down but a few people said it might be too rich because he could poo through the eye of a needle for about a week, serious bottie gravy

Tilly loved raw chickie wings + her poo was like granite

I just couldn't cope with the digestion problems

Good luck, if raw fails, for me Orijen is the best dry food (thank you Lynn + Linda xxx)

Yes you've got to get the quantities right.. they need meat, offal and bone. E.g. If you feed chicken wings you need offal with it or it's too boney. Fish is good - one of mine won't eat it so I supplement with salmon oil.

Poos - if they're too crumbly feed more offal, or too loose feed more bone.

As Stuart says, variety but I would make sure she's ok with one protein source before introducing another to allow her system to cope. So feed chicken for a couple of weeks, before giving beef etc.

And don't be alarmed if you see bits of bone in her poo - their tract adapts and gets more efficient at breaking bone down. Modern dogs which are fed pellet / tinned food often have this initially.

[Manchester-Mike]

That was a one off for now, dont know what the hell were going to do fed up to the max now, shes been pooing oddly for a while, its like she will have a normal one but keep on straining untill diarhea comes out, a few drops. No matter what she eats. Vet said try changing her food, which we have. From royal canin, to wagg, to orijen. Shes just been outside now and the poo was oddly huge and she strained again afterwards and the diarhea was even more watery. How long would that beef steak take to digest? Shes not ate anything else apart from that today.

Shes just never well and its well annoyying, going to go back to the vets again but i could probably already write the script, "well give her this oral medicine, and 12 tins of this £3.50 a tin special dog food and see how she gets on on that"

Sorry to moan on here but had to do it somewhere am just fuming. Whats even more annoying is the fact she is fully insured with petplan (apart from digestive symptoms) because when we got her she had 4 weeks pet plan insurance, after that 4 weeks the vet gave us a free week insurance, and within that week we had to take her to the vets with diarhea, so after that week had run out we didnt realise but when we phoned petplan to take out the insurance they said well we wont cover her for that if shes been to the vets for it. If only we had known!

sorry moan over

[Stuart]

Is the diarhea when she is out on a walk or anyplace?,.. the reason I ask, is because many dogs will produce very week diahea when they get excited, in Sams case it is when he is off lead in the hills,... this can be normal in many dogs

I dont know your vet, and so couldnt comment on him/her,.. but just be aware of some vets, they are paid to get people to buy certain brands of food,... so if you are not happy with your vet, look elsewhere

...and moaning is half a forum, the other half is finding the answers