Dog Food

[oafpatroll]

My second last Bull Mastiff was fed a homebrew diet for years as he had some mystery gut illness that didn't respond well to any of the foods we tried. I forget exactly what the recipe was that the vet gave us but the highlights were diced sheep heart and lung, carrots and brown rice. The boy was a beast so we had to make a batch twice a week and since we lived on a 500 square metre stand in poncy Parkhurst at the time our snooty neighbours developed an 'appreciation' for the smell of 15l of offal bubbling away. Food did him wonders but the looks on the faces of the neighbours was priceless.

[DaavG]

Had my bully on Karoo for a few years. This last batch he started crapping blood. R13,000 later was diagnosed with "dietary indiscretion". Basically, they didn't know what problem was, they just know it wasn't a virus or bacteria. Just when we had started him back on Karoo, he started crapping blood again.

Last time I buy that crap.

What's he on now?

[DaavG]

Anyone feed raw food?

[Springer]

Commercial dog foods are a curse. Stopped them years ago - granted there are some good ones, but generally they are not great. I have raw fed my dogs for years, done properly it's cheaper than good commercial foods, and night and day in terms of health benefits for dogs.

[janfred]

What's he on now?

Amigo Confidence.

Now, instead of three heaps of turds per day in hard, medium and soft, we get one reasonably firm heap per day. And no blood!

[oafpatroll]

Commercial dog foods are a curse. Stopped them years ago - granted there are some good ones, but generally they are not great. I have raw fed my dogs for years, done properly it's cheaper than good commercial foods, and night and day in terms of health benefits for dogs.

What do you feed? Seriously thinking of going this route again as our current pooch's food skyrockets in price.

[Springer]

What do you feed? Seriously thinking of going this route again as our current pooch's food skyrockets in price.

Briefly - My butcher used to make me packs of afval and all the leftover cuttings as well as some netvet if needed. Also the saw shavings which contained pretty much everything. Anything offcut from our kitchen prep, root veg in small amounts - also added to that chicken necks from time to time when I could get them. Eggs too once or twice a week and beef liver or heart. During the hunting season my working dogs would get a can of sardines added to their food or increase the fat content by adding more netvet if we were on a trip. If I ever needed to use commercial food it would have been a high protein high fat food such as Orijen but only to about 50% and not consistently. Its not everyone's choice, but it worked well for my dogs and proved to be beneficial once the dogs hit their older years, they enjoyed good health and were free of health niggles many dogs younger than them experienced. Bones are also good for dogs, but note that (as mad as it sounds) dogs need to learn to handle bones, so if you start them off don't leave them unattended - and if you have more than one dog, they can cause aggro if unsupervised.

[Ocali]

I have a little fellow, and he's also had the blood in the stool situation. Vet got him on a Hills scientific diet for food sensitivity.
Any normal like chicken livers, chicken, lamb shanks, he can't eat any longer. Causes constipation and then the blood in stool situation.
Small doses of cooked chicken liver seem to be okay, but I try and avoid it really and still to Hills.

Sent from my PPA-LX2 using Tapatalk

[oafpatroll]

Briefly - My butcher used to make me packs of afval and all the leftover cuttings as well as some netvet if needed. Also the saw shavings which contained pretty much everything. Anything offcut from our kitchen prep, root veg in small amounts - also added to that chicken necks from time to time when I could get them. Eggs too once or twice a week and beef liver or heart. During the hunting season my working dogs would get a can of sardines added to their food or increase the fat content by adding more netvet if we were on a trip. If I ever needed to use commercial food it would have been a high protein high fat food such as Orijen but only to about 50% and not consistently. Its not everyone's choice, but it worked well for my dogs and proved to be beneficial once the dogs hit their older years, they enjoyed good health and were free of health niggles many dogs younger than them experienced. Bones are also good for dogs, but note that (as mad as it sounds) dogs need to learn to handle bones, so if you start them off don't leave them unattended - and if you have more than one dog, they can cause aggro if unsupervised.

Thanks, that sounds eminently doable. Always found the idea of cooking the afval I got from my butcher silly but being young and more ignorant I just did what I was told. Taking the cooking step out probably halves the schlep.

[Luker]

Anyone feed raw food?

Every day. I add pilchards during hunting season.