How much raw to feed

[MUDDYBOOTS]

Hi,I started feeding Cloe and Benson raw last Friday and have been feeding chic wings in mourning and beef mince or tripe at night,but I am not at all sure how much of each I should be feeding.I know a starting point for Benson who is 13.5 kilos is around 400g/day (he is a busy 13 month old working cocker) but he seems to be loosing weight on that and he was ribby to start with so carnt afford to lose anymore.
If I want to increase how much food I give him do I increase his mourning(RMB)meal,and his evening meal in proportion AND do each of these meals need to be equal in weight.
So if I want to try him on 500g do I have to give him 250g of chic wings.I get his wings from morrisons and get the small ones,they weigh about 75g each so that would mean three or four for his breakfast which seems a lot.
They both started off by chewing the wings until the bones were crunched up but today they seemed to get board with that and almost swallowed them whole,is this OK and do they digest the bone.Plenty goes in but none comes out Oh, and on that subject their poos are really small compeared to when they were on kibble,is this normal

[spanielcrazy]

I needed to measure things out at first to get an idea of what the portions were, but after that I just played it by ear. The morning and evening meals don't need to be the same, a lot depends on what you are feeding and what your rotation is, it also depends on your schedule: how much time do you have to let them eat, how long before last walk before bed, etc.

Yes they can digest the bones if they swallow them whole, but it's better for their teeth if they crunch them.  And yes, the smaller poos are normal, means their bodies are using what they are eating and not wasting it! 

This may help you:

http://www.raw4dogs.com/calculate.htm

 

[bluegirl]

I have given meals were I'll give the girls 3 -4 chicken wings and my boy 4 - 5 wings especially if they are smaller ones. (and my boy is similar weight).

[Karma]

Honey started out on 3 wings as a meal - as she got older she needed a little less and is now down to 2.   

[laurenollie]

Sorry to Hijack but wanted to say thanks for the calculator! I'm currently trying to figure out what Ollie needs to switch him over to raw!!!

thanks

L&O x

[vixen]

I have to hold chicken wings with pliers to stop my girls swallowing them with two gulps.   
By holding on to the wings, it means the girls really have to chew which I think is better for their teeth and is better for me as I don't worry about the bones as I know they have been crunched up. 

[MUDDYBOOTS]

Thanks for the replies,thats very helpfull.

Karma,or anyone,when you feed Honey two chic wings for her mourning meal,how much muscle meat (or offal or combination if you are mixing)do you give her through the day.Just want to make sure they get a good balanced diet,I know you have already said aim for 10% bone but don't know how much bone is in a wing.

[Karma]

I tend to feed similar sized portions of muscle meat to meaty bones... but will tweak it as needbe - so if a meal is particularly boney I'll up the amount of meat she gets that day, if I notice she's struggling to go to the loo at all, I'll swap the next bone meal for a meat one... and now that she's not getting tripe kongs twice a day I'm swapping one bone meal a week for a meal of tripe, as this will have affected the overall balance.

When I started out I weighed things religiously, and looked up bone:meat ratios etc, but you definately relax into it and learn to judge by how they are... 

[MUDDYBOOTS]

Thank you

[laurenollie]

Has anybody got a good link that can tell me how much meat/bone/offal I should be feeding

Really want to get Ollie started on RAW but I'm struggling to get my head around it of how much of each type of RAW he should have!! The calculator is great as I know know how much he should have daily - just have to figure out how much of what!!!

thanks all

L&O x

[MUDDYBOOTS]

I hope someone puts you onto a good link because this is what I find most worrying,getting the balance right,although I have had lots of helpfull advice and Karma in particular has been very reassuring.
I would defiantly only use the calculator as a starting point tho.When I started Benson on raw last Friday I weighed him and he was 13.3kilos,I have been feeding him 3% of his body weight,a bit more the last couple of days,and when I weighed him today he was down to 12.5 kilos .

[Karma]

It's hard to give a link to state precisely how much of what to give, as there are different models out there which each suggest slightly different amounts....
This discussion comes up quite a lot on the BritBarf yahoo group, and the general rule of thumb on there is to aim for 10% bone, 10% glandular offal and 80% meat ratio within the meat/bone content of the diet.  Bearing in mind your bones have meat on them (hence the term raw meaty bones), in practice this works out at about 40-50% RMB, 10% glandular offal (liver, kidney or pancreas - of which half should be liver) and 40-50% muscle meat (which includes tripe and heart). 
If you are feeding vegetables/fruit, this can then be added - again there are great variations as to the amount suggested - some say none is needed, others suggest 15-20% of total diet and others advocate a "meat and 2 veg" approach, where you feed twice the amount of blended vegetables as the amount of meat/bone you give.

I generally work on portion sizes of approx 150g for Honey - and over a week (14 meals) she will normally get 5 raw meaty bone meals, 2 meals of liver, 1-2 meals of tinned fish and 5-6 meals of muscle meat.  She also gets tripe in her Kong when we go out.
I've tweaked this over the months, so that it suits her - we started out with more bone, but she was getting a little constipated, so we pulled back a bit.  Also if a bone meal is particularly boney, I'll add a bit of tripe mince or something...

[spanielcrazy]

I generally work on portion sizes of approx 150g for Honey - and over a week (14 meals) she will normally get 5 raw meaty bone meals, 2 meals of liver, 1-2 meals of tinned fish and 5-6 meals of muscle meat. 

You needn't worry about getting the proportions in every meal, as Karma shows you are going for rough proportions over the course of a week. You'll find recommendations ranging from 70-80% meat, and the balance in offal and bones (and veg if you like) Your dogs will also let you know if they are getting too much bone (constipation  ) so just reduce it a bit.

As with humans, we don't get a perfectly balanced diet in every meal, we try for balance over a period of time. Same with raw feeding. I weighed and fussed and worried about proportions at first too--I think everyone does  but after a while you learn to wing it.

I also have my "I'm in too much of a hurry" recipe of raw hamburger, cottage cheese, veggies (baby food  ) and bone meal made up for rushed days  the dogs don't mind     

[laurenollie]

Thank you so much - it helps a lot when you put down the meals you feed! Now i just need to figure out which boney meals Ollie will eat and if he'll take to the offal!!!

Do you buy most of you meat from supermarkets? I've also read that some minces you can feed have grind up bone in are these specially bought for raw feeding? And not just our typical mince from butchers/supermarket??

L&O x

[Karma]

We buy most of our stuff from the supermarket - we get the minced tripe (freeflow) from Pets at Home, and do get the occassional frozen pet mince from there too (those are the ones with bone in) for emergencies, but Honey doesn't really enjoy them as much - part of the fun (and benefit) of raw feeding is that it takes effort to eat (giving good jaw exercise and teeth cleaning).