# Feeding bones



## manonhl (Feb 10, 2021)

Hi everyone,

We recently starts feeding bones to our 7-month old male. He gets a diet of kibble with salmon oil in the morning, then raw meat containing bones and offal at lunch and dinner (pre-packaged). His digestion has been so much better with raw food, and the shedding is less heavy. We are trying to complement with bones because he is underweight, and also because they keep him busy while we eat or can't give him attention. He eats frozen raw chicken wings entirely, and we also tried a big, thick beef bone with marrow. That lasted ages as he licked the marrow and scraped the meat around, but I am curious if some people leave their pup the bone itself, or remove it after there's no meat and marrow left on it? We removed it as we feared that huge, thick bone would splinter or just be too much for him if he tried to eat it, especially as he had already had dinner. We put in the fridge, but i am not sure if it's safe to feed a raw bone that has been thawed? 

Also, would a big bone like that be considered a meal in itself? 

We got them from Farmer's Dog UK but no instructions came... 

Any thoughts would be helpful.


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## Nina - Åse (Dec 26, 2020)

Hi Manonhl!
Would be great to understand your experience so far - we have a 5 month old who is currently on beta puppy kibble and I have been thinking about moving to a raw diet or at least in part. I too have looked at the farmers dog website but it doesn’t give any guidance for puppy’s on amounts etc so was nervous to rock the boat as Ase is currently doing well on Kibble and it’s me that thinks it looks dull for every meal!

Any thoughts greatly appreciated!
Nina


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## manonhl (Feb 10, 2021)

Nina - Åse said:


> Hi Manonhl!
> Would be great to understand your experience so far - we have a 5 month old who is currently on beta puppy kibble and I have been thinking about moving to a raw diet or at least in part. I too have looked at the farmers dog website but it doesn’t give any guidance for puppy’s on amounts etc so was nervous to rock the boat as Ase is currently doing well on Kibble and it’s me that thinks it looks dull for every meal!
> 
> Any thoughts greatly appreciated!
> Nina


Hi Nina,
We were also worried about giving him the same meal all the time. After doing research, we understood that even the best kibble is not ideal because it contains all the nutrients at once, and some of these don't interact well, so the pup ends up lacking essential nutrients that could not be absorbed properly. And giving them raw is not only the food that's meant for them as a species, it's also not necessarily more expensive, and it makes for better stool.
We've tried several brands (just trying different offers). Bella and Duke was too much hard plastic, so much freezer space, and the meat was too mushy. It gave him diarrhea. Nature Raw is great with their compostable packaging, but a bit more pricy. Farmers dog seems good, though their plastic stub bags can get messy. It does say on the stub to feed about 400g a day for pups 10-15 kilos, so we follow that (1 stub is 2 meals for him). Some brands include veggies and others don't, but we give him celery/carrots/cucumber/blueberries as training treats, so that makes for the fibre (also fixed his anal gland problem as now he expels them with firm stools). All those bands seem to have a similar meat-offal-bone ratio, so that wasn't factor.

I think if you're going to switch to raw food, you should give your pup 2 kibble meals and 1 raw a day for a couple of weeks, then 1 kibble 2 raw, etc. Raw turkey and chicken are the gentlest for digestion. A bit of diarrhea is normal at the beginning. Then they get firm stools.
But the thing to remember is not to mix kibble and raw in the same meal, as they have very different digestion times.
We decided to keep feeding kibble only for breakfast and then raw, because it helps us balance the food budget and it's easier in the morning. We also hope it gives him enough nutrients overall because the kibble is a puppy formula. I think we'll do that until he is 1, and then only feed 2 bigger meals of raw a day.
Good luck, hope it helps!
Manon


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## texasred (Jan 29, 2012)

I don't feed raw, but have heard you need to watch the bone ratio.
To much bone in the diet can cause constipation. 
Maybe @Bob Engelhardt can add some insight.


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## Bob Engelhardt (Feb 14, 2012)

texasred said:


> I don't feed raw, but have heard you need to watch the bone ratio.
> To much bone in the diet can cause constipation.
> Maybe @Bob Engelhardt can add some insight.


 I don't feed raw either, but have given them raw bones. I bought pork bones because they were smaller. The guys got an ounce or two every day & didn't have any GI issues. Well ... they both had bloody diarrhea recently and my wife was sure that it was caused by bone pieces. I don't agree, but nevertheless we don't give them bones anymore. They did love them. And it was great for keeping their teeth clean.


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## manonhl (Feb 10, 2021)

Bob Engelhardt said:


> I don't feed raw either, but have given them raw bones. I bought pork bones because they were smaller. The guys got an ounce or two every day & didn't have any GI issues. Well ... they both had bloody diarrhea recently and my wife was sure that it was caused by bone pieces. I don't agree, but nevertheless we don't give them bones anymore. They did love them. And it was great for keeping their teeth clean.


That's good to know. To be watched, in any case. Thanks!


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## gunnr (Aug 14, 2009)

If the bone is big enough and dense enough, I let them keep it. I don't let them have poultry bones, they splinter to easy.
Finn also has elk antlers to work at, and my previous dogs used to find deer antlers.
Once they start to splinter, they get tossed.


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## texasred (Jan 29, 2012)

Mine get beef kneecaps, but they are not raw.
What I like about them, is the crumble when the dogs chew on them. They don't break, or splinter. Once the bone gets small, I just throw it in the trash.

@Bob Engelhardt for some odd reason, I thought you fed raw to Daisy.


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## Gabica (Jan 20, 2018)

we do raw feeding, but the bones are grounded in their food. i give them moose antler and himalaya chews, just as odorless bully sticks, dehydrated treats like chicken paw, fish skin jerky, and many other dehydrated treats.


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## Nina - Åse (Dec 26, 2020)

manonhl said:


> Hi Nina,
> We were also worried about giving him the same meal all the time. After doing research, we understood that even the best kibble is not ideal because it contains all the nutrients at once, and some of these don't interact well, so the pup ends up lacking essential nutrients that could not be absorbed properly. And giving them raw is not only the food that's meant for them as a species, it's also not necessarily more expensive, and it makes for better stool.
> We've tried several brands (just trying different offers). Bella and Duke was too much hard plastic, so much freezer space, and the meat was too mushy. It gave him diarrhea. Nature Raw is great with their compostable packaging, but a bit more pricy. Farmers dog seems good, though their plastic stub bags can get messy. It does say on the stub to feed about 400g a day for pups 10-15 kilos, so we follow that (1 stub is 2 meals for him). Some brands include veggies and others don't, but we give him celery/carrots/cucumber/blueberries as training treats, so that makes for the fibre (also fixed his anal gland problem as now he expels them with firm stools). All those bands seem to have a similar meat-offal-bone ratio, so that wasn't factor.
> 
> ...


Thank you so much for this Manon - I have ordered a starter box from Naturaw and will slowly introduce next week and see how it goes - Your experience and advice greatly appreciated!

I will let you know how we get on - Nina


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## PawPatrol (Aug 17, 2020)

I've given our pup lots of turkey bones, but he doesn't really like the raw turkey meat, so I've cut that back. He always digested the turkey bones great. Poops looked fine. 

I will say, after many attempts with beef bones (he only really eats the marrow), they gave him gnarly constipation, so I stopped.


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