Your comments are sought - feeding

[boxerincairo]

we've had our nearly seven month old for 17 days now. i joined boxerworld and tried to get her feeding correct (using advice i read here).

i'll tell you what i've been feeding and hope you will critique my plan.

please don't critique the grocery store bought food part. i bought two big bags before i knew better. when they are gone i'll buy something more healthy. i am adding the variables to attempt to enhance the nutrition.

please just critique the variables. i.e., carrots, potatos, sardines etc.

my strategy has been to feed a core diet and to "spice" it up with a different variable each day. i feed morning and night. usually i only add the "variable" in the dinner meal.

dry grocery store kibble is always available for bogey. she doesn't eat much but does snack during the day.

day 1 - half can wet pedigree or alpo (hcwpa) mixed with a finally chopped boiled potato.
day 2 - hcwpa mixed with a finally chopped boiled carrot.
day 3 - hcwpa mixed with a chopped banana.
day 4 - hcwpa mixed with a serving of yogurt.
day 5 - hcwpa mixed with a can of sardines.
day 6 - hcwpa mixed with a raw egg.
day 7 - hcwpa mixed with a chopped apple.

she didn't care for the banana but ate the carrots and potato. she LOVES the sardines.

she eats dog biscuits but almost grudgingly. she isn't compelled by food like my old rhodesian ridgeback.

a few times i've fixed her chicken or minced beef. believe me, the cost of living in cairo is low enough this isn't as extreme as you might think.

what do you think of my dogey menu? what other variables could i add? ideas please.

Bogey's dad

[gmacleod]

I would add meat That's what is missing in her diet there. Vegetables and fruit can be a nice addition, but the diet needs to be based on meat. I understand that you don't want a critique of the dog food - but there's not a whole lot of point in critiquing bananas when a dog's diet should be at least 90% meat based (and the dog food has only a tiny amount of meat in it).

[boxerincairo]

thanks for the tip that dog food (canned) doesn't have enough meat to keep bogey happy and make her strong.

give me a ballpark figure for a 7 month old female. how much chicken or ground meat should she be getting PER meal (two feedings a day)?
quarter pound / half pound / pound ?

the few meals i have cooked for her i just threw the chicken or beef (oops, i almost said beer) into a large soup pan and fried it. i added the smallest drop of virgin olive oil.

i added this to the egg, yogurt, potato, etc. depending on the schedule and she at everything (well except for the banana).

suggestions?

bogey's dad

[gmacleod]

Hmmm. How much meat added to the dog food, or how much meat if you ditch the dog food and feed raw or homecooked meals instead?

On raw food, most dogs of her age would probably eat around about 800 grams to 1 kilogram of raw meaty bones (emphasis on meaty) and offal per day. That's approximately 2lb per day, so 1lb per meal if you're feeding twice a day. That varies a little with the size of the dog, of course. But that would be a rough average, I think.

If you're cooking for her instead, then you'd probably feed a bit less - because you can't cook bones (dangerous). So you'd have to cook the meat and then add bone meal to the food. In that case, the total meat amount would probably be around 70% of that described above.

But if you're talking about simply adding meat to the canned dog food, then I'd probably try to make sure that the meat component of what you feed is at least half of the total. So if you feed 1 lb of food for each meal, then I'd make 50% of that meat and the other 50% the stuff in the can. I think it would be wise to add some bone meal also, unless the meat you feed is raw with bone included.