commercial dog food

[loaded4bear]

I 'm loking for some help with feeding commercial dog food. A local hunter recently lost his eight year old plott male to liver failure (vet said after he died). I lost a Camron female a year ago from something with the same symtoms. After reading alot of information I have read many bad reviews. Some make good sense and others are grey. DOGFOODANALYSIS.COM only aproves a few dry dog food types. They say meat should be most of the diet and that meal and by-products do not count for they are junk. These few dog food types cost about $1.25/lb and up. The idea seems to follow the nature order that dogs in the wild ate meat and not corn. The more you read they recommend green bean and potatoes? I have never had a dog dig up my potatoes or eat my beans? Has anyone tried natural foods and found any advantages? and how can you afford feeding six 50lb dogs?

[Arkansas Frog]

back when cattle was cheap we use to go to the sale and buy a old wiener cow and kill her and feed her to the dogs, Horses are cheap now but some states won't let you kill them. but if I was feeding 8 or 10 dogs I would buy a horse or a old long horn steer. they don't bring much here in Arkansas compared to regular beef. lady just gave 32 horses away last week here in Ark. buy two cheap freezers

[FullCryHounds]

I've been preaching for years to feed meat along with your dry food. These dogs are meat eaters, not corn, rice, or oats. The best feed out there for your dogs is horse meat or beaver meat. I grind mine up and add it to my dogs feed every other day.

[loaded4bear]

thanks guys
have you noticed any advantages, healther, live longer,more stamina ect...

[pete richardson]

thanks guys
have you noticed any advantages, healther, live longer,more stamina ect...

cant prove it,, but i think that dogs fed raw meat / fish etc
have stronger immune system-

they recover faster from just hard running , injuries seem to heal faster -

[Brady Davis]

Where do you get the horse and beaver meat?

[Treedog/Boone]

I know a guy that use to feed raw chicken. You could see a diference in his hounds heck hes got one around today thats pretty healthy and old.

[ub]

Raw chicken necks are also very good to feed with them. I buy them from a butcher shop very cheap.

[loaded4bear]

I've been feeding freezer burnt and old meat with my dog food (1/2 n 1/2). It's only been two weeks but I can't see any big differences.

[Brady Davis]

FREEZER BURNT AND OLD MEAT? LOL....LUCKY HOUNDS....J/K

[loaded4bear]

look at your dog food label you'll see things like animal digest, by-products cleaned off the floor, dead dogs and road kill.

Something else I have read about is the meat products labeled on the dogfood is the wet weight not the dry weight. the dry weight is 80% less. The corn is the major ingredent in most foods. The even split the corn into two or three components to keep it from out weighing the wet meat products.

[Ike]

Just doing my taxes for last year and see my dog feed bill was up around thirteen hundred dollars last year, and I figure things are gonna have to change in the coming months. I'm feeding too many dogs for catch and release and am gonna have to (or should) make some tough decision this spring............

ike

[wvpringle]

ok - I checked out the website and the Dog Chow looks pretty bad with that information. I better shoot some more deer next year.

loaded4bear - I think you hounds run good with the dog food you been using, but if you can get them better - go for it.

Maybe you can get them to catch the bear by the road, you know how I like to walk

[loaded4bear]

I found a helpful web site www.dogfoodproject.com It breaks down dogfood ingredients.
It tells which ingredients to look for (meal specified with a name like beef meal, chicken meal lamb meal..ect and which to avoid ( meat meal,fish meal,poutry meal..ect).

It explains that the ingredient on the label before the first fat or oil products are the main ingredients. It goes on to say corn is not a good source of protein but is a good source of carbohydrates, which would be products after the fat.

I guess it is easy to see I have too much time on my hands! Can't wait for it to warm up and wake up those bear.

[houndcrazyfool]

protein generates cell growth, and in return will help heal and recover faster.So it makes sense... I also heard that some of the so called high protein corn based dog foods cause kidney or liver failure, so ive tried to get away from that.
I have just started adding meat(venison,bear,chicken) to my packs diet a couple days a week. Its hard to tell the difference but they sure do like it,LOL!