You can feed a bit of raw food any old time; probably best if you threw in the odd chicken wing as a treat to start with to see how the dog gets on.  A dog needs between 2 - 3% of its bodyweight per day in raw food if you feed it totally.

Hiya

Im not having a go at you, honestly, but i keep seeing this ' i cant feed raw, i dont have the time' thing cropping up.

Im a little confused, do you think feeding raw takes hours and hours or something?

Apart from the 20 minutes spent splitting up chicken wings into bags and freezing them, and the half hour making veggie mix once a week.

Once you have sourced somewhere to buy recreational bones, you just incorporate that into the shopping trip..

Then, get into the habit of taking frozen wings out of freezer before bed, and by tea time the following day they are defrosted. Same for veg. For breakfasts my dogs get a tin of sardines each. (occasionally its offal and veg).

So apart from 50 minutes once a week, it doesnt take me any longer than feeding a complete food, unless im feeding a recreational bone, which i wont do if im not  present to supervise (but i can do taht and be on here at the same time).....

So really, if some one doesnt have the time to feed raw, where are they finding the time to have dogs in the first place?

Again thats NOT  a dig at anyone, I just wonder if peoples view of how long it takes to feed raw is a bit skewed.

Em

I am lucky, my chicken comes already bagged up, whether it is carcases, wings, legs etc;  heart, kidneys, liver, tripe are bought in meal size cartons/packages, as are turkey drumsticks, fish etc.  Like you I defrost my meals a day ahead.

I do not make a veggie mix in advance as I tend to use whatever is on offer and blend that once a day (takes 30 seconds); takes me about 2 minutes to peel some garlic and get out the Vitamin E, FBO and Vit C.

Opening a tin of fish or carton of yoghurt takes seconds.

So I suppose that works out about 5 mins per day at most?

Save time on washing up as well as RMBs are thrown on the floor, no bowls needed :D

I agree with you Em. It doesn't take long to get into a routine then it's really no bother. It certainly takes loads less time than feeding the family and at least the dog appreciates it!  ;) :D

Kath.

I really enjoy it :) - at work they all say that Lana is my substitute child and my maternal instincts are creeping in   NEVER :D  Thing is its just me, OH and Lana - I buy meat at tesco and the local butcher and most of it can stay in the fridge so I generally dont worry about defrosting.  Last night tesco had a load of reduced meat because it was a day away from sell by, I got a pack of ribs for 80 pence, corn fed chicken breasts and turkey drumsticks, oh and some liver.  While I am at work I think to myself 'what can Lana have for tea tonight' :D  I enjoy the responsibility of sorting Lana's meals!

:D

phew, i thought i was going to come back to a load of trouble here, having read back my post, it *could* be construed that im saying ppl who dont feed raw shouldnt have dogs, and tahts not the case at all.

I really do think that people with no experience of raw feeding think we have to sit there for hours on end, whilst our dogs chew through half a cows carcass or something!

Em

Melody I missed you getting a new puppy congrats. :-)

Pamela