Hi folks,  I've been feeding raw now for a few weeks and have been pleased with the results up till now but this evening the dogs stools seemed to be wrapped in a film of mucus. I'm giving different types of muscle meat including chicken + bones, offal, fish sometimes fresh sometimes tinned, eggs including shells, pureed veg, yoghurt, vit C, fish oil, keepers mix and sunflower oil. Is there something that I'm not giving or possibly giving too much of one ingredient? Last night I gave them mostly heart with some chicken, an egg, veg and the additives. Any ideas?

Somethings irritated the bowel but I don't think one evening of dodgy bowels does a panic make :)  I could be something in the diet or it could just be something he has picked up outside so I would see if it continues first.  If it did you would need to start an elimination process to find out the likely cause but I think you are way off needing to do that yet.

Hi Isabel,  It was'nt just the one dog I have four and it seemed strange that they should all produce the same thing. I forgot to mention that the heart was ox heart and I was wondering if possibly I'd given them too much in one go! I'm not actually panicking more of a case of trying to get it right, at the moment I seem to be living and breathing vitamins and minerals etc. etc.

Ah! Whatever happened to punctuation. :p  A little apostrophe in the right place and I would have known it was more than one :)  Heart is just a muscle so I don't think you can give too much of that, was it entirely fresh?  I'd still leave it to see what they are like tomorrow before worrying too much.

Ok, thanks Isabel!

Hi kizkel.
I had the same problem with my two danes and found out that it was due to them not getting enough fibre in their diet. I increased this and they have been fine evr since - just a sugesstion.

Kizkel, I'm not a barfer, but know several people who have gone barf.  Perhaps you have introduced too many foods, too quickly?  You say you've been barfing for a few weeks now, yet your food list is very long and varied already.

Hi both and thanks for replying. I think you're both probably on the right track. I never do anything by halves me. Reading through the threads the other day I saw a book recommended by tohme - "Natural Nutrition for Dogs and Cats" by Kymythy R. Schultze. I ordered it immediately on the internet and it arrived yesterday. According to that it's possible that I've been feeding too much veg. I think maybe I've incorporated to many ingredients in one go, also it confirmed my suspicion that I'd fed too much heart in one sitting, she states that although heart is muscle meat it should be fed in small quantities. She also does not recommend yoghurt so I'll give that a miss and see how it goes from there.

>She also does not recommend yoghurt so I'll give that a miss and see how it goes from there.<

Even though shultze's book is a good one,i have it,i think she tends to lean a bit over the side of 'purist' feeding! eg: NO dairy products,FASTING etc. Get a few more books on raw feeding and use them as a guide,not as rules set in stone ;) The Barf diet,by Billinghurst is a good one,also 'raw feeding made easy',by Carina Mcdonald is excellent,except you need to order the latter from the 'American' Amazon as it is not available in Britain :(

If your dog does well on yogurt it would be one of the last things i would omitt from your dogs diet.I dont personally feed yogurt,partly coz my dogs dont like it :(  but also because i dont think it supplies enough probiotics etc. etc.,well not as much as the probiotic capsules i give them anyways! Yogurt is good for maintenance,but for therapeutic levels the capsules are best IMO.

Could have been too much heart - the organ meat is very rich so this combined with the veg could have caused the problem.

Yes Annie ns I think you're right.

>Could have been too much heart - the organ meat is very rich <

Not sure if i misread your post Annie,but are you calling heart an organ meat? 

Yes Hailey, I was - now I'm also confused as to why you're confused! :-)

Whilst the heart is indeed an internal organ it is also a muscle, therefore it should not be considered as offal but part of the muscle meat that your dog consumes.

Wow, never thought the day would come tohme when you and I disagreed on any aspect of raw feeding :D but I still think heart comes within the definition of organ meat in the books I have read, so we'll have to agree to differ on this point :-)

Heart is a muscle,not an organ,therefore it is classed as a muscle meat when feeding dogs :)

Hi Hailey,  I know that heart is a muscle but I still don't feel it falls within the definition of muscle meat where raw feeding is concerned.  I'm not being stroppy :-) but prefer to stick to my own belief based on my own research.

The heart is an organ which is made of cardiac muscle.  Therefore, the heart is an organ but when eaten becomes muscle meat.

Hi there kizkel, it is quite normal during the transition stage for stools to be wrapped in mucus, when changing over to raw feeding.  This should pass in a month or two.

There is no need to worry unless of course this is accompanied by any other symptoms such as blood etc. 

Remember the internal organs of your dog are being given a more thorough work out with raw food than with processed food and also because of the diet various toxins will also be expelled from the body during this period.

The same occurs in humans when they change over to a diet of fresh food rather than microwave meals.

HTH

ps not sure why you are giving sunflower oil as well as FBO?

Hi tohme,  I do worry about them getting the correct nutrition and I have read so much now on barf and so many people have differing ideas. The first piece of information I read recommended brown rice - I fed brown rice. It really upset my male bc. and brought on a bout of colitis - which he has a tendancy to- the author also recommended barley, oats, honey, cottage cheese, grape juice sunflower oil and codliver oil, amongst others. I now realise that these recommendations were incorrect but it's little wonder that I'm confused, I then stumbled on CD and could'nt believe my luck, I've read as many of the threads as I can and things are finally coming together - I hope! You recommended the book by Kymythy R. Schultze, that arrived yesterday and I hav'nt had my nose out of it. I shall now dispense with sunflower oil and not worry about the mucus. Thank you for your advice not just on this occasion but to all the other questions I read that come up about feeding barf. I can assure you it's very much appreciated that you and others share your wealth of knowledge and experience with those of us who are desperately trying to do right by our animals, no matter how many times the same questions are asked. thankyou. 

Yes one can have too much info sometimes.

The thing to do is read a lot, start out slowly and then adapt the diet to the individual dog to suit both the dogs and yourself.

You won't go far wrong with Kmythy's book, the only thing I disagree with her about is fasting, I choose not to fast my dogs but again that is just personal preference.

Good Luck.

I am relatively new to BARF too and have also read extensively on the subject but I found the Kymythy Schultz book most helpful and it is the one I return to again and again as I find it the most straightforward and simple to understand. My OH was very wary about the whole Raw thing but once he had read this book, he was much happier and could see the potential health benefits over dry complete foods. My giant breed pup and large crossbreed are doing really well on it. Pup is growing steadily and my boy has lost the few pounds I could never seem to get off him on dry food :)

*edit* just saw Tohme's post about the fasting. I couldn't get my head around that either and I can't imagine going 24 hours without food once a week so don't really expect the dogs too either. Besides, I'm sure it would just encourage  my two to scavange more on those days :rolleyes: and they do more than enough of that already!

Yes Shaynlola, was'nt too happy about the fasting. Barf is supposed to be returning to the natural way of feeding and I just can't imagine a dog in the wild waking up one day saying "oh good, saturday, my fasting day". My dog's know the time and are like sharks circling around me at feeding time EVERY day of the week! I'm pretty sure that wild dogs are opportunists and their motto is "eat now cos you never know when the next meal is likely to walk by!"

But presumably in the wild, there would be days that the dogs would be unable to find food and therefore be forced to fast?  I think the idea behind this is that it gives the dog's digestive system a rest and allows the body to sort out other things.  Some people think it's a good idea for humans too :-).  Must agree that my dogs wouldn't take kindly to it but I have a friend who feeds raw and she does fast her dogs each week for half a day.