Hi I'd like to move our girls onto a RAW diet as the theory behind seems eminently sensible but the things that stops me are the time and space needed to do it properly. Our fridge is crammed most of the time with food for the family especially just after the weekly shop and on some days time is at a premium and while a couple of scoops dropped in a bowl might not be the best, it is the quickest.

Is there any merit in feeding about 50% of their meals RAW and the other 50% staying with JWB( which they all seem to love).

Also had some frozen sardines a while ago which the girls pinched while defrosting - they chomped them down guts, head bones and all with no ill effects - was I lucky or is it ok to serve a dog an entire fish?

Nothing wrong with 50/50 Barf, it's 50% better than no Barf ;) and Im sure your girls will benefit from anything raw they have. I would recommend though that you feed kiddle as one meal and raw another.
Kibble and most raw things will have a different digesting time so they're better given separetly. If your girls have an iron stomachs then I'm sure they'll be able to handle a mix.
Whole fish is absolutly fine. I give mine sprats and they LOVE them!

It takes me one hour a week on monday afternoons to visit the butcher and collect the week's bones and meat and then return home and package up a week's meals for two large breed dogs. I bag up seperately 14 meals which takes up two freezer draws, leaving 2 more for our food. By the time i do the family weekly shop on thursday there is space in the freezer for the things i need as the dogs have eaten their way through half the meals. It took a month to get into a good routine, the first time we did our butcher day it took us about 3 hours and we had to weigh out every meal etc! Now its easy peasy. At dinner time i just take the two bags i've put out to defrost the night before, or that morning, snip off the top with scissors and plop the contents out on the patio or in a bowl depending on weather conditions! No more effort than putting down dry food imo. I'd definitely encourage you to go for it, if you want to try half kibble half raw then do, although i'd be inclined to do a few days raw and a few kibble rather than both each day. If it goes well you may find that the practical issues holding you back are overcome with practice. Good luck!

I've fed raw and kibble in the same meal for years now with no problems. I see no problem in feeding things that digest at a different rate together. I'm sure bones digest at a different rate to meat, although both are raw. JMHO.

I agree with flying finn if you dont feel you can do 100% (yet:)) then 50% 50% is fine. I would not feed in the same meal as the digetsion rate is different and it would be better to separate . I know many who do feed together with no problem but its just my opinion from my readings 
That apart yes go for it which ever way you prefer.
I order mine in bulk in manly 2kg bags so its acase of stacking the freezer once every 2 months the grabbing a bag a day to defrost and feed. Altrernatively a visit to your supermarket, pet shop or butcher as needed then grab a bag to defrost and off yu go.
make sure you use a wider variety of meats bones and offal as you can and as chunky as possible is best if not mince and bone is better than none at all. Include fish canned or any way yu can including whole if poss.
I dont routinely feed veg frui and grain but that is due to differing opinions on the need for theses. Nor do I supplement

Hey, we all had to start somewhere, and dipping your toe in the water by feeding 50:50 is an excellent plan, many people feed like this continually, either raw and kibble mixed or one meal raw and one meal commercial.

So do what is convenient for YOU.

And yes, dogs can chow down on whole raw fish no probs

Two of my dogs are on half raw, half kibble (Taste of the Wild) and are doing great. So I can't see anything wrong with it.

does all meat, fish and bones have to be frozen and defrosted before feeding?

I don't. I get the fresh lamb bones from my butchers every wednesday and my guys have them the same day.
Also if I buy supermarket mince either beef, lamb or turkey, I will give it without freezing.
My husband likes steak tartar and I never freeze his mince before he eats it, so don't see the point of freezing the dogs mince either.
If you want to be absolutly sure there's no bugs then you should freeze, but I look at it this way. Dogs lick their bits and bottoms and other dogs bits and bottoms. They drink the most vile water and eat rotten meat if they find it. If I'm not looking mine bury their knuckle bones, dig them up and chew them when they are decomposing, so I'm sure they can handle a bit of human grade mince.
My friend who Barfs doesn't freeze everything either, but I'm sure there are people who do. In the end it's up to you.

> My husband likes steak tartar and I never freeze his mince before he eats it, so don't see the point of freezing the dogs mince either.
>

This is why we freeze beef fed raw.
There have been no reports of humans affected by Neospora so your husband can continue enjoying his steak tartar if he dare :), but it certainly affects dogs.  This is a parasite not a bacteria so not the same as their dirty little lickings which their systems can deal with.

No you don't need to freeze everything. It is just a convenient way to store the bags of food if you don't want to be thinking about making up meals everyday. Also, you can feed meat and bones frozen, they don't need to be defrosted first. If your dog is a gulper then this helps to slow them down. Some dogs might prefer to leave the meal to warm up before they tuck, some dogs won't touch offal unless its frozen. Its one of those things you can just try out and see.

Freezing is an important process for some meats.  Stooge has put a link re Neospora in beef, and wild rabbit is another that must be frozen before feeding if you want to eliminate the risk of tapeworm (freeze for a minimum of 3 weeks).

There are other advantages of freezing.  As shivj says, it can be a useful way of slowing down a super fast eater or gulper - particularly with smaller poultry pieces such as wings.  Feed partially defrosted to soothe sore gums in teething puppies and it can disguise a strong flavour if you have a dog that isn't too keen on offal or fish.  One of mine will eat liver and kidney frozen in chunks but if fully defrosted it must be blitzed to a puree and hidden in mince!  They quite like 'fish icepops' too but aren't keen on any raw fish at room temperature either :)

I feed lamped rabbit regularly (at least twice a month ) and beef etc and never frozen it for health purposes.

Nothing in life is risk free so you need to conduct your own risk assessments and determine the likelihood and severity of the problem.

thanks for the info. After giving the dogs their first taste of whole fish yesterday, i think i'll be trying the 'fish icepops' next. One of the labs gobbled a whole sardine with no probs, the other rolled on hers then refused to eat it, one of the terriers has hidden his (praying to god its not hidden in the house), and the other terrier turned his nose up at it in disgust. They also had some defrosted diced beef heart in with their tea last night which went down really well with them all apart from the terrier that wouldn't touch the fish and he's even turned his nose up at a chicken wing this morning.

Well we started on RAW tonight pasta, 2 chicken wings each, puree carrot and shredded greens - they left the greens(just like kids) I'll try blending it next time. Tomorrow night it'll be sardine carrot and rice.

They'll be getting JWB kibble for breakfast.

Any criticism/comment of their daily consumption on here would be appreciated. My girls are Wire Haired Vizlas btw

> My girls are Wire Haired Vizlas

Ditto -'cept mine are boys

2 wings each would be a snack for mine!  What weight are your girls?

If you're going to add veg - and there is absolutely no need to - then you'd probably find they enjoy it more when it's added to mince rather than bones.  Also if you feed cabbage as greens then keep it to teaspoon sizes rather than tablespoons as it's quite strong for first timers :)

Mine is a female Vizsla.  Whole fish is much better than just the meat.  In fact big old fish heads contain loads of good stuff - usually free from the fishmongers too.  I feed mine 2 chicken wings for breakfast plus some pureed veg (puree w/ a bit of oil) - I buy Tesco value frozen veg & use that.  Sometimes she gets a wing and a raw egg.  I add any leftovers or some cottage cheese.  Mine weighs 23kg & looks pretty well covered.

Dinner is around 200g of meat (chunks of tripe or beef from Pets at Home), maybe some leftovers and another tablespoon of veg.  Sometimes she is funny about new foods - a dollop of honey usually works (plus the toughlove down for 10 mins and then remove the food - repeat for about 4 days if necessary!!)  As a puppy she was very picky - but has got better and better.  She now has a cast-iron stomach and particularly likes really spicy food!!  Most days I also give her a bone - ideally one she can consume most of, rather than a large marrow bone.  I also like to feed the turkey necks from Landywoods - they are the epitome of raw meaty bones.

Storage is a bit of an issue - if I had space I would get another freezer, but I really enjoy feeding this diet & it seems particularly good for Vizslak!!

What about the danger of salmonella in raw poultry?

Girls weigh in between 22kg the smallest(smooth) and 27 the biggest(wire) whole sardines for dinner tomorrow - am I overdoing the veg? 2 tablespoons? How many chicken wings would you recommend I'd been told 2. Was going to give 1 sardine each tomorrow- they are fairly big with some veg and rice.

All seems so much trickier than scooping out kibble!!

Honestly it gets much easier - and I promise you will really enjoy feeding it.  Yes - I would say just under a tablespoon of veg w/ each meal for the smaller girl, and just over for the larger one (as someone said - the jury is out re. whether veg is necessary or not).  I would give the smaller girl 2 wings for breakfast w/ a bit of veg, and the larger one 3 wings.  Rice isn't necessary - but useful for upset stomachs, or we feed it if the rice is a leftover from a takeaway - otherwise we don't feed any pasta or rice.

There are all sorts of advantages you might not yet know about - fresh breath, clean teeth, really firm poos that are small & don't smell much, little/no gas  . . . plus the pleasure of watching your dogs chomp down lovely looking and smelling food.  If it's their first time w/ chicken wings they may take a while - my bitch licked one for about 20 mins before she figured out that it needed to go in whole, be chomped up within the skin and then swallowed whole.  Only once did she not chew it enough - she threw it up, chewed it a bit more & swallowed it again!!  Gotta love dogs.  Don't be too worried about Salmonella & Listeria - dogs very rarely get it - their guts are well designed to cope with most bugs.  The only time I poisoned mine was with some pre-cooked chicken that I knew wasn't OK for humans.  It turned out that it wasn't OK for dogs either - she threw it up in the garden about an hour after eating - then came in & demanded a replacement breakfast!

I buy the Tesco value chicken wings - about 10p each.  Then bag them up 2 at a time & put them in the freezer.  They pack down well.  I put one in the fridge for breakfast & then when I take it out, I replace it with one from the freezer to defrost for the morning.  Travelling is no issue.  I just pack the bags into a freezer bag and defrost when/if necessary.  No need to be nearly as careful w/ poultry for dogs as for humans.  Similarly for dinner - after breakfast I weigh out the frozen meat and leave it in the bowl at room temperature so it's thawed by dinner - then I throw in veg, leftovers and maybe some yoghurt or cottage cheese.

It's easy enough to adjust the quantities until the dogs are just the right weight.

Dogs lick their bums and eat poo and don't get sick, they are not vulnerable to the same bacteria we are (In reply to Zan)

> What about the danger of salmonella in raw poultry?

As long as you take normal hygiene precautions (as you would with handling raw poultry for your family) BEFORE it goes into the dog, then the dog deals with whatever's there. They are perfectly adapted to eating carrion and rotting stuff; from having antibacterial saliva, right through to far stronger stomach acids than us (which can dissolve bone) and a shorter digestive tract.