Hi,

Yesterday we whelped 8 beautiful chubby, healthy pups easily and Mum is doing a fabulous job with them; a real supamum actually.

The only problem, if indeed it is a problem, is that today mum is refusing any food other than raw chicken wings and necks. She's always been raw fed and food has never been an issue. I've tried her with minced chicken, lamb meaty bones, beef meaty bones but to no avail, completely turns her nose up at them. Show her a chicken wing or neck and whoosh it's gone! She has loads of milk already, pups gulping nicely, no health problems with her or the pups. All pups bar two put on weight overnight, the two only lost a few grams, one 9 grams the other just 2 grams, so very happy with them, been popping the two who lost on more often.
She's drinking lots of water and some goats milk fortified with evap. milk, not enough to quench her hunger though. All pups very content and sleeping well between feeds.

I'm perfectly happy to go on feeding her chicken wings and buying whole chickens to quarter for her if I have to, but just concerned that she's having the right vitamins and minerals?

Before she whelped she ate anything you gave her btw. I know it's early days and tomorrow she might start eating other things, but if there are any raw feeders out there who have had a similar thing happen then it would be nice to hear from you! 

Hello Hachiko,
I only feed raw and my girls rear beautiful strong puppies who I start offering raw mince to at 2.5 - 3 weeks of age.
If your girl is happy to eat raw chicken wings and necks for the first few days and you can supply her with this then I wouldn't worry. The last thing you want to do is stop her eating just because she won't eat what you want, she will not come to any harm and by eating the wings and necks she will be getting a good calcium intake. She is a very important person at the moment with a huge responsibility, I personally would "play the game" her way for a few days but at the same time offer little amounts of her other meats each day untill she gets back to normal.
Have fun and good luck :)

love what youve wrote wee man sometimes i wish there was a like button :).....all the best with mum and pups hachiko x

> If your girl is happy to eat raw chicken wings and necks for the first few days and you can supply her with this then I wouldn't worry

Just wondering if there would be a danger of the bitch being constipated with too high a bone to meat ratio? I couldn't feed mine solely chicken wings or necks, if they have them on two consecutive meals they often struggle to poo.

What about either minced tripe or tripe chunks?

Hi Wee man,

Thank you sooo much for the reply, it has really put my mind at rest!

I've been feeding raw now for a few years and I agree the pups are amazingly strong and healthy! This lot were born looking and feeling like the book of the bitches description of 'feeling like a hand in a glove' at birth, really plump and so active, mum had a really easy birth too considering they were all around 460g and the biggest was a whopping 484g (17oz), I call him chubster!

I too start them off with raw mince, I ball it and freeze it and then take out as much as I need for each meal. By 3 weeks (they are a large working breed) they are testing their teeth on wings as well as minced chicken and beef and by 4 weeks they pretty much have the hang of chomping on anything! Don't you just love the food play fights when they're this age? So funny but cute at the same time!

She's had 4 wings and 3 necks so far today, I did get her to eat half a carrot too so hoping that will help any probs with toileting, but tbh I've never had a problem with that and the wings I use are very plump meaty ones.

I'm very fortunate as I have 2 brilliant suppliers of raw near me, one has poultry: wings, necks, livers, heads, gizzards, mince, and backs. The other does, beef (mince and meaty bones) lamb meaty bones, turkey drumsticks and wings, green tripe, chicken wings, kidneys, livers, minced lung and chicken mince...oh and she sometimes has joints of frozen beef which they all love to have a slice of! I spend about £150 a month on their food but I have 7 adults and 1 x 7 month old...it costs more when I have pups of course as need to feed mum extra and the pups themselves at weaning! Not bad really considering, I do have 5 freezers going though lol, with only one for human food! I supplement them with a little grated veg which they also love, I know a lot on raw don't feed veg but I just don't feel right not giving it to them! Do you?

Hi Hachiko,
Yes mine get raw veg too, when we prepare our own veg the girls all sit and wait for the peelings or leaves that are not wanted, if we can eat it so can they. When we go for walks or up to our donkeys field the girls frequently search and graize for different grasses and herbs, I would never stop them doing this as they know what to pick and eat, in the autunm they enjoy searching and finding of blackberries and sometimes wild raspberries, they also enjoy any fruit that we eat and if the donkeys are not fast enough the girls will steal their carrots from beneath their noses.
I never worry about their poos getting too hard after having bones with their meals for a few days, this just helps to make their anal glands work properly, which has to be good, if you sometimes watch while they are having a good hard poo it is possible to see a squirt of liquid which is expressed from the glands (very exciting) ! :)    

Hi Wee man
Haha, yes the joys of raw feeding! I remember well the excitement, when we changed to raw, of seeing their poo change to nice firm crumbly lumps, bored everyone sensless about it for weeks! Never noticed the squirt though but we've not had any problems since we started raw so I assume its doing its job :)

Very happy as yesterday afternoon our baby girl suddenly got her appetite back! This morning she ate a full pound of mince, 6 chicken necks, mixed raw veg, some cooked spaghetti that was left over from dinner last night and then she begged for something when I opened the fridge door so she had a couple of slices of cheese, and its only 9.00 am. She's got her lovely figure back already so need to make sure she doesn't get too lean.

All pups growing like weeds and although I was sleeping on the sofa all night, I really could have been in bed as she's very attentive. Masses of milk too and she turns regularly on her own. Not like another of my girls now retired...she was a nightmare as would only feed on one side so had to keep turning her and she was such a stubborn dog that it needed two of us to do it!

Thank you so much for your help, you really did put my mind at rest!

Hi Hachiko, good to hear all is back to normal.
It's so easy for someone else to say don't pannic and all's well give it time!
Even when you know the answer to a problem yourself it is not easy to not pannic. (did that make sense ? )
Great news, now have a good Christmas. :)