How Long Should it Take...?

This is a dedicated place for all of your questions and answers about Raw Diets. There are also some really cool groups like "Raw Fed" on the topic you can join. This forum is for people who already know they like the raw diet or sincerely want to learn more. Please remember that you are receiving advice from peers and not professionals. If you have specific health-related questions about your dog's diet, please contact your vet!

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Phineas

go and go and go- and go and go- and...

Barked: Sat Feb 11, '12 3:52pm PST


	I recently--about 2 weeks ago--switched Phineas over to raw. He has been eating mostly chicken quarters (80% of the time), with the occasional back or odds and ends parts from a cut up whole chicken thrown in. I also throw in some pumpkin sometimes, but not religiously. He still has pretty bad poops--they start out hard but are mostly diarrhea by the end. The volume of the poop compared to kibble is about a 1/4, which seems good, but I would have thought that by now he'd be stabilizing. Some extra explanation--he's always had digestive issues, which is why I wanted to try raw. He had giardia as a young puppy and has always been a hard keeper. The vet recently x-rayed him for other reasons and noted his intestinal tract is not "normal"--apparently she thought the walls showed some abnormal thickness. Even on good kibble his stools were pretty soft, and he was up to eating 4 1/2 cups a day without packing on any pounds (he is an active, very lean 45lb bully-shepherd(???) mix)--not to mention I was cleaning up at least 4c of poop a day. Gross. I dont necessarily "mind" the runny poop, and I want to give this a fair amount of time, but I also dont want to continue anything that is hard on his system... Does anyone have any thoughts or advice on this front? Thanks.

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Moose

Moose is a- monster

Barked: Sat Feb 11, '12 4:41pm PST


	I could be wrong but it almost sounds like he is getting too much bone... When I screw up and Moose gets constipated he often has poops that start out rock hard and gets runny at the end. I would try cutting back on some of the bone and see if it helps at all.

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Audrey- Hepbull

I am not dumb, I- am ignoring you.

Barked: Sat Feb 11, '12 4:55pm PST


	do you give him probiotics/digestive enzymes? They really help my dog if she has digestive issues.

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Conker

OBEY ME!

Barked: Sat Feb 11, '12 5:49pm PST


	My Shiba had a tough time adjusting to raw. His poop was very unpredictable but some of it sounds like what your guy has. I added in a probiotic made by Ark Naturals called Gentle Digest (any human-grade one would work fine too) and that really helped get him on the right track.

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Phineas

go and go and go- and go and go- and...

Barked: Sat Feb 11, '12 6:42pm PST


	Okay, thanks Conker and Audrey, maybe I'll try that. Thinking maybe I'll give it another week before I change any of the variables then will add the probiotic. Moose, not that I am an expert in any sense of this realm, but from my understanding wouldnt too much bone make them constipated before the other end of the extreme? I would say at absolute maximum he's getting maybe 30% bone? Probably less than that. After starting to read the RMB book I am wondering if I could up his bone intake and see if that evened him out...

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Maxwell

I'm triple- superior MAD- now!

Barked: Sat Feb 11, '12 10:20pm PST


	Consider how much you are feeding as well. If his poop is runny then he isn't absorbing all the food well anyway, try dropping the feed down a bit for a couple days to see what happens. If a dog is skinny and increasing the feed just causes soft poop then adding a meal is more likely to put weight on.

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Duke

I'm king of the- world!

Barked: Sun Feb 12, '12 7:37am PST


	I second the recommendation to add in a quality probiotic and digestive enzyme. Duke has significant GI issues and both have helped him tremendously. I introduced both into his diet slowly to let his gut get used to them. Duke gets both daily and will for the rest of his life. Here's an interesting video/article on probiotics: http://probiotics.mercola.com/probiotics-for-pets.html. Granted, this is sponsored by Mercola and they are pushing their own product, but the info is good. Dr. Becker is a highly respected holistic veterinarian. She presented recently at the University of Wisconsin Vet School and I had the opportunity to hear her speak. Duke gets the Mercola digestive enzyme and a probiotic called NutriGest Rx :http://www.homevet.com/osc/product_info.php?cPath=6&products_id=122 &osCsid=42c04d78433eff6bdb74faac465c3210 I like this one because it contains herbal supplements that help soothe the GI system (licorice, aloe, ginger). NutriGest is one of the probiotics recommended by Mary Straus on her discussion concerning digestive disorders: http://dogaware.com/health/digestive.html

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Phineas

go and go and go- and go and go- and...

Barked: Sun Feb 12, '12 7:55am PST


	Thanks Duke and Maxwell. Duke, I will watch that video. We have a great pet supply store right around the corner, I will have to go investigate which brands they carry. Maxwell, he does need to put weight on. Right now I am feeding him a full leg quarter in the AM and a half quarter in the PM. Should I somehow try evening out the quantity? I dont want to cut back too much on volume as he seems pretty ravenous and still hunts around the kitchen even after eating his full quarter... He been eating that daily amount for a few weeks and has gained a bit of weight but still needs to add a few more pounds at least. He is a performance dog so I do want him to stay lean but not showing-the-world-his-vertebrae lean! Maybe the pribiotic will help things "stick" a bit better.

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Maxwell

I'm triple- superior MAD- now!

Barked: Sun Feb 12, '12 10:59am PST


	I was always puzzled by people reporting their dogs took too long to eat, didn't like the kibble, didn't pick up any and all organic matter within reach before I got Max. Sassy was a major food seeker and I thought that was normal. It turns out Max mostly let Sassy do the seeking and now she is gone has started doing a bit of that himself. Since a wild dog will eat until it is gone of course they are hoping to con you out of more food while the getting is good. You may return to the previous diet and they want to get as much of this good stuff as possible for as long as they can. Feed your dog to gut tolerance and put your hands on him to gauge whether he needs more food, don't let him convince you he needs more food because he has room in his tummy. I would tend to underfeed a dog until the gut is accustomed to the new diet and worry about putting on the weight later. Maybe you will be lucky like I am and you will be able to feed big and small later and he can get really and truly full. Max will actually stop eating with food left on the ground, pretty neat after feeding him a measured diet his whole life. At the very least you will be able to offer up hard to eat stuff that take a while to get inside. One huge advantage of this diet is you don't offer food [kibble] and chews [bully sticks and kongs], you offer big awkward meals [pork neck, feet and shanks, beef rib racks, turkey joints...] that cover both needs.

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Phineas

go and go and go- and go and go- and...

Barked: Sun Feb 12, '12 1:25pm PST


	Thanks Max. I definitely am not letting his apparent hunger be my only gauge---my two other dogs are bigger food hounds than he and would eat until they exploded if I let them. He is the least ravenous of all three but has shown increased interest with the raw, as you said. Here are some pics of him from today---you can see he does not have an ounce of extra on him. (Sorry for the external link but I cant get Dogster's code to work with my Wordpress files...) http://whattheagility.wordpress.com/?attachment_id=1086 Of course, now that I've posted here and ordered $$$ worth of probiotics online, he seems to have had his first semi normal poops today. Whatever it takes I guess, right...?? (edited to add/fix missing images) Edited by author Sun Feb 12, '12 1:35pm PST

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