How do u rate this homemade dogfood?

Z

zjn

New member
Hello Reddit,

I have been feeding my dogs (5yr/male 85lb blue pit, 16yr/female, "labbish", 75lb) this homemade mix for several months now and they seem to love it with no issues/reactions.

My lab stopped eating and nothing I put on it would interest her...until she got this. Now she does her happy dance and tries to eat from the bowl as I am putting it down.

This recipe makes 6q quarts. I am currently topping up their Purina "lamb and rice" kibble. (1 cup kibble and 1 cup "real food")

I will feed this exclusively once I finish their 40lb bags of kibble.

I cut'n'paste this from an earlier reply and I thought there might be some good additional info, so here goes ....

2 chicken quarters ( about 2.5 pounds)

4 sweet potatoes, or more

6 carrots, or more

can each of red kidney beans, lentils, and chickpeas

Dump into a slow cooker for 4 hours ( 6 hours if your chicken is frozen)

Carefully pull out chicken with a slotted spoon, Pull the bones and chop the meat real fine ...feel for bones and toss, knuckles and cartilage are ok

If you got a vitamix, dump all the chicken in and fill with broth...crank that bad boy up for 5 minutes or so, you will have nothing bigger than a grain of rice, more like pudding. This looks horrible, but the dogs love it, especially the older crowd!

Do the math on your dog based on weight (2.5% to 3.5% of your dog's weight per/day, for example, an 80lb dog == 1280 ounces * 2.5% == 32 oz == 1quart/day)

https://www.purina.com/articles/dog/feeding/how-much-should-i-feed-my-dog

You only have 4 days, 5 days max before this goes bad. Freeze what you cant use in 4 days. Put these in ziplock bags with daily amounts. Peel them off from the freezer the night before you need them.

I would not go much past a month frozen, but ymmv!

PS.. I have since added:

0.75 lb of chicken livers,

replaced the canned beans with soaked/boiled dried beans,

1 can of pure pumpkin puree

I will probably add 2 cans of sardines in olive oil... my Pitt goes crazy when I open cans now!

Please let me know what think, what to watch for, what to add, what to add/cut, etc, etc

I am planning on making this for neighbors for a "to be determined" fee ... hopefully cheaper than Ollies and FarmersDog

Thanks for reading!
 
@zjn Something I have seen with some dog Instagrams is Balance it. You put your dogs recipe in it and it will make a supplement to make sure it’s balanced .
 
@zjn It sounds like you put a lot of thought into it, but without working with a veterinary nutritionist you could be leaving out important vitamins and minerals that your dogs get from formulated kibble.
 
@peterpeter Agreed, that's why I am asking the group...maybe a vet and/or nutritionist will pipe up and say "have u considered this? ... or that?" .... or try this link .. or book .. or whatever

I have seen a lot of links on con-home_recipes with this and this is the number one reason many vets are against home recipes. I would love to hear them out.

I thought of having somebody with basic vet training that could draw blood from the dog at the client's home and submit that to a lab for analysis. Work with a passionate vet for KPI marks and monitor monthly, or even weekly...("what's in your wallet?")

Not cheap, but will be accurate for their dog(s). As a team, we could all work together to build a plan for the "forever dog".

This is probably a better health than most people have. With less bureaucracy and middle men to boot.

Thank you for responding, and hopefully more people do.
 
@morherof2 ….? I’m not sure what you’re getting at.

Formulated kibble has all kinds of vitamins and nutrients in it to make sure dogs are as healthy as possible. That’s a fact.

I’m not debating if kibble is the best option or not, I’m just saying that OP’s recipe, if not formulated a vet, COULD be missing nutrients and vitamins that dogs need. It doesn’t sound like OP is adding supplements and without being an expert on food it’s almost impossible to know if all the right nutrients are in that homemade recipe.

It’s important for people who do this to work with vets. It’s a great idea if you’re committed to it but you gotta make sure all the nutrients are there. That’s the benefit of well formulated kibble, whether you think it’s the best way to feed a dog or not
 
@zjn I cooked for my pet for his last 2 years of his life (lived till 16yo). Before that we tried for several months of kibble and then many $$$$ of vet bills and unable to determine why after clean diet (boiled chicken and steam rice and meds = ok) and return to kibbles = red jelly stool

Once we went to home cooked food and we use a pet diet software to create as balance a meal for our pet he bounced back years younger - it took several months of fine tuning the formula to get there.

From what i can tell your formula will be short of balanced diet for your pet

100 jars (3 meals/day) = month for xam
 
@nlu Thank you for your reply

I am sorry but I can't read your link. Can you post just the text?

What recipe app/package are you using?

This is verrry interesting!
 
@zjn Look up Pet diet designer

I did not want to pay $300-400 for a recipe and when you need to finetune its another $100-200 per occurence

We are not cooking for our 11 mo old Rescue but plan on making toppers when is is older
 
@nlu The package looks promising.
It seems they are selling an annual $20 subscription
But they seem real heavy handed without offering refunds once you have purchased a subscription. I too do not want to pay $300+ per recipe and however more for tuning

I am emailing the vendor to clarify if this is still the case. That would be shady. There is no reference of extra fees in their website.

Thank you for pointing that out.
 
@zjn They have been on BETA for years and personally i dont think a version will ever get launched. But the beta does what it does and at that time (3 years ago) i was unable to locate any better other than trial and error

I would ask when will a final version be launched
 
@nlu So, if I purchase their subscription, do I need to pay for each recipe?
Are there any other purchases I need to make?

Thanks
 
@zjn Sorry I don't think you understand what the software does. Maybe purchasing a recipe is best for your dogs. Or even find a new kibble
 
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