This site is an archive of ChiotsRun.com. For the latest information about Susy and her adventrures, visit the Cultivate Simple site.
Thank you for all your support over the years!

Cultivate Simple 10: Real Food for Your Pets

December 17th, 2012

This week we discuss feeding your pets a raw/real food diet. Over the years when we have mentioned this people have always had questions. We discuss our reasoning and methods as well as good ways to start out. Leave any comments or questions below and we will cover them on the next episode.

Featuring the lovely Angel Chimes.
angel chimes

Real/Raw Food for Your Pets

Raw Feeding FAQ’s:

Cooking with Mr Chiots

Brians apple crumble

Mr Chiots recommends these cookbooks:

His apple crumble was pretty good, we discussed a few changes that might make it better, like the addition of some crystallized ginger and more spice in the crumble.

Hugh’s Apple, Raisin, Walnut Crumble

7 Comments to “Cultivate Simple 10: Real Food for Your Pets”
  1. Lisa@The Cutting Edge of Ordinary on December 17, 2012 at 8:00 am

    We lost our precious Moose a few weeks ago. He came down with a terrible case of pancreatitis and passed away on the 4th. I was looking into feeding him a raw and homemade diet before we lost him. I’ll keep these books in mind if my heart ever heals enough to get another pup.

    Reply to Lisa@The Cutting Edge of Ordinary's comment

  2. Melissa on December 18, 2012 at 10:09 am

    Just finished listening, great job as always! Really need to pull up the River Cottage Series on amazon– we watched that show while living in Scotland and it had a huge influence on the more simple life we now live. We thought his name was great as well– we named our Jack Russell- Hugh Fearnley Whittingstall- Hugh for short! :)

    So I have to say, I feel encouraged to make a greater effort to feed our dogs better. It’s hard when you have 3 (and soon to be 4) dogs- it gets to be a lot more work! But I really do want to get to the point where at least half of their food is raw so I’ll go pull those duck necks out of the freezer– make sure you save those from your Muscovies. Also just out of curiosity– do you plan to clip the wings on your ducks? We’ve had one of our females missing since Saturday, kinda think she flew off! There is no sign of a scuffle in the yard and the rest of the ducks are fine. We had been pretty good at keeping wings clipped but I think hers grew back out and we didn’t clip soon enough. Kinda think she might be hiding a clutch of eggs somewhere.

    Anyways, thanks for mentioning the grain book- that went on my library list! I’ve been looking for something like that recently.

    Reply to Melissa's comment

  3. glenda on December 19, 2012 at 4:06 pm

    I have lots of cats and have begun to feed chicken each day. Do you ever feed your cats fish? My cats are crazy for fish but I rarely prepare it for them.

    Reply to glenda's comment

  4. Kiskin on December 19, 2012 at 5:40 pm

    Thank you for the interesting discussion on raw food for pets!
    I have been feeding my dog BARF diet for over a month now and so far I am very pleased with the results – his coat is shiny and looks healthy, his teeth that were brown (my dog is 2 years old) are sparkly white and the bad smell from his mouth is gone. He is energetic and happy.

    My biggest fear when starting raw feeding was that my dog would choke on the bones, since he is a devourer since puppyhood. But I learned, that the trick is to feed big chunks of meat and bone, as big as the dog´s head – he can´t swallow it whole and starts chewing properly. I no longer panic about raw chicken bones, add raw eggs and live yoghurt.

    There is a very informative group on Facebook called Raw Feeding (RF) http://www.facebook.com/groups/261761471359/

    Reply to Kiskin's comment

  5. angie h on December 19, 2012 at 11:44 pm

    Ugh! I have a freezer full of chicken and lots of deer for the dogs. I just need to start doing it! Biting the bullet soon! Thanks for the great info and it was a nudge to get started!

    Reply to angie h's comment

  6. Heron on June 24, 2013 at 8:37 pm

    I live in Northern California (bay area/Silicon Valley) We tried feeding our 2 Huskies (age 12 and 13 this year) raw food for a year and they did fine since we weren’t feeding them crap food. (We feed them top of the line dog food like Orijen and Nature’s variety.) However we just cannot justify the cost anymore since It cost us about $400 a month. We do still supplement with raw food couple of times a week. I think a healthy lifestyle is very important as well. If you don’t exercise your dog, no amount of raw food will help. Despite not feeding our dogs raw food daily they are extremely healthy. (mind you they were both rescue dogs that we adopted when they were 7 and 8) They can easily and happily still pull a sled with a team that’s half their age and jog 3-5 miles with me daily.
    As for Vaccination, I wish I had the confidence to not vaccinate for FIV

    Great podcast by shining the light on raw food and vaccinations. I enjoyed listening to your podcasts and am playing catch up.

    Reply to Heron's comment

    • Susy on June 24, 2013 at 8:45 pm

      It can be expensive in some places. Luckily, we have found local sources for good quality raw meaty bones, chicken necks and backs at a great price. Currently I get chicken necks and back for $36 for 40 lbs and I only pay .99 for raw meaty bones. It can be pricey in some areas. We also raise some of our own pet food, especially vegetables.

      Reply to Susy's comment

About

This is a daily journal of my efforts to cultivate a more simple life, through local eating, gardening and so many other things. We used to live in a small suburban neighborhood Ohio but moved to 153 acres in Liberty, Maine in 2012.

Admin
Read previous post:
Quote of the Day: Gandalf

"Saruman believes it is only great power that can hold evil in check, but that is not what I have...

Close