Raw bone feeders, question for you.

kpwlee

 Amanda do you give Bevo or any of the larger dogs beef ribs or pork ribs?  They make me very nervous with beastie, I have seen them splinter when he can be bothered to chew them.  He has a nasty habit of putting the whole thing in his mouth.

Bevo gets beef & pork ribs, be he gets the whole side so that he has no chocie but to chew....at least a little bit.  The other big dogs are good chewers, so they get individual ribs. 

If you really are interested in going raw, you might want to join a local raw feeders email group.  I joined two when I decided to make the jump.  Ours has a list of grocery suppliers who will sell to individuals.  Our guys rarely eat chicken, (think once a month) & I am paying, on average, $0.67 per pound.  I usually order 500 pounds at a time, & THEY DELIVER!!!  We also have a grocery store that will order me whole goats.  They charge around $0.55 per pound, & it usually weighs between 75-85 pounds.  I have to cut it up, but with practice, I can get it cut up into workable pieces in about 15 minutes. 

We feed a little over 100 pounds of food a week.  It costs us about $70 a week to feed 5 dogs & a puppy raw.  (Chyna & Brutus are kibble dogs.)  Because of the amount of kibble Bevo needs to maintain weight, it is substantially more cost effective for us to feed raw.  Before going raw, Bevo alone was eating a 30 pound bag of EVO every 10 days.  You can do the math.

I have several frozen turkey necks in my freezer...so far kind of nervous about giving them to Gibson. I have given him some...but I usually break them into smaller pieces... of course I am afraid he is going to choke.

any suggestions?

Dyan, if I'm nervous about gulping, I start with something bigger than their head. For a dog Gibby's size, that's going to be a large chicken, a duck, a turkey, or a whole side of ribs. He will then HAVE to chew. Turkey necks are rapidly consumable, even by my little girls, and VERY bony.

 Thanks for the info Amanda - I will check out the local raw feeders groups - there are NO butchers around here I have looked for one since we got here 6 years ago.  I could try some of the hispanic or oriental markets but he ones I have been to don't butcher on site either.  The one source of beef heart I know of I have to ask to order them.

I found one source of full pork spines which I like better than the pieces of pork neck - dummy has gobbled sharp pieces of the neck and barfed them up - nice.

If I could get him what he needs for .67/lb I'd be doing it!  I try to get whatever I can for about $1/lb unfortunately that is fairly limited.  On occasion I get some good deals on the 'last chance' meats and he gets some treats.

The largest ribs I have gotten are like this

and he did this

then went about eating each rib

kpwlee

then went about eating each rib

So like...THATS the kind of bone I am afraid of.   HHHmmm! So I guess I should not worry so much.

Turkey necks....I have given them to both Gibby, Bubby and Ollie.....but I would break them into about 1 or 1 1/2 inch pieces....all three chew.  So  if I know ( think ) Gibby chew the smaller piece....can I pretty much figure he'll chew the whole thing?

And when you guys say "boney".....thats a no - no???   I went and bought turkey necks because I thought they were supposed to be great.

I haven't tried turkey necks simply because no one here has them. Usually I can just find the marrow bones and pork necks.  I found knuckle bones today for the first time and grabbed them. It's now a very quiet evening in my house with three of the four nibbling away

ETA: ribs as well. And lamb is their favorite..so when the ribs or shanks are on sale, we always buy them. Happy dogs

Bugs is such a good boy staying on his towel.  I've tried that but as soon as I give her the bone she feels the need to take it someplace else.  It's not something I want her to do but I cannot seem to stop it.  She does it with cookies and snacks too. 

Aesop gets bones in his crate..not due to mess factor, but because he'll let everyone else take his bone from him 

LOL, Aesop didn't get the memo about chows!!

He did not.  His meals have to be fed in his crate as well, lest he starve due to small dogs taking his dinner.  Poor gentle pushover

ETA that once sequestered he really enjoyed his knuckle bone yesterday. He'd not seen one before (as they're oh so elusive here) but once he figured out what to do with it, he had a grand time

kpwlee,

Are you near Chapel Hill? If you are, send an email--there used to be a good butcher in Carrboro (next to Chapel Hill).

 This place looks like a great resource - especially for those of you in Ohio

http://www.aplaceforpaws.com/

Karen, I wish Bevo would eat as carefully as Bugs does.  Bev crunches off the tops of the first two or three ribs & swallows them whole if I'm not sitting right there.  Usually, sitting on his blanket with my hand on one end of his ribs is enough to slow him down, & motivate him to actually chew.

 my point in showing that pic is that instead of eating the bone and meat at the same time he cleaned the ribs and then ate the bones - he puts the whole rib bone in his mouth - easily which scared me senseless.  I wound up taking them away and he rarely gets ribs now.  He is very prissy though and always stays on his towel.  In fact once I threw a short rib in his bowl that was an extra from preparing our meal and he paced and whined and went t the back door  several times.  I opened the back door and he ran over to his towel.  I got it and laid it down, he took the rib laid on his towel and went to work.

Oh!!  I didn't realize that he put the whole bone in his mouth!  That would scare me to death too.

I cannot believe that he insists on eating on his towel!  If given the chance, Bevo would eat everything in to ottoman.  I have to stay on him to keep his bones on his blanket.

ETA:  I have determined that starting a puppy on raw is much easier than transitioning an adult.  Cher is eating one raw meal, one kibble meal, & one home cooked meal a day.  She gulps the kibble & cooked, but she's a great chewer with her raw.  I can hand her a neck, & she chews it so nicely.  Just something to think about....