Dog Community

Raw Has No Nutritional Value?

Posted : 6/7/2006 10:18:31 PM

This was from another thread:

The total opposite is to be said in a sense. Raw food has little to no nutritional value in it. Although some people may feed it to their dog's because it seems more natural I guess there is close to no nutritional value. Although you may not like the added nutrients in packaged k9 food, in reality your dog needs these. He needs the added vitamin supplements, the omegas and whatever else may be added.

I'm hoping Sasha0999 will step up and back up this assertation. Or consider the fact that whole foods are the original and natural source of nutrition for any animal, not the chemicals that companies spray on kibbles.

Today I fed my dog a raw shoulder arm "picnic", complete with bone. He ate about three pounds of this. According to the USDA nutrient database, he had the following nutrients available to him per pound of meat consumed (this does not include the bone, which this database obviously does not consider edible):

Nutrient Units 1.00 X 1 lb
-------
453.6g Proximates Water [align=center]g [align=right] 281.50 Energy [align=center]kcal [align=right] 1148 Energy [align=center]kj [align=right] 4804 Protein [align=center]g [align=right] 75.71 Total lipid (fat) [align=center]g [align=right] 91.58 Ash [align=center]g [align=right] 3.81 Carbohydrate, by difference [align=center]g [align=right] 0.00 Fiber, total dietary [align=center]g [align=right] 0.0 Minerals Calcium, Ca [align=center]mg [align=right] 23 Iron, Fe [align=center]mg [align=right] 4.49 Magnesium, Mg [align=center]mg [align=right] 77 Phosphorus, P [align=center]mg [align=right] 857 Potassium, K [align=center]mg [align=right] 1320 Sodium, Na [align=center]mg [align=right] 308 Zinc, Zn [align=center]mg [align=right] 10.75 Copper, Cu [align=center]mg [align=right] 0.367 Manganese, Mn [align=center]mg [align=right] 0.050 Selenium, Se [align=center]mcg [align=right] 110.7 Vitamins Vitamin C, total ascorbic acid [align=center]mg [align=right] 3.2 Thiamin [align=center]mg [align=right] 3.298 Riboflavin [align=center]mg [align=right] 1.175 Niacin [align=center]mg [align=right] 18.067 Pantothenic acid [align=center]mg [align=right] 2.976 Vitamin B-6 [align=center]mg [align=right] 1.755 Folate, total [align=center]mcg [align=right] 18 Folic acid [align=center]mcg [align=right] 0 Folate, food [align=center]mcg [align=right] 18 Folate, DFE [align=center]mcg_DFE [align=right] 18 Vitamin B-12 [align=center]mcg [align=right] 2.90 Vitamin A, IU [align=center]IU [align=right] 27 Vitamin A, RAE [align=center]mcg_RAE [align=right] 9 Retinol [align=center]mcg [align=right] 9 Lipids Fatty acids, total saturated [align=center]g [align=right] 31.752 10:0 [align=center]g [align=right] 0.045 12:0 [align=center]g [align=right] 0.091 14:0 [align=center]g [align=right] 1.134 16:0 [align=center]g [align=right] 19.686 18:0 [align=center]g [align=right] 10.478 Fatty acids, total monounsaturated [align=center]g [align=right] 40.688 16:1 undifferentiated [align=center]g [align=right] 2.540 18:1 undifferentiated [align=center]g [align=right] 37.422 20:1 [align=center]g [align=right] 0.680 Fatty acids, total polyunsaturated [align=center]g [align=right] 9.798 18:2 undifferentiated [align=center]g [align=right] 8.210 18:3 undifferentiated [align=center]g [align=right] 0.680 20:4 undifferentiated [align=center]g [align=right] 0.454 Cholesterol [align=center]mg [align=right] 322 Amino acids Tryptophan [align=center]g [align=right] 0.898 Threonine [align=center]g [align=right] 3.361 Isoleucine [align=center]g [align=right] 3.411 Leucine [align=center]g [align=right] 5.965 Lysine [align=center]g [align=right] 6.731 Methionine [align=center]g [align=right] 1.923 Cystine [align=center]g [align=right] 0.934 Phenylalanine [align=center]g [align=right] 2.994 Tyrosine [align=center]g [align=right] 2.522 Valine [align=center]g [align=right] 4.042 Arginine [align=center]g [align=right] 4.881 Histidine [align=center]g [align=right] 2.849 Alanine [align=center]g [align=right] 4.491 Aspartic acid [align=center]g [align=right] 6.868 Glutamic acid [align=center]g [align=right] 11.413 Glycine [align=center]g [align=right] 4.382 Proline [align=center]g [align=right] 3.470 Serine [align=center]g [align=right] 3.125

Source
USDA National Nutrient Database for Standard Reference, Release 18 (2005)
http://www.nal.usda.gov/fnic/foodcomp/search/

Edie

Posted : 6/7/2006 11:27:30 PM

Brookcove,on which thread did you see this jargon posted on?

FTR if raw has no nutritional value then dogs fed on raw would be dying left right and centre from malnutrition.Also,if raw has no value,then neither does cooked [8|]

starsenchis

Posted : 6/7/2006 11:29:35 PM

[linkhttp://forum.dog.com/asp/tm.asp?m=67715]http://forum.dog.com/asp/tm.asp?m=67715[/link]
This was posted by Sasha0999 in the "do raw fed dogs live longer?" thread...

brookcove

Posted : 6/7/2006 11:37:22 PM

My first feeling was "don't feed the troll." But then I feel this urge to challenge stuff like that for the sake of lurkers. "Mom, today I read on i-dog that meat has no nutritional value, so I'm going to take this multivitamin and eat a twinkie instead of dinner." [

] I'm just kidding of course, but I really wouldn't want people to think that if they are not adding vitamins to their dog's food, their dogs will die of malnutrition.

ron2

Posted : 6/8/2006 5:52:03 AM

IMHO, it's not particularly raw or kibble that prolongs a dog's life. It's the care and quality we bring to their life. A number of stories here are of farm dogs fed from meat that you knew about. And, they got to eat it every day. A wild dog isn'y lucky enough to get a meat meal every day. The fact that they can and do consume vegetation helps them through that. I have seen, on a special about "Global Wolf," a wolf eating chutes from a bush. So, a wild dog dies from predation, starvation, and malnutrition, usually in that order. And they don't live as long as our pets. If the wild canids were given meat and other foods every day, they would live longer but their quality of life might not be as good because they are wild and are not meant to be caged.

And our pets can be allergic to certain meats. In the wild, a dog allergic to a particular meat has reduced it chances of survival and Nature will fix that. The allergic dog dies. If it dies without reproducing, then there are no meat-allergic off-spring to weaken the species.

So, to re-phrase, the dogs live longer, raw or not, because of the care we take to feed them every day in as balanced a method as we can manage.

Julitza

Posted : 6/8/2006 6:09:52 AM

My uncle has about 20-25 hunting hounds and they all get fed raw with a bit of kibble mixed in and these dogs are some of the healthiest dogs I have ever seen. There coats are shiny they dont have bad BO and they can run around all day. And for the kind of excersize they do they need to be well nourished.

luv4gsds

Posted : 6/8/2006 6:33:33 AM

It sounds like a troll to me trying to get feathers a flying. Anybody can see that barf/raw has nutritional value to it. Its so strange that dog food companies are trying to make their kibble as close to barf/raw as they can. Not saying anything bad about kibble.

ron2

Posted : 6/8/2006 6:16:35 PM

In addition to my previous post, I'm not so against raw, I'm just not totally for it, either. I would be more prone to homecook. But either way, I would do it only after a ton of research and a balancing of the recipe by someone better at it that me. That being said, I still defend my use of kibble and the brand that I use because it is working for us. Short of bloodwork, Shadow gets a clean bill of health when we visit the vet.

brookcove

Posted : 6/9/2006 2:06:07 PM

We do bloodwork on a yearly basis for the young ones. Twice a year for the oldsters, and above thirteen we go to every three months. Plus for any rescue intakes, a baseline is part of the workup. I was glad for this just recently when a new foster dog came up with a slighly elevated ALT and WBC indicating as a first guess, tick disease. She did indeed have erhliosis as it turned out. We thought she was just stressed out and underfed.

I feel it's important to take regular snapshots throughout my dogs' lives - you can catch things much quicker this way and work prophylactively.

Margaret Tyler

Posted : 6/9/2006 5:01:40 PM

I've always been weary about feeding an all raw food diet. My vet is an pro natural food vet. She says that all dogs should have some raw food in their diet,but not an all raw food diet, unless their diabetic. She explains that she has never read an article from a scientific source that has proved that your average dog does better on an all raw diet.
I feed a 1/2 raw 1/2 dry diet, just to play it safe

sooner

Posted : 6/9/2006 6:38:58 PM

Although you may not like the added nutrients in packaged k9 food, in reality your dog needs these. He needs the added vitamin supplements, the omegas and whatever else may be added.

Sasha0999, you can correct me if I'm wrong, but aren't those added back in because the raw ingredients loose them in the cooking process?

Margaret Tyler

Posted : 6/9/2006 6:47:47 PM

You're right! Good Point

jessies_mom

Posted : 6/10/2006 11:37:03 AM

She explains that she has never read an article from a scientific source that has proved that your average dog does better on an all raw diet.
I feed a 1/2 raw 1/2 dry diet, just to play it safe

I know raw foods have plenty of nutritional value but I would like to see a study on how well dogs digest raw food. It's known that they don't digest raw vegetables unless they're finely chopped or pureed but I also wonder about raw meat. Do they have sufficient enzymes to digest a large percentage of the nutrients from raw meat? The only study about digesting raw protein that I know of was done on humans and it showed that we digest cooked eggs better than raw eggs. I do feed Jessie raw meat with one of her meals.

luv4gsds

Posted : 6/10/2006 1:49:44 PM

Here is a good site to go to.
[linkhttp://www.healthyvet.com/docs.htm]http://www.healthyvet.com/docs.htm[/link]

ron2

Posted : 6/10/2006 4:57:01 PM

The good doctor, however, says something that got me corrected here, before. I had once surmised that a lot of allergies were food based. Someone promptly told me I was wrong and that food allergies comprise 10 percent or less of allergies. Then, I surmised that perhaps diet can affect the immune system, thereby leaving a dog open to inhalant allergies and such. That receive a little better reception. But doctor Pollock is saying that the majority of chronic allergies are food based? Which is it?

As for more dogs being sick, I think that has more to do with the increasing population of pets, especially ill-bred ones. A percentage of any population of anything will have certain traits or problems. A larger population will still have the same percentage, even though it seems more cases of these traits and problems are occuring.

Someone pointed out that pureed vegetables, etc, take the place of nutrients a dog would get from eating hide and hair, ala a wolf. I didn't know that deer hide contained beta-carotene and potassium and vitamin E and K. Also, Dr. Pollock advocates feeding grains. How does that sit with such people who don't want their dogs to have any grains? I'm not saying that having no grains is a bad or good thing. If we just pick and choose what we agree with, then how would we be able to quantify the nutritional benefits of a raw diet, if we can't agree on what constitutes the proper raw diet, which does not mimick the meal from a kill? And are we doing our dogs a disservice if we ignore part of a raw diet because it doesn't fit our philosophy or faith? Or any particular diet, for that matter?

Certainly, a diet might have to be tailored to a dog with specific needs. Some dogs can't handle grains, freshed cooked or extruded kibble.