Can a dog be a vegetarian?

calliecritturs

Given that tripe is generally seen as a 'yummy' I'd imagine whomever got to it first probably snagged it. 

corgipower

I haven't researched the source, but I find this article rather interesting. I'm open to anyone who wants to tell me that the source is unreliable though. This is the page on eating stomach contents

   I watched a documentary on wolves last week, and the alpha female was the first to eat the deer that was killed. Like the article said, she ate the heart, liver, and kidneys, and didn't eat the stomach contents.
 

abbysdad

She said: "She loves exercise and has a real passion for being outdoors.
She can be a thorn in my side when she's restless, but it's what keeps
her going."

Anyone can say their dog is a certain age ... and given that this dog is a border collie and an 'outdoor loving dog' -- I'd again register my skepticism -- I tend to think such dogs supplement their diet as THEY see fit and the owners may not be aware of it.

brookcove

Good luck with the beans. 

  Charlie, hilarious!

Ben actually gets legumes in his veggie mix - but not for the protein.  They are simply another natural source of nutrients.  I rotate peas, various beans, lentils, and other exotic legumes I can find (the Hispanic market is a wonderful place for produce).  They are a tiny part of his diet though.

Hello Brookcove,

Hope all is well down on the farm.  I know you have a good handle on things down there and with the nutrition and hope the crew are all doing good.  I never told you this but I've always thought the BC's are beautiful dogs and I may just have to get one some day.  I think anything in moderation and a tiny part of the diet is nothing to get alarmed over.  I would be hesitant though to make something like beans say 1/3 of a diet which was the impression I had received from the OP here in this thread.

CC.

[quote user="corgipower"] 

True, and I hadn't thought of tripe. But tripe isn't something to be gotten from all animals. I haven't researched the source, but I find this article rather interesting. I'm open to anyone who wants to tell me that the source is unreliable though. This is the page on eating stomach contents ~ http://rawfed.com/myths/stomachcontents.html [/quote]

Hello Corgipower,

Here is a quote from the Abady articles I dug for you.  It goes along with the myth theory, and here is how it all got started.  Then again, you know many feel it is hogwash because of the source and part of some sort of cult mythology with no peer-review grant money to back it up.  It is all so snake-oil like and so hard to believe that people actually profess this kind of stuff....how dare they buck system.  Must be sheer nonsense and utter absurdity that people even write this kind of stuff....so anti-establihment...it's just unbelievable.

Abady Article excerpt, Raw Diets for Dogs and Cats:

The problem with the current raw diets is that most of them are primarily composed of plant matter which is indigestible to the dog (and cat), even though it is well known that feeding raw plant matter exclusively to dogs will result in starvation, because dogs do not produce the enzymes needed to break down cellulose (there are many other reasons as well).

In the 50s, the largest producer of dry diets circulated an absurd notion that dogs consumed mostly the plant matter contained in the internal organs of their prey, justifying the production of kibble composed mostly of highly processed grain. This mistake is now being applied to try to justify the use of voluminous amounts of raw vegetables which are included in today’s raw diets. Grain can be used by dogs if it is highly processed. Raw vegetables cannot, regardless of whether they are masticated by the animal or ground mechanically. In addition, the pulp produced is not suitable to the feeding of carnivores.

CC.

um, hello? talk about uninformed. most raw diets contain very little plant material, less than 10% of the diet is supposed to be veg, and you're supposed to grind it up well, to break open the cell walls, so the dog can digest it.

oh, and tripe only comes out of cows. Deer don't have tripe. And tripe isn't "veg", nor is it stomach contents, it's the lining of the highly specialized cow stomach.

calliecritturs

Anyone can say their dog is a certain age ... and given that this dog is a border collie and an 'outdoor loving dog' -- I'd again register my skepticism -- I tend to think such dogs supplement their diet as THEY see fit and the owners may not be aware of it.

I agree with this. Case in point, a friend of a friend who is a vegan decided to put her golden on a vegan diet. She researched it pretty well and went to a lot of trouble to try to get this diet balanced. The dog didn't like the food, it picked at it a bit, lost some weight and then started killing and eating every living animal it could find outside (rabbits, ground hogs, etc). This of course upset said vegan quite a bit because she was cleaning up animal carcuses every time she went outside, and she ended up switching him back to kibble. I have to say this dog looked fabulous when he was doing his own hunting!

This of course upset said vegan quite a bit because she was cleaning up animal carcuses every time she went outside

This made me laugh!  Lol... : )

tripe only comes out of cows. Deer don't have tripe

Every ruminant can supply tripe, which is part of the four-chambered specialized digestive system of ruminants.  Tripe excludes none of these, though I've often seen just omasum, or just abomasum sold as green tripe, while bleached or honeycomb tripe is the reticulum.  The rumen may or may not be included in any green tripe - it would be hard to tell as by weight it would be a very small part - it's not much more than a chamber to hold great volumes of water and vegetable matter.

Someone sells deer tripe canned (Canine Caviar maybe?) and I have, of course, fed my dogs fresh tripe from my sheep. 

really? I stand corrected. I thought it was a thing of cows.

mudpuppy

really? I stand corrected. I thought it was a thing of cows.

It is.  Just not only cows.  

Here's that Canine Caviar Venison Tripe: http://caninecaviar.com/venisontripe.html  I saw commercial lamb tripe somewhere else, wish I could remember now where it was.

Here's the greentripe.com lowdown on tripe: http://www.greentripe.com/description.htm