Barf / Kibble Combo

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SPARKP

Boxer Pal
Rosco is 12 weeks old and has been on Nutros Max. His coat looks great and yesterday he weighed in @25 lbs for his last set of puppy shots. I was thinking about feeding a raw / kibble diet combo. Is this a wise thing to do, and if so what would be the best way to do it. What do you guys think?


Thanks,
Steve
 

gmacleod

Elusive Moderator
Staff member
Well, there are a few people who do mix barf and kibble. Effectively if you're doing that then there is no need to feed very much in the way of vegetable matter (if any at all) in the barf part of the diet. Kibble is mostly grains, so there would be little need for any additional plant material. So the barf part of the diet could be made up pretty much exclusively of raw meaty bones, offal and a few additions like eggs, fish and dairy products. Nothing to stop you giving fruit as treats though.

The one caution on feeding that way is that you should not actually mix the two foods, but rather feed one meal a day that is kibble, and a second meal that is barf. Reason being that the digestion times of the two foods are vastly different (around 11 hours for kibble versus around 5 hours for raw food) and that can cause some problems. No worries if you feed the two food types as separate meals though.
 

SPARKP

Boxer Pal
Thanks for the suggestion on feeding the kibble separate, I would have never thought of the different digestive times. Also, this may be a dumb question but what is offal?
 

gmacleod

Elusive Moderator
Staff member
Offal is internal organs - things like heart, liver, tripe (green, not bleached), kidneys, etc. Those things are extremely nutritious.
 

SPARKP

Boxer Pal
Can I assume that offal is beef and chicken internal organs? If so, is one more nutritious than the other?


Thanks again for your help / knowledge,
Steve
 

gmacleod

Elusive Moderator
Staff member
It is the internal organs of any animal.

I don't think any particular one is more nutritious than another, so to a large extent what to buy depends on price and availability - and possibly on your dog's preference if he has one.

Another thing to keep in mind is that it is a good thing for a dog to be fed a wide range of different meats. So if you're feeding mostly chicken parts as the raw meaty bones (RMBs), then beef or lamb (or some other) offal might be a good way to go.
 
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