planning the switch

[Kaytlin and Cooper]

So, we will hopefully be getting our own place in the next few weeks, and im hoping to get Cooper and the cats back onto the raw (the inlaws didnt like us feeding it at their house). I used to feed pre-prepared stuff, now I plan of doing it myself

So, it has been 6 months. Cooper has had a bone once a week, but she wont touch chicken or turkey anymore. Im thinking maybe I just wait it out, and once shes hungry enough she will eat it. I have some turkey backs and im going to give it a try as the inlaws are away for a few day (hee hee hee)

From the research I have done it seems that Cooper needs

5-10% organs

10-20% bones

75-85% muscle meat

Another place says 80-10-10 meat bone offal

A recipe I found says

4.5lb chicken thighs

7oz liver

14oz heart

8-16oz water

4 egg yolks

Cooper loves her red meat, but is pork safe? Does it need to be frozen for 20 days first? or is this just for wild shot pig?

Apparently my cats need

10% organ meat, 5% of which is liver

8% bone

Another place says 85-5-10 meat bone offal

i havent been able to find cheap meat ($1 lb) yet (apart from turkey backs at 59c lb), but Ive only been looking in grocery stores. i have a few butchers to go to. Also a local GSD breeder has told me where I can go in the states (short drive away) to get cheap meat.

Im kinda nervous, especially as 2 of my cats can be picky, but Im going to give it a go. I have no idea how im going to figure out the bone content.

If I can get meat at $1 lb I can feed all 4 of them for around $90 a month, which is about the same as I spend on kibble

[Ricki and Tara (doodle)]

Good luck Kaytlin!  It sounds like a good plan! I have yet to get past my fear of Tara choking on a bone so I am currently giving her raw meat and cooking the bones to mush and adding them back in. So she doesn't get the benefit of chewing but she does plenty of that with her bully sticks.  Currently I have given up on measuring anything. I mix it all together but some days she is getting more meat other days more or less bone than the day before. I kind of go nuts when I have to measure and count everything. In the end I think it all averages out.

[Kaytlin and Cooper]

Thanks Andrea

I think the cats will transition ok - the 2 older ones ate raw for 7 1/2 years - one will only eat chicken, the other is more adventurous. Our kitten (who I guess is no longer a kitten at 1 1/2) ate raw at his foster home, and ate raw for about 6 months with us so I think he will do just fine.

This morning was the test - we fed breakfast late so Cooper was really hungry. I cut some meat off theb one and chopped some up for her, some for the kitten. I mixed in a little canned food and they both gobbled it up. Cooper took a little time to chomp on the bone, but I put her in her crate and left her to it. Within a few minutes she was chomping away.

I think with a little bit of patience, they will get there! 

[Kaytlin and Cooper]

So, it has been a few months now. Cooper absolutely loves beef and pork, but im really struggling to get her to eat white meat. She used to eat chicken all the time when she was little, but over time got fussy with it. So we have tried turkey. She really isnt interested. Not even the dark meat. I got a whole turkey and chopped it up for her! We have added in canned food, and she will eat some ground turkey, but wont eat the chopped up turkey. No chance she will munch on the bones yet (legs and wings). She is gobbling up her fish oil capsule though :)

The cats will eat ground turkey, and small turkey chunks. We are adding a bit of canned food at the moment. The kitten will eat pork, liver and beef. Im going to be adding a little liver to the cats food now (they have only been on the raw a week, we used up the kibble we had first).

Is there any problem with Cooper eating just red meat, or should we persevere with the turkey? Im concerned with the higher fat content of the beef. She is skipping some meals because she will not eat the turkey. Im usually a tough love kinda person wen it comes to food, but maybe she really just doesnt like the white meat. Tonight Im going to add ground beef with ground turkey. See if she will eat that.

Cooper is munching on a pork bone every day. She gets fed meat morning and night, and gets a bone early afternoon

[Kaytlin and Cooper]

success! Ive been mixing ground beef and ground turkey 50/50 and Cooper gobbles it up!

[Kaytlin and Cooper]

Id also like to add for future reference, for other people, Cooper weighs 60lb the cats weight 10, 13 and 15 lbs. I feed the cats 350g between them, and Cooper gets 600g meat, and bone and some steamed veg. if we are going on a big hike I feed her more. So roughly 2lb in total a day

We live in Canada but go over to the US to buy meat as its much cheaper!

We buy pork with bone in (sometimes its small bones we throw out, or bigger bones we keep) at $1.69/lb

Ground beef at $2.60/lb

Ground turkey at $1.89/lb

A whole turkey at $1.29/lb which works out at $1.50 once you remove the carcass (keeping the legs and wings, organs and neck)

Beef liver at $1.99 for 3/4lb

We havent moved on to other organs yet, last time we gave them to them they wouldnt eat them, it will be a slow process

We can get chicken leg quarters at 69c/lb but Cooper wont eat those yet

We have worked out, it costs us around $120 a month to feed them all a mixture of meat, which is a little more than we pay for kibble, but the extra cost is worth it. If Cooper would eat chicken it would be cheaper than kibble