A Complete and Balanced Raw Diet for Your Dog
Raw dog food is becoming a popular choice for many dog owners that worry about their dog’s diet and nutrition. If you haven’t heard about raw dog food diets yet, you’re in the right place to learn what raw dog food is and what benefits it can bring to your dog’s health.
In addition to the what and why of raw dog food, you will also find a few pointers on what to look for in raw dog food ingredient lists. Finally, you’ll learn about the safety of raw dog food. Keep reading to learn more about these alternative K9 raw diets.
What Is Raw Dog Food?
Essentially, raw dog food is an uncooked and minimally processed dog diet. This diet is made from blending the muscle meat, organ meat, and ground bone of prey animals. In some raw dog food diets, dog-safe fruits and vegetables are also added to fill out the nutritional profile.
Raw dog food is available in a few forms that dog owners can pick from, including:
- Freshly homemade raw
- Frozen raw
- Dehydrated raw
- Freeze-dried raw
Each of these K9 raw dog food styles lasts for different lengths of time. These raw food forms will also require different storage types and purchase patterns. You’ll have to examine the amount of time you have available for dog food purchase, preparation, storage, and sanitation.
Why Feed Raw Dog Food?
Raw dog food blends like K9 Kravings and the private label of 3 Raw Hounds aim to bring dogs back to a more natural diet. Domestic dogs are a type of carnivore that are more opportunistic, much like humans. Raw dog food offers dogs a fuller diet approach that can have health benefits.
What To Look For in Raw Dog Food
Common blends of raw dog food ingredients include chicken, salmon, or beef and vegetable combinations. Some types of K9 raw dog food have supplemental mixtures of dog-friendly fruits and vegetables. These blends help to increase the nutritional benefit of this food diet for dogs.
Unlike some commercial dry dog foods, 3 Raw Hounds prides itself on seeking out the best vendors for all of our prey animal meat selections. And like the K9 Kravings raw dog food line, we proudly display our ingredients on each package.
In any raw dog food, you will want to look for clear and specific ingredient lists that include:
- The animal used for muscle meat
- Organ meat
- Ground or partially ground bone
Some raw dog food diets will also add blends of:
- Balanced vitamins and minerals
- Dog-friendly, low-carb vegetables and fruits
There are two approaches to raw dog food diets. One approach is called the Biologically Appropriate Raw Food diet, aka BARF. The other approach is the Prey Model Raw diet or Whole Prey model.
Prey Model Raw diets will focus on the protein, organ, and bone portions of the raw dog food diet. Any vegetable matter portion of the diet is served separately on an as-needed basis. The BARF diet includes vegetables and fruits in each raw dog food serving.
Benefits of Raw Dog Food
Typically, dog owners will seek out raw dog food diets for their dogs when they are concerned about the quality of their dog’s food. Some dog owners seek the potential doggie-health benefits of a raw dog food diet. The possible benefits of raw dog food can include:
- Loss of excess weight
- Improvement in lean muscle
- Softer fur and healthier skin
- Cleaner teeth
- Better scent
- Improvement in digestion and bowel movements
- Improved energy levels
- Reduced or eliminated preservatives
Is Raw Dog Food Safe?
Raw meat can cause concern about potential bacterial contamination in raw dog food. However, there are sanitation methods that dog owners can use in their daily feeding and clean-up to negate these concerns. Some good raw dog food sanitation practices can include:
- Cleaning the dog’s food bowl after every serving
- Washing your hands before and after handling the food
- Cleaning the dog’s feet after it makes waste
- Using a thick doggie clean-up container when removing waste
Dog owners should exercise these sanitation practices any time that they feed their dog raw dog food. Without standard sanitation, any raw food can prove to be unsafe. Owners should also follow the directions on each package for recommended thawing times to minimize bacteria.
However, it should be noted that young children, elderly adults, or immunocompromised individuals residing in the household may become ill more easily around raw dog food. If you experience health concerns while feeding your dog raw dog food, you should speak with a doctor.
Curious and want to learn more about the raw dog food that we offer? You can email the 3 Raw Hounds team at 3rawhounds@gmail.com to ask questions and offer comments. We always do our best to respond within 24 hours.