I had heard of both Primal and Oma's Pride before, though haven't fed them personally.

Just as an aside, there seems to be a TON of new frozen raw foods out after the recall. Some of them have been around for a while and some...well, it kinda makes me wonder. Make sure that any diets you feed are AAFCO formulated at the very least just to make sure they aren't just throwing together whatever sounds good and putting feel good statements on the website and packaging. AAFCO feeding trials are great too. Most of the newer foods don't have these. As far as I know, Nature's Variety is the only frozen raw diet that's undergone AAFCO feeding trials (which was great for them to do, especially for convincing certain veterinary nutritionists that raw diets aren't the spawn of Satan).

If you're feeding a home prepared diet, it's not essential for every day to be balanced, just over time. But if you're feeding the same diet every day like a commercial, it should be balanced. Anyways, I'd recommend inquiring with the company if they are AAFCO formulated/passed feeding trials and if not, why? Also if they have sent samples of the food off to a nutrition lab for testing.

 

Thanks Mauren.
I have feed Nature's variety frozen in the past, and on occasion do feed it as well.
I was just looking into the logs since it's a bit more economical.
I've noticed that a lot of the frozen diets don't have the AAFCO stamp of approval, but with that being said things like ol'roy and pedigree do.. so .. take it for what it's worth I suppose.

My dogs get a variety of supplements and their diet changes. I switch protein sources, they have added calories from things like the Honest Kitchen, as well as other add ins such as veggie Amixx and urban wolf.
They also get some orijen kibble and ziwi peak.

I feel their diet is pretty good actually. I just wanted to see if anyone had any comments about the two listed above. I appreciate your reply I had to laugh about raw food being the spawn of satan. Good thing my vet does not agree with that.

Julie

 

both have a 20 - 30% vegtable formula which is much more than i feed. primals formula doesn't say what the % (if any) of organ meat and oma's pride is only 10% organ meat. primal contains stuff like coconut oil which i don't feed. i think oma's has different stuff in it too.

 

Well, more what I meant is what we're seeing is a TON of these food companies pop up almost over night with a lot of claims, "testimonies," and soft focus photos of happy dogs and cats and ingredients when they very well could be making the stuff up in a bathtub with the moonshine and methamphetamine. A lot of the companies who have been in business for about a decade or more (Natura and Nature's Variety in particular) have worked pretty hard to get their names in good standing with the veterinary community. Me and a couple other vets on VIN have worked VERY hard to establish a presence and a legitimate place for both home prepared and commercial raw and natural kibble and canned diets. All it takes is one vet posting on VIN about a dog ending up with rickets or other vitamin/mineral deficiency from eating some commercial frozen raw diet that their well meaning owner ordered from some company off the internet for all that work to fall down and for all of the veterinary nutritionists to say [-X "We told you so! Now go pick up a bag of Hill's or Purina right away!" It's like the same thing with BSL. You can have 1000 fantastic *fill in the blank "dangerous breed" here* dogs and one kid gets mauled because some idiot wasn't being responsible. All that hard work was for naught.

I have no problem at all with a well balanced commercial raw diet and they can be especially useful when a home prepared diet isn't practical. They can also be very useful for recovery or cancer diets when lightly cooked. But I do want to caution folks that the companies should be spending as much money on making for certain you are getting a quality product by having it formulated and sent to outside labs to make sure it meets some basic standards for nutrient levels, especially when most of these diets are well over $2 a pound (more expensive than what most people do for a home formulated raw diet). Basically, make sure you're getting what you pay for!! And AAFCO doesn't approve or disapprove of diets. They just have a set of standards for either formulations or feeding trials.

 

Thanks Mauren and Susan for your replies.
Do you both feed only home prepared foods?

If not, what commercial diet or foods do you feed?

Thanks again,
Julie

 

i get all my whole bones from bravo because everything is grass fed, no antibiotics, no hormones, etc.. i also like their chubbs because they are made up of one protein, bones, organs, veg. even better are their chubbs with no veggies. i add my own salmon oil, vits, green sea veggies. i also like their chubbs of pure organs and the chubbs of fresh frozen green tripe.

 

What do I feed? Oooh, that's complicated. :-D

I feed a whole prey model style for the most part. A simplified version, like whole turkeys and chickens, with giblets if possible. Since I don't usually get them with the guts, they get green tripe or The Honest Kitchen Preference (their veggie mix) 2-3 times a week. I have grown to see the importance of tripe and/or a veggie mix in the diet. I use Solid Gold Green Cow Tripe, but I'm looking into getting bison and beef tripe from a local guy. They also get canned EVO 95% rabbit, duck, venison, etc once a week for variety.

One of the lamb producers at the farmers market gives me meaty lamb bones (mostly leg bones and spinous processes) and lamb heart for $1 a pound, real meaty lamb ribs (which I prefer to beef and pork ribs because they are easier for the dogs to crunch on) for $2 a pound, all grass fed and finished, bless her heart. They sometimes get pork neck bones from a guy who pasture raises his hogs, which are $1.75 a pound.

I've used nutrition software to see how close it is to being balanced and it's not bad. I actually need to redo it again as I've changed some things too.

 

Very cool!
Thanks for the replies. A software program? That is pretty damn awesome

I just purchased 40Lbs of Oma's Pride chicken and turkey. I really liked the way it looked and smelled when I fed it to my dogs. No smell and you can actually see the meat.

I haven't tried solid gold's canned tripe, but I do give their tripe treats. I use the TriPett version for tripe. I'll have to look at the two and compare them.

Thank you,
Julie

 

when i feed the bravo blends, i usually add extra organ meat and extra green tripe. mostly i now make my own blends but i use the bravo components because i like the idea of using grass fed meats. also i like the murray's chicken frames and necks. they don't have fat or skin and are bigger than any i have found in the regular markets. they each weigh slightly over 1 lb, and come 40lb boxes.

the bravo blends are not considered complete diets, but for me, when these companies start adding in a lot of different stuff i worry if that starts to muck it up. i think less may be better, so i can add to it what i want.

i was thinking of going with canned tripe because it would be a lot easier to deal with than the frozen, but then 'whole dog journal' had to come out and say fresh is best, but frozen is next best, so i am guilted into staying with frozen. maren, i yhink that is really great about your source for fresh buffalo tripe.

 

Coming in late on this one, but wanted to chime in anyhow I feed Oma's...it is a recent discovery and I'm really pleased with it. I specifically feed the ground turkey frames and ground chicken frames as a base for my diet (adding in a variety of muscle and organ meats, plus occasional fruits and veggies). It costs between $1.50 - $2.00/pound depending on what kind of discounts my supplier gets me. Since I buy the 5 lb packages, it takes 4 days to feed that particular package. I find that the meat stays very fresh and never smells funky on that last day. My girls have done exceptionally well on Oma's, plus it is much cheaper than most of the prepared raw I can get my hands on.

 

Thanks Melissa. I have been very pleased with the turkey and veggie, as well as the chicken and veggie mix. I don't think I have any last more than 2 days in the fridge, but mine are the 2lb chubs.
I agree tho, no smell at all. I like the fact you can actually see the meat in there. It appears to be very good quality.


Thanks Again,
Julie