Salamander, I have enjoyed your posts on many issues and we agree on much. On this one we will have to agree to disagree. I understand the resistance to feeding raw because I used to be there. Thankfully I am no longer there — but it took me a long time to get over my fears and I had to go gradually down that path. Even then I was bombarded with a lot of “well-meaning” nonsense that had no basis in truth — mostly from the vet community. Thankfully we used our eyes, ears, and God-given common sense. I did my research and we saw the results in our dog’s health. We had thought they were healthy on kibble before, but did not know how healthy they could be until we went raw. There are some things we do not feed — but there are many ways to “feed raw” and not all of it involves feeding bones. Some feed ground bones, some whole, and some not at all. Some feed RMB’s, some, like us, do not — but it is counterintuitive to believe that feeding food prepared who knows when under the current FDA compliance policy is healthier in any way to feeding whole, fresh food. There is a scientist (whose name I forget but I could find it if I had the time) who has been researching carcinogens in human food. He discovered that they can be evidenced in hair. He pulled hairs from his kibble-fed dogs and found carcinogens present that were off the chart: a non-issue in raw meat. No, he doesn’t feed raw and he has no “agenda” in terms of trying to convince others to do so. Interesting.
I took the opposite route and went from for to against, for the exact same reasons after carefully weighing information and coming to my own conclusions based on what I could see.
Odin, for example was born with familial hypothyroidism and mild follicular alopecia.
Both manifested so abnormally early that I had to literally fight my vet for the T panel to even be done.
He was shocked that I'd been right.
The dog "looked great" at that age [1 YO]
However, several months of 6 star rated kibble made "great" look pitiful.
Everyone remarks how utterly lush his coat is compared to the other Dobes they've met and how robust he is.
The baby is following in his paw-steps with the difference that her meat supplementation is always cooked.
She looks glorious, in spite of being covered with "shop dust".
We have no skin conditions, food allergies, itching or other issues and I never wash my dogs.
I wipe them off with a microfiber cloth for 'special occasions' and that's about it.
Regardless, you are and will always remain my dear FRiend.
Best wishes for your furbies, *always*. :)