Chapter 17

Feeding Your New Puppy

 

AT LAST I HAVE MY NEW PUPPY !

Most folk, as soon as they get their new puppy home want to feed it straight away.  Usually that is not a great idea.  My advice is, if you must feed the pup, do do not let it eat a lot.  If is is allowed to eat as much as it wants to, which a lot of new owners just love to see, it drastically overeats.  It eats as if it had never been fed before.  It overeats because it is used to competing with a heap of hungry puppies for food.

That new puppy has no idea it has been removed from it’s mum, it’s brothers and sisters, from the humans it was used to, and from the surroundings, which it loved and called home.

Sometime in the next 24 hours all this will dawn on your new puppy.  The realisation of being lost and lonely and miserable.  Meanwhile, with all that food in it’s little tummy, particularly if it’s food it’s not used to, you will almost certainly see digestive upsets, colic and diarrhea.

That pup which a few hours ago seemed like a bottomless pit, now refuses to eat anything, including what the breeder assured you it had been getting as it’s full time diet.

That is why so many folk turn up at the vets  within 12 to 24 hours of their new pup’s arrival.  They present their vet with a miserable, lethargic bundle of puppy suffering from putrid watery diarrhea, and maybe some vomiting.

 

A Better Plan

To avoid all that, wait until the pup asks you to feed it.  Let puppy spend it’s first few hours at your place in happy exploration, and having a great time playing with it’s new owners.  If it wants to drink water… no problem.. let it find the bowl you have casually placed on the floor.

This ensures that pup gets to know you and it’s new home on a casual relaxed basis.  Exploring and playing is tiring for a pup.  There is a very good chance your new pup will sleep through the first night with no disturbance.  You can help that along with a drink of milk, egg and honey.  (See recipe in chapter 13.)

The next morning, that hungry little pup will be happy to accept the food you offer.

The first food we offer all new pups are chicken wings, or at least some sort of boney off cuts.  I cannot think of one occasion when a hungry new puppy was not prepared to eat a chicken wing or similar, and always with great enthusiasm.

However, as I have said, do not let it gorge itself.  You may offer another in a few hours, but still leave it hungry.  This way it will quickly settle into its new home with very few tummy or psychological upsets.

The important point is not to give it to give it too much.  If you know the sort of food it had been eating before coming to your pllace, that will be OK for the moment.

In a few hours, offer some more of the same, but still leave it hungry.  This way it will quickly settle into it’s new home with very few tummy or psychological upsets.  If you wish to change puppy’s diet, you may do so after puppy has settled in.

 

That Brings us to a Most Important Question

Apart from what the breeder may or may not have told you to feed that puppy, just what sort of food do puppies eat ?

Do you give it cat good ?  That sounds all right.  Should you feed it mince ?  A lot of folk do.  What about milk, porridge, eggs ?  Can it eat bones ?  How about some rice, left over veggies and a bit of gravy, or that bit of chicken from last night’s tea ?  Perhaps some breakfast cereal ?  What about steak or kangaroo meat from the pet shop ?  Will this bit of custard do any harm ?  Then there is ice cream, and chocolates, and bread, and butter, and vegemite ?  What about fruit and yogurt and cream ?  What about commercially produced ‘’scientifically balanced’’, needs-nothing-else-added, straight-from-a-tin-or-paquet puppy food ?  That might be easiest.

The truth is, you can feed your puppy all or some of the above or something entirely different.  The choices are in fact, almost endless for your opportunist, carnivorous, omnivorous, scavenging puppy.

In other words, your puppy can and will eat just about anything, but what is the absolute best ?

• This is the most important choice you will make for your new puppy.

Yes, I know you will keep it away from other dogs until it is fully vaccinated for Distemper, Hepatitis and Parvovirus.  You will worm it regularly, and take great care not to run over it or tread on it.  You will groom it and teach it good manners.  You will make sure it does not ge heartworm.  However, the big question is, will you feed it properly ?  Do you know how to feed it properly ?

• The way you feed your new puppy will determine it’s health for the rest of it’s life.  It is that important.

Most new puppy owners seem to know this as if by instinct.

That is why they plague their vet with questions like…….

‘’What is the best food to feed my puppy ?

What is the best brand of puppy food ?

How often should my puppy be fed ?

How much should my puppy be fed ?

What sort of meat should I feed my puppy ?

Should you feed puppies bones ?

If so what sort ?

What about calcium ?

What sort and how much ?

What about food scraps ?

Is cat food OK ?

My puppy is a Chihuahua, does it have special needs ?

My puppy is a Great Dane, I suppose it needs lots of calcium ?’’.

The question are never ending.  People with new puppies do not only ask vets of course.  They seek and are given advice from every quarter.

• It is not surprising that so many people are unsure about feeding dogs, particularly puppies.  They receive a mass of confusing and often conflicting hints coming at them from all directions.  From breeders, pet shop owners, adverts on television, vets, books, butchers, newspaper articles and so on.

 

Who Should They Believe ?

The answer to that is very simple.  To get the answers you need, you have to ask the dog itself.  The way to do that is to observe three things.  What happens in nature, what happens in families and kennels all over the world as different puppy feeding regimes are tried, and the results of modern research into canine nutrition.

By understanding what puppies eat in the wild, you will have valuable clues as to what we should be feeding our domestic pup of today.  You will find out exactly what the digestive system of a pup is programmed to eat by centuries of evolution.

Combine that approach with an examination of the results of modern research together with feeding trials… carried out daily all over the world, in the homes of new puppy owners, and you will get first hand practical advice on what works well today, and what doesn’t.

 

Your Puppy has the Insides of a Wolf

We cannot be absolutely certain about the origins of the domestic dog.  One thing is for sure.  Your little puppy came originally from wild dogs, and there is a lot of evidence to suggest that wild dog may have been the wolf.

Although we humans have changed the appearance and the nature of the dog in all sorts of ways by domestication, we have not changed it’s basic internal workings.  In other words, today’s domestic dog has essentially the same digestive system and over all physiology as it’s ancestor the wolf.

That is why it is valid to study what wolves and other wild dogs eat, to help develop a healthy puppy diet today.

• This approach is used by all modern zoos and by hospitals which use animals in their fight against human disease.  As much as is possible, all the animals in these places are fed their natural diet, and this includes the dogs.  No processed food here.  Zoologists know that natural foods produces the greatest health with the least problems.

 

Wolf Cubs Growing Up

By looking at young wolves growing up, we are actually observing our young puppy’s ancestors.  If we couple that with our modern scientific discoveries about diet, health and ageing, we should be able to produce a realistic, health promoting, puppy diet.

Wolf cubs grow up hungry, they grow slowly and they eat a lot of bones.   They spend their day in play, in sleeping, in scavenging, and eating.  Eating little bits all the time, and bigger meals as food becomes available.  They are not fed on any sort of regular basis.  Sometimes they go for a couple of days without much food.

All their food is raw.  Nothing is cooked.  That simgle fact is vitally important.  Wild dogs eat totally raw food all the time.  Their whole digestive system, their whole physiology demands raw food.

• Your puppy is no different.  For your puppy’s health sake, most of it’s food should be raw.

Wild puppies eat or try to eat just about everything they come across.  This includes soil, the stomach contents of their parent’s prey, mostly chewed up and fermenting grass; raw meat, raw bones, raw offal such as heart, kidneys, brains, eyes etc; raw vegetables, raw fruit, raw grass, raw berries, raw insects, raw bark, raw roots, raw feces etc.. You name it and they eat it or try to eat it.  All raw, nothing cooked.

Young wolf cubs do not seriously hunt.  They play.  When they have finished playing they stop and rest.  No long boring walks on a lead for wolf cubs …..

In the wolf family, eating is based strictly on an individual’s position in the pecking order, or order of dominance.  When times are tough, a wolf who is low on the pecking order goes hungry.  This is important when it comes to understanding how to feed domestic puppies.

Weaned wolf puppies, puppies abandoned by mum, are left to fend for themselves.  They are at the bottom of the pecking order.  This means they are last ones to eat.  No preferential treatment like our modern pups.

• Those half starved puppies, fighting amongst themselves do not get to eat a lot.  Mostly, it is whatever the adults leave.  The result is that what they do manage to eat, the central theme of their diet is raw meaty bones, and not much else.

The ‘’not much else’’ is important however.  It includes material such as bits and pieces of internal organs, bits of intestines with their finely crushed grass and other vegetation-type-contents, some feces, and whatever else they can find that seems remotely edible.

The pup’s hunger is important.  Firstly, it drives those wild puppies to supplement and balance their diet by scavenging and hunting.  They learn to eat a wide array of food types.  Whatever they find in the way of fruit, insects, roots, edible fundi, soil, berries, grass, etc. they eat.  The second thing it ensures, is that they never grow at their maximum pace.

• From studying the eating habits of wolf cubs which are seen to be perpetually hungry, subsisting on raw food consisting mostly of bone and being forced to scavenge a wide variety of foods, we get four vital clues about successful puppy raising.

 

Four Vital Clues

• Number one… The bulk of a puppy’s diet should consist of raw meaty bones.
• Number two… All or most of the rest of their food should also be raw.
• Number three… Puppies should always be kept hungry.  They should never be grown at their maximum growth rate.  They should be kept slim, lean and hard.  Guard against roly poly, fat, young puppies.
• Number four… Puppies should learn to eat everything.

 

Let us Look at some Modern Feeding Experiments

Ironically, it is usually those people who are most determined to do the absolute best job of feeding their puppy, that make the most mistakes and produce the poorest results.

• Doting owners, using ‘’the very best food’’ and plenty of it together with lots of calcium supplements, produce rapidly growing puppies .. and .. exactly what they did not want, a puppy with problems.  However, others, people who don’t try too hard, but follow their nose, often end up doing an excellent job.  Let us see why that is.

I want you to consider two typical puppy raising scenarios.  We vets get to see such dramas played out on an almost daily basis.  I am going to describe to you the raising of two pups.  Both were Rottweilers, they were from the same litter, they were both females, and both appeared to be in perfect health when they went ot their new home.

One of the pups was bought by a young truck driver.  He was married with a couple of kids.  If was a spur of the moment decision.  He thought the dog would be great to guard this truck.  He left the job of rearing it to the lady of the house.

The other one was delivered to the home of a wealthy young business couple.  They were planning to have it as a show dog, and possibly as some sort of status symbol.

 

Raising the Truckie’s Rottie – or

The Puppy that Brings Itself Up …..

Harried young mother, three screaming kids, a hardworking, never-at-home husband, and a brand new puppy.  Dad hopes it will guard his truck.. eventually.  He is wrong of course.  It will end up belonging to mum and the kids.

You see, mother gets the job of rearing it, and dogs tend to love and give their loyalty to the one who feeds and looks after, and with kindness, disciplines them.

It is said that if you want anything done, give it to a busy person.  That is what happened in this case.  Along with shopping, feeding the kids, doing the housework, washing, ironing, cooking, cleaning etc. etc., all on a fairly limited budget, this young lady was also expected to raise the puppy.

A busy mum has not got a lot of time for a young pup.  However, using her common sense, and trusting in luck, she does the best she can.

Let’s examine what that typical youn mother with limited resources feeds a young seven weeks old puppy that is suddenly thrust upon her…

• Those food scraps the kids didn’t eat will do.  Get some bone from the butcher.  That’ll keep it busy and out from under mum’s feet.  Drop it the unwanted food scraps while preparing the human's food.
• Forget about dog food, it’s expensive, besides, that canned stuff stinks and it tends to give puppy the trots !  Bones are cheap, and the scraps cost nothing.
• Puppy occasionally raids the garbage can, the kitchen tidy, eat the cat droppings in the sand pit and the kitty litter, and anything else it can find which seems remotely like food.

A neglected pup ?  Perhaps, perhaps not.  Strangely enough, it seems to be growing up fine, with no problems !  However, before we pass final judgement, consider the following.

 

Puppy that Gets the Best of Everything

We are now in the home of that wealthy young business couple.  They have just taken delivery of their brand new puppy.

This moment has been planned for some time.  They have been to dog shows and breeders too numerous to mention.  Finally bought this pup before it was even conceived!  Waiting, waiting, waiting… throughout the pregnancy, through the young puppy sucking on mother stage, and finally, at long last the day arrives.  At long last they have their beautiful new Rottie puppy.

• Every thing is ready.  They gave a brand spanking new kennel, they have puppy food by the truck load, freezers full of expensive steak, they have vitamin supplements, they have mineral supplements, especially calcium, and they have the phone number of absolutely every vet in town….. just in case.

Every waking moment is devoted to that pup.  Every breath puppy draws is analysed and every action observed.  Every motion that puppy passes is examined for colour, consistency, smell, size, weight, texture.  All abnormalities are noted, and the vet rung or visited at great expense to enquire the significance of these happenings.

This puppy is going to be the best in town.  It is going to grow bigger and faster, and have stronger bones than any other puppy ever.  Three square meals a day.  May be four.  Look at this puppy grow.  It is big and fat and roly and shiny and beeootiful.  Calcium supplements are poured into this pup.  It’s bones are going to be perfect.  Only the best is good enough for this puppy.  No expense is spared.

Every care is taken to ensure that nothing untoward happens to this puppy.  It is never allowed to eat soil, or the droppings of other animals.  Such things contain germs and worms, and could well do it harm.  At least that is the reason the owners give if asked.

• Also, and this is most important, this puppy is not allowed to chew bones.  It’s owners believe they are positively dangerous.

Every piece of food it is given is cut up into small tempsting morsels which ensures puppy eats as much as possible.  To further enhance this eating frenzy, all food is beautifuly cooked.  This means more of it is eaten, because it tastes better than raw food, and also, it ensures all possible parasites and germs are totally destroyed.

Puppy is not allowed any scraps of any description, because it is on a strict growth diet of carefully selected lean meats, vitamin and mineral supplements, and top quality dog foods.  No chances will be taken with this pup.

Exercice ?  Is this puppy exercised !  This puppy will be no weakling.  It is going to be developed into a champion right from the start.  Every morning and afternoon, out on the lead, off we go for a good lng healthy walk, to make sure that lungs and heart and muscle and bones and nerves are all developed to the peak of perfection.

• The owners strongly believe that this puppy will be perfectly healthy and win all the shows.  But will she ?

Fortunately this pups owners are very wealthy.  They need to be.  For some unexplained reason, even though it was bought from a stud where it’s parents had been certified as free from all hereditary bone diseases, including hip dysplasia, before it reached the age of four month of age, this puppy was having difficulty walking.

Several vets are consulted.  In the end, a specialist is visited.  Practically every major joint in the body is affected.  They are told by the specialist that this is the worst case he has ever seen.

• By the time that pup is nine months old, more than two thousand dollars have been spent on her with vets and specialist attention.
• Meanwhile the only money spent at the vets on the other pup is for worming and vaccination.  Just a normal, happy, healthy pup.

 

The Winner

It may seem stange, but out of the two pups I have just described, the pup which had all the fuss made over it, the one that ate all the expensive food and calcium supplements, the one that had all that care taken, all that money spent on it including all that top class veterinary attention, by the time it reaches adult hood does not turn out to be the healthiest of the two.  Far from it.

• In fact, at age three, that dog had to be put down because of crippling arthritis.

The dog which is brought up amidst the hurly burly life of a young family, the dog which practically brings itself up, living an a diet of bones, food scraps, and whatever else it can find, and playing with the kids in the backyard, will in most case grow to adulthood with very few problems.

 

Why is This ?

Surely the more care we take of our young puppy, the healthier he will be ?  That is common sence – yes ?  True enough, if the care you take is the right sort of care.

• However, it is possible to literally kill or maim your young puppy with kindness.

We vets see the disasterous results of over-zealous, trying-too-hard-to-do-right-thing type puppy rearing all the time.

• All the common bone problems seen in young pups including hip dysplasia are the result of incorrect feeding and exercice of the type the pampered over fed puppy received.
• This is true of obesity, skin problems, dental problems, and a host of other problems that occur as the life of the dog progresses.  It also includes the old age diseases.  Such things as diabetes, heart disease, arthritis, cancer and so on.

I want to pause for a moment, and examine what that harried young mother did for that puppy which was soooooooooo right …

 

The Puppy Raising Secrets of a Young Mother

Why is it that a young mother do so well, seemingly without really trying ?

• That young mother actually duplicated many of the conditions under which her puppy’s ancestors, wolves, were raised, for countless generations.  A process that has continued for literally millions of years, long before man came on the scene, and tried, with the help of science and commercial dog food, to do better.

Lack of time and money helped.  It ensured that pup was fed lots of bones.  When mum gave that pup a meaty bone to eat, she knew it would not bother her for a couple of hours at least.

THAT IS THE FIRST AND MOST IMPORTANT SECRET FOR SUCCESS IN PUPPY REARING, BONES.  That puppy ate a lot of bones, just like it’s ancestors, the wolf cubs.

• What she did not realise, was the enormous benefits, nutritional, physical, dental and psychological she was giving to that pup when she fed it bones.

Not that it mattered whether she realised or not.  She had done it, and that was the main thing.  In fact, that habit of tossing bones to her puppy on a regular basis, that is, practically every day, is the first and most important secret for success in puppy rearing.  Bones.

• Because that puppy ate a lot of raw meaty bones, just like it’s ancestors, the wolf cubs, this was a guarantee, the closest you can get to a guarantee when rearing pups, that this one would be healthy.

Lack of time and money also helped ensure that puppy was fed sparingly, just like the wolf cubs.  Sure it was fed adequately, but it was not over fed on a regular basis.  This is the : -

SECOND SECRET OF SUCCESSFUL PUPPY REARING..

The puppy never grew at it’s maximum growth rate.  It was never one of those rolypoly fat puppies.

• It is a general scientific principle that any plant or animal grown at it’s maximum growth rate is much more prone to disease, is short lived and in general is much less healthy than animals or plants which are held back.  Not stunted, just held back slighly.

The held back creatures still grow as big, it just takes a bit longer.

This brings us to the : -

THIRD SECRET OF SUCCESSFUL PUPPY REARING used by that young mother.  Because puppy was hangry much of the time, and because mum did not have a lot of time for it, that pup did lots of scavenging.  It ate all manner of things.  These included grass, cat droppings, insects, it’s own droppings, scraps from the table, bones it had previously buried, and of course soil.

In other words, the third secret of successful puppy rearing used by that young mother was that she gave the puppy plenty of opportunity to eat a wide variety of foods.  Just like it’s ancestors the wolves.

• The greater the range of foods that pups become acustomed to and learn to eat, the greater the chance they will get all the nutrients they need for healthy growth and development.  In later life, pups fed this way continue to accept a wide range of foods and thereby maintain their health.

THE FOURTH SUCCESS SECRET used by this young mother was to fed the pup a lot of raw food. Like the wolf cub, that puppy’s body is designed to do best on raw food.  Science has discovered a whole host of nutrients in raw food which are essential to health and longevity.

• These nutrients are destroyed during cooking.  They include vitamins, enzymes and many other compounds with life-extending and health-promoting properties under the general name of anti-oxidants.  While the vitamins can be replaced with supplements, most of the others are only found in raw food.

If we can feed raw foods to pups without endangering human health (see Chapter 9) and without endangering our dogs’ health, then we should do so.  The results will not always be apparent immediately, (they often are), but over a peried of years, the difference in the health of dogs raised on raw foods compared to those raised on cooked foods is staggering.

• Of course there are foods such as grains which must be fed cooked, but in general, raw food is what your puppy requires.

THE FIFTH SECRET OF SUCCESS used to rear that puppy occurred because it lived with a young growing family.  That puppy was fed food suitable for growth.  That is, high energy food, high protein food, and food rich in vitamins and minerals.

Basically, if those young kids were on a healthy type of growth diet, oatmeal porridge, yogurt, vegetables, meat scraps, cheese, whole meal bread etc..

THE SIXTH SECRET OF SUCCESS in raising this young puppy, relates to the fact that the family was struggling, and not awfully rich.  This puppy was fed on butcher’s bones and left overs.  The owners could not afford and possibly did not even know about calcium supplements.  They certainly would not buy loads of expensive high class meat for the pup.  They did not use dog food.

In other words, the sixth success secret used by that young mother was not to use a combination of calcium supplements, commercial dog foods and loads of expensive steak as the basis of that puppy’s diet.

• More puppies in the last 10 to 20 years, have been ruined by a diet of commercial dog food, expensive steak and calcium than perhaps any other method.

THE SEVENTH SUCCESS SECRET was the way this young puppy received it’s exercice.  Mother did not have time to take puppy for long interminable walks twice daily.  Instead, puppy romped with it’s ‘’brothers and sisters’’, the kids, in the back yard.  It simply played.  When it had had enough, it stopped.  Just like the wolf cubs.

• One of the major causes of bone problems in adult dogs is the sort of exercise they received when young.  The problems I refer to include hip dysplasia, elbow dysplasia, shoulder dysplasia etc..

Those long boring walks result in a tired and bored puppy which can hardly drag itself along.  Bones previously held strongly by taut strong muscles, no longer have this protection.  They now grind heavily against each other … this process helping to remould their soft ends…  Part of the formula for bone problems !

THE EIGHT SECRET of successful puppy rearing relates to this young mother’s inability and unwillingness to keep puppy inside.  That young puppy had access to sunlight, fresh aire, grass, plants, insects, soil and plenty of fresh water.

THE NINTH SUCCESS SECRET used by that young mother was not trying to give the puppy everything it needed in a nutretional sense, in each and every meal.  She raised it the common sense way, the way she raised her kids.  She achieved balance for that puppy by feeding a wide variety of foods at many different meals.

She may not have known it, but it is actually much more beneficial to a pup if individual meals concentrate on a limited range of foods.  The major reason for this is to prevent interaction by different nutrients which tend to become unavailable or indigestible, particularly when they are also cooked.

• The attempt to make each meal balanced and complete is a major problem inherent in all modern processed foods.

THE TENTH SECRET OF SUCCESS used by this young mother was to do it with lots of love thrown in.  That love, that interest, ensures two vital things.  Firstly, the psychological effect of being loved and wanted, helps build a strong immune system in the pup.  Secondly, it ensures that the puppy is ‘’looked at’’on a regular daily basis.

• LOOKING at growing pups is vitally important.  It helps to decide how much food should be fed.  For example … ‘’No more food for you today my young puppy … you are getting too fat !’’ … or … ‘’Oops, did I forget to feed you last night, here, have another chicken wing !’’
• By studying this mum’s methods in the light of rearing wolf cubs in the wild, we find that we have discovered the ….

 

Ten Secrets of Successful Puppy Rearing

FIRST SECRET.. Heaps of raw meaty bones as the basis and major component of the diet …. About 60% of total food intake.

• SECOND SECRET.. Grow those pups slowly, keeping them lean and slightly hungry.
• THIRD SECRET.. Feed those pups a wide variety of foods.
• FOURTH SECRET.. Feed those pups mostly raw foods.
• FIFTH SECRET.. Feed foods suitable for growth, that is, high in good quality protein, fats, vitamins and minerals.
• SIXTH SECRET.. Do not base the diet of those puppies on raw steak, commercial dog food and calcium supplements.
• SEVENTH SECRET.. The only exercice allowed is play.
• EIGHTH SECRET.. Pups must spend most of their day outside in the fresh air on clean earth and grass in the sun, with ample fresh water available.
• NINTH SECRET.. The diet is to be balanced over time, not by providing balance in every meal.
• The TENTH SECRET.. is a puppy raised with love, resulting in a strong immune system, and a puppy that is ‘’watched’’, and fed according to it’s weight, condition and general health.

The Importance of Bones .. or Getting Down to First Principles !

• What I want to stress is the absolute importance of raw meaty bones to your growing puppy.  It is essential to build your puppy’s diet around raw meaty bones.  With them your pup will grow easily and well and will have no problem.  Without them, we vets see a continual parade of horrors in terms of puppy health.

If you decide to go the meat (and no bonesO and supplement route … you will almost certainly fail, and if you decide on going the all commercial dog food way … well, the pup will go OK …PROBABLY .. for a while, but in the long term, if that is all you feed .. you will produce an adult dog with a multitude of problems.

 

Raw Meaty Bones Supply Most of a Puppy’s Nutritional Needs

Your puppy needs food that will support it’s proper growth.  It is most important that you understand the importance of bones in this regard.  It’s requirements include adequate protein, fat, energy, vitamins and minerals.  Raw meaty bones do in fact supply most of those requirements.

The very best raw meaty bones in our experience are chicken wings, or chicken necks.  They supply top quality protein, top quality fat, the fat soluble vitamins, some of the B vitamins, plenty of energy, and all the minerals your pup requires, and this may include iodine.

The fat in raw chicken has an excellent balance of essential fatty acids plus the fat soluble vitamins your puppy needs.  The bone in raw chicken wings is full of iron containing marrow.  This helps build your pup’s blood and immune system.

The only nutrients which may be in short supply are some of the B vitamins.  However, I have raised large numbers of puppies on raw meaty bones and precious little else.  They have done extraordinarily well.  Certainly much much better than a pup fed on one of the supposedly complete and balanced top class commercial dog foods.

We choose ckicken and ckicken bone for another reason.  Human health.  With chickens as opposed to sheep or beef or pork, there is aboslutely no chance of humans getting hydatids.  This fact is of importance to sheep farmers and urban hunters.  However, dog owners obtaining sheep, beef and pork products from their butcher have no worries.  For more information on Hydatidosis, see Chapter 9.

Ckicken bones have another advantage.  Because they are derived from very young animals.. they contain no toxins, as is possible in bones from old animals.  Another benefit of them having come from young animals is that the bones are soft and easy for a puppy to chew.  Also, chicken wings are just the right size for small animals… manageable.  They are also the right size for an animal that may have to eat in the house… they seem in our experience to be less trouble.. and the puppy always eats the lot … all gone… no problems.

The bottom line is that raw chicken wings and necks are fantastic nutrition for your puppy.  Meaty lamb bones are almost as good… but not lamb shanks too often.  The bone in lamb shanks is too hard for puppies.  Some people feed shank bones to very young pups ….this can be a problem because all the pups get is the meat, they cannot chew up these very hard bones.

 

It is Absolutely Essential that Young Puppies Actually Eat the Bones

• One of the most important group of nutrients puppies derive from bones are their mineral requirements.  This is a point I really want to emphasise, particularly in relation to their calcium needs.

So many people, when they raise puppies, particularly the giant breeds, make mistakes with calcium supplementation.  This is because trying to juggle various foods and various calcium supplements to obtain the correct ratio and amount of calcium and phosphorus is an almost impossible task.

It is also a major headache for any one trying to advise you.  This does not have to be.  The answer to this particular headache is so simple…..

Bones supply your puppy with it’s complete mineral requirements in perfect amount and perfect balance.  There is no need for calcium supplements when you feed bones.

Calcium supplements given to a bone eating puppy are not only unnecessary, they will cause problems… bone problems.  Nor do you have to worry about giving too many raw meaty bones.

• Raw meaty bones are not like calcim supplements where the amount to give is critical, and in most cases almost impossible to figure.  The simple rule of thumb is to ensure that your puppy receives about sixty percent of it’s diet as raw meaty bones.
• It is because this method is so simple, many people refuse to believe it or do it !  They seem to think that because calcium supplementation of pups has always been a headache, feeding bones is just too good to be true.

 

Dental Health

If you have read the chapters on bone eating, you will know that when your puppy eats bones, it is getting it’s teeth cleaned and it’s gums massaged.

• Teeth of young puppies cannot grow strong and become firmly embedded in the skull if they are not stressed by bone eating when the puppy is young and developing.

Dogs that eat raw meaty bones as a young pup and continue this into adulthood, never develop tartar, and very rarely develop dental problems.  This saves the dog a lot of pain and ill health, helps promote a long life, and saves the owner of that dog a lot of money.

Many people want to believe that nylon bones are good for thier puppy’s teeth.  I suppose they might be if the puppy chewed on them, but where is the joy for a dog chewing a nylon bone?  It is like chewing gun long after the flavour has gone.  There is no incentive other than destructiveness, or boredom in chewing on a nylon bone, and no other virtue beyond teeth cleaning.  Nylon bones are a great way to produce a bowel blockage.

• Similarly, dry dog foods do not clean teeth and they are awful nutritionally.

 

Eating Exercise

One vital form of exercise, mostly denied the modern puppy, is the exercise derived from the chewing of raw meaty bones, particularty the larger bones.

The exercise resulting from bone eating perfectly stresses every one of a puppy’s every one of a puppy’s bones, and beautifully tones practically every muscle in it’s body.  Watch a puppy eating a bone and you will know what I mean.

Picture that puppy, both front paws planted firmly on it’s bone, shoulders braced, back legs standing firm, then head down and rip and tear away.  That puppy is working it’s jaws, neck, shoulders, front legs, back and hind legs.  It is using practically every muscle, joint and bone in it’s body.

Eating this way helps produces perfect angulation of bones, and strong healthy muscles.  This is quite apart from the beneficial effect that bone eating has on teeth and gums.

Compare this daily exercice of ripping and teating and chewing bones, with a commercial dog food puppy that sucks down a plateful of slop, or a bowl of biscuits, or mince.  Head down, a few quick gulps and the food is gone.  No exercise of any muscle in the body.  No teeth cleaned, just a belly full of lifeless food.  Food that sits as a leaden lump in a swollen flabby belly of a thinly musclud pup that will never grow to it’s full potential.

I constantly see such pups brought into the surgery.  tHey have not, cannot and do not develop their body to anything like the level of excellence of a bone eating puppy.  Bone eating pups, if compared to commercially fed pups, will be found to have much more developed and defined muscles.  (see chapter 7 – puppies must eat bones)

This whole body exercising seen with bone eating, is actually a form of isometric exercise.  Exercise where the muscles remain under tension.  One of the many benefits of this type of exercise is that it helps in the vital role of keeping the hips tight in larger dogs prone to hip dysplasia.  Strong muscles round the hip joint are highly correlated with freedom from hip dysplasia.  This is another benefit not available to the commercially fed dog.

• In other words, quite apart from the incredibly high nutritional value of bones to growing dogs, dogs that eat bones regularly while they are growing will be far less likely to develop bone problems because of the continual and vital exercise bone eating forces them to engage in.

 

Sheer Joy

Eating bones for a dog is a joyous experience.  It is so enjoyed by dogs that it actually of itself boost their immune system.

 

Meaty Bones make Puppy Owners Lazy … but it’s OK!

We have found that we can get away with feeding puppies almost one hundred percent chicken wings, chicken necks and lamb off cuts and very little of anything else.  The pups I speak of here are some of our rescue jobs.  Crossbreed pups brought in to our hospital for various reasons over the years.  Puppies we take pity on.. get them going… and find them a home.

Living where we do, these pups always have access to soil and cow poop.  These two ‘’foods’’ probably contain the nutrients which may be missing from the bones.  That is, they provide some of the B vitamins and iodine and essential fatty acids.  On the other hand we had similar success when we lived in the city, where they had no access to either cow droppings or soil !

Of course I am speaking about our laziness here.  We often do not have a lot of time to be fiddling about with these pups.

• That is how we came to discover just how easy this puppy raising business is.  That is how we came to discover that regular feeding in not necessary.  That you can produce healthy dogs from very weedy and sickly pups as long as you feed lots of raw meaty bones, with occational other things such as porridge meals, household scraps, brewer’s yeast, kelp and olive or safflower oil.

However, I am getting a bit ahead of myself.  I hope by new you believe me when I tell you, firstly how EASY it is to raise puppies successfully using raw meaty bones as the basis of their diet, and secondly how IMPORTANT it is that you do decide to feed your puppies that way.

 

Before Your Puppy Arrives

Go shopping and buy some chicken wings, brewer’s yeast, kelp tablets or powder, some quick cooking rolled oats, some eggs, some canola oil, and some safflower oil.  Buy a clever and/or a meat mallet.  Have a little bit of minced meat on hand.  Have some fresh green veggies on hand.

• That is your puppy starter kit.

I am assuming your puppy is about six to eight weeks old, and is in good health.  I do not have a clue what your pup has eaten up until now, but I am assuming it is eating solids.

Let me assume you have followed my advice.  You have brought your puppy home and not over fed it.  Your puppy is now hungry.

• Offer you puppy a little bit of minced meat.  Beef, lamb, pork, chicken… it doesn’t matter.  Not totally lean, not too fatty. … WOOF!  Gone?  Great, excellent.  Is your puppy still hungry?  Fine let it be hungry for a moment.  You are now going to try it with a chicken wing.

Now lots of puppies will eat a raw chicken wing straight off… no preparation at all.  Others, particularly the smaller breeds, or puppies that the hang of being a dog… that is, eating chicken wings… at first.

To get those overly humanised puppies started, you often have to cut into the chicken a little bit, to expose the flesh.  Most hungry puppies, once they have tasted that chicken flesh… grab it out of your hand and get stuck into it.

Some very small, very finicky puppies need even more help.  They need you to turn that chicken wing into mince before they will touch it.  Remember we did the mince test above… they ate that very readily.

Turning that chicken wing into mince is why you need a cleaver or a meat mallet in your puppy starter kit.  You need a chopping block as well.  Thake that cleaver or possible a meat mallet and bash away at that chicken wing until it is all bashed up into a very fine mince… bones and all.  Alternatively, use your food processor to mince it up.

If your little puppy will still not eat it… it could be sick, it may not be hungry, it might still be miserable, or if it ate the mince… then it is addicted to mince.  If is was a very tiny pup, the mince might have filled it.

If you believe it is still hungry, but that it is addicted to mince, mix the tiniest bit of minced chicken wing with some mince.  Every time you feed the mince add a little bit more chicken wing, until in the end, you are feeding pure mince chicken wing.

• This may take three or four days, but it is worth the fiddle.  Do not give up and just feed mince… Warning… you will produce a problem puppy if you do !  It will be totally deficient in calcium, iodine and copper etc.. For more information read about the dangers of an all meat diet in Chapter 4.

With the finicky puppies, once you have got them eating the minced chicken wings, you gradually mince it less and less, until in the end, they are eating a whole wing that has not been interfered with at all.

• Your puppy is eating chicken wings!  Great… That means you are well on the way to a healthy puppy.

 

Feeding Other Things to Balance the Chicken Wings

The principles or secrets of successful puppy rearing which concern us here are firstly number three… feeding a wide variety of foods… remember, your puppy being an omnivore can eat anything and it is important to accustom it to eat as many different sorts of food as possible.  Secondly number four.. feed mostly raw foods, and number nine.. balance that diet over time and do not try and balance up every meal.

• To get out thinking about what else you could or should feed your puppy, focus your mind on the various food groups other than meat and meaty bones such as the fruit and vegetable foods, the grains and legume foods, protein foods such as eggs, the dairy foods, the offal foods and the food supplements.

These are all perfectly acceptable foods to feed your puppy.  They are all capable of supplying your puppy with nutrients for growth.

 

The Porridge Meal Recipe

First of all, let’s talk about adding grains to your puppy’s diet.  That is why I got you to buy some rolled oats in the starter kit.  If you read the chapter on grains, you will see that rolled oats are a suitable food for puppies, in fact for dogs of all ages.. as an addition to the basic bone diet.  But not in large amounts.

Use the quick cookign ones because they have been broken up into very small pieces.  This makes it easier for your puppy to digest them.

The oats are best cooked up into porridge in the usual way or alternatively you may soak them for an hour or so, or even over night.  This is equally as good, preferably feed them at body temperature.  They should end up being a nice mushy consistency.

• To a cup of this prepared oatmeal porridge (cooked or soaked), add a teaspoon or two of honey, a teaspoon of olive oil, a teaspoon of brewer’s yeast, several dessert spoons of suitably prepared vegetables (crushed, pulverised etc.), some dried fruit, some shredded coconut, and half a crushed kelp table.  You could add an egg or an egg yolk or two.  We often do, even though it is not consistent with idea of separating starch and protein meals.

What have you got?  You have got a high energy, high fibre, high vitamin food.  Not a complete food… because the minerals and the protein are missing, or if you did add an egg, just the minerals are missing.

• This does not matter.  The minerals will come from the chicken wings you are feeding at other meals.  You can quite happily feed this sort of food once a day, or once every second day.

Other meals which you can feed to balance out the chicken wings include vegetable meals, milk, egg and honey meals, straight meat meals, and once or twice a week, a meal containing liver or kidney or brains etc..

 

Note That No Meal is Ever Complete and Balanced.

In other words, you should never attempt to make each meal a complete and balanced one.  So long as there is a balance of nutrients over a period of about three to seven days that is fine.  There is no harm of course if a meal is ‘’complete and balanced’’ occasionally, but not all the time.

• The more different foods you feed your puppy, the better he or she will be.

 

The Vegetable Meal

If you have not already done so, read the chapters on vegetables and raw foods.  Done that? .. Good… you now know that the best way to feed your puppy vegetables is to put raw vegetables through the juicer and then recombine the pulp and the juice.

 

Recipe

Into a cup of this vegetable pulp/mush, you can throw a beaten egg, the brewer’s yeast, the kelp powder and the olive oil.  If it is winter, une cod liver oil once a week.  It for some reason you cannot do the vegetables that way, then half lightly steamed and mashed, mixed with half raw and puverised is a good way to get puppy started.  So is hunger.

By adding egg, you are ensuring you pup obtains an excellent supply of first class amino acids, and some essential fatty acids, and plenty of healthy vitamin A. and D.

If you like, for a change, to either the porridge or the vegetables, instead of egg, or as well as egg, you might like to throw in some offal such as liver or some dairy foods.  a heaped tablespoon of yogurt, or grated cheese, or cottage cheese.  All excellent growth foods for our little puppy.

• You may also feed table scraps to your puppy, so long as they are good healthy sorts of growth foods.  For more information on feeding table scraps see Chapter 4 and 15.

WARNING

Keep in mind that these other meals are fine, but make sure that the bulk of your puppies diet.. at least half, and preferably –

-       60% - 80% ……..is raw meaty bones !

 

How Much Food Should I Feed my Puppy ?

• This question involves principle or secret number two.  That is, the importance of keeping puppies lean and not growing them at maximum growth rate.  Fortunately with this question, there are some simple rules of thumb.

The first rule of thumb is that up to three months of age, feed three to four meals a day.  From three to six months of age feed two to three meals a day, from six to twelve months feed two meals a day, and after twelve months of age, feed one meal a day.

The second rule of thumb is that at each meal, let the pup eat as much as it is able to in ten minutes.  After that, take the food away.  This guideline is really only appropriate when feeding something like dry dog food.

However, neither are bad guidelines.  They have evolved from the experience of countless puppy owners over the years.  Despite that, they must be combined with the important guidelines we have already discussed.

• The idea of always leaving your puppy a little bit hungry.
• Not growing your puppy at maximum growth rate.
• Occasionally, say once or twice a week, fast your puppy on fluids only for twelve hours.
• Do not allow your puppy to become fat and roly poly.
• Keep your puppy slim, active and athletic.

In other words, the bottom line is…

• Learn to look at you pup.
• If you are not sure whether it is too fat, too thin or just right, then check with your vet.

 

Don’t Be a Slave to Rules !

When it comes to two, three or four meals a day.. please do not be a slave to that.  They are a very rough guide only.  Il is not vital that your puppy be fed like clockwork..  i.e. always three or four times a day, and at the same time.

• I think it is a great idea to vary the time when your puppy gets fed.  It may suit you to feed your puppy on a rigid schedule….if so fine go for it, but if it just as convenient and suits your lifestyle and working schedule to feed your puppy at odd time… then go for that.

Eating at irregular times is the way both puppies and adult dogs eat under natural conditions.  They eat when they are hungry, and when the food becomes available.

• I believe it is important that not all demands made by your puppy are met..  That is, as and when your puppy wants them.  In other words, while I do not advocate strict timetable feeding, neither do I recommend demand feeding.  It should be a combination of puppy being hungry, and what suits you….the owner.

So feed  … when puppy is hungry, definitely not on schedule, and not necesssarily just when puppy says he or she is ready.  In fact, let those times when it is actually difficult for you to get home and feed your puppy be that time when you give your puppy a very healthy fast.

• You have to temper the idea of not gorwing your puppy too fast with it’s opposite… not producing stunting and starvation.  This is common sence stuff.  In other words, severe food restriction will result in permanent damage to your pup.  If we could put a figure on it, you should feed your pup about three quarters of what it would eat were it allowed to eat as much as it wanted.

 

There is No Scientific Formula to Help You

What I cannot do is give you a set of figures which tells you how much food should be fed for a given weight and age of pup.  That does not work.  There are too many variables.  You are going to have to learn to look at your dog critically and use your common sense.

• Your puppy should obviously be growing… that is why, when your puppy arrives, weigh it.  Weigh it every week and keep a record of your puppy’s weight.

Another rule of thumb is that you should be able to easily feel your puppy’s ribs, but you should not be able to see them.  Of course that rule refers to a short haired dog.  You will have to part the hair of you long haired dog, or examine it when it is soaking wet.

Let me repeat.  If in dougt about whether your puppy is growing at an acceptable rate, that is, whether it is growing too fast and too fat, or whether it is gorwing too slow, too thin and too help back, or whether it is just right…. Check with your vet.

 

Vitamin Supplements for Pups

If you have no idea at all about this subject please refer to Chapter 5.  In that chapter I spoke about the five possible levels of vitamin content in food.

Very briefly, there were.. first level..  not enough.  Second level.. just enought to prevent severe deficiency symptoms.  Third level.. vitamins in abundance, that is sufficient extra vitamins to cover most stresses, fourth level, vitamins at pharmacologic levels.. the levels where vitamins can be used like drugs in treating a wide range of disorders, and the fifth or toxic level.

The important point is that sensible supplementation will never do any harm.  It makes up for any deficiencies in the diet.  That is, adding vitamins to your puppy’s diet so that they reach that third level of ‘’vitamins in abundance’’ is a great idea.  On the other hand, excessive supplementation of vitamins like vitamin A and vitamin D can, if taken to extremes (the fifth level), be toxic and therefore cause problems.

• Where it was once thought most vitamins were only necessary in pretty small amounts (the second level), modern research is showing that many of them have roles we have not known about… roles involved in preventing degeneration and ageing.  In these roles, they are not only tolerated in larger amounts, the body actually requires them in alrger amounts than previously thought.  The third to fourth levels.

The B Complex Group

For puppies, a balanced supplement of B vitamins daily will never cause a problem.

Any excesses will be removed by your pup’s kidneys.  Your pup simply piddles them out.

• In other words, even if your puppy’s diet is supplying adequate B vitamins, supplying extra will do no harm.  As a guide, for large puppies, feed a child’s dose, and for small puppies, half a child’s dose daily.

Vitamin C

Vitamin C is the safest and least toxic vitamin known.  In the wild, because dogs eat a lot of raw vegetable material, they are supplied in their diet with large amounts of vitamin C.  In addition, because they are on a healthier diet, their liver actually manufactures more vitamin C than a modern dog eating cooked home made or commercial diets.

Daily supplementation of vitamin C has in our experience only ever produced good results.  As a guide, 500mg of vitamin C with each meal is fine, and more can only do good.  In Fact, vitamin C  can be added to the point where it will cause diarrhea, then back off a bit.  That would then be regarded as the maximum dose.  For maximum benefit, vitamin C should be given several times a day.  This is only necessary however, when the vitamin C is being used to treat an acute problem, such as if your puppy was developing a bone problem.

 

The Fat Soluble Vitamins :

Vitamins A and D, can be supplied for your puppy by giving a teaspoon of cod liver oil once a week.

Vitamin E can be supplied as a supplement… vitamin E capsules.  For an average sized puppy, 200mg (i.u.) daily.  Vitamin K is bothe manufactured by your puppy in its intestines in adequate amounts, and is a vitamin that is found everywhere in fresh green leafy foods.

 

Play is Ideal Exercice for Growing Dogs

For a puppy, play is the preferred type of exercise.  It is controlled exercice.  The puppy controls it, because the puppy determines when enough is enough.  The puppy will stop playing when it gets tired or sore.  It is normal, natural, and is positively healthful.  Indeed it is essential.

• In play, a puppy stops exercising before any damage to it’s bones or joints occurs.  When puppies are forced to take part in long boring walks, they often continue long after damage has begun to occur to their joints.  This is the origin of many problems later in life including hip dysplasia and other skeletal problems such as arthritis.

 

Why Not Feed Dog Food to our Pup and be Done with It ?

• In fact that is the suggestion and strong advice of many vets.  So is it a good idea or a bad idea?

What your vet means when he gives you that advice, is that you should seek out and find the PERFECT PUPPY GROWING FOOD.

What you will be looking for, is a first rate commercial puppy food, balanced perfectly for all nutrients, no excesses, no deficiencies.  It will contain between 1.0% and 2.0% calcium.  No more and no less.

The phosphorus in that food will also be between 1.0% and 2.0%, but will always be slightly less than the calcium.

It will have the perfect amount of protein for growth, and that protein will be of the highest possible quality.  It will have the perfect amount of fat with a perfect balance of essential fatty acids.

It will be perfectly balanced for all minerals which will be in a perfectly available form.

That food will have all vitamins in abundance, but none at the toxic levels.

• Find that perfect puppy food is the advice given by the veterinary profession, feed only that with no supplements and your puppy will have the best chance of growing normally.

Those vets are quite correct.  If their clients follow that advice, they will almost certainly have very healthy puppies… to a point.  For example, all the benefits of bones would be missing.

That means poor dental health for a start.

• There is another problem with that advice.  For the Australian consumer, such a commercial dog food does not exist.  Even if it did, it would be impossible to find, because nobody has done the appropriate trials which would tell us which one it is.

There are no puppy foods marketed in Australia with a guarantee that the optimum levels of calcium and other nutrients have been added.

However, even if you could find such a product, that guarantee means nothing unless those foods have been extensively and exhaustively tested by independent authorities.

In other words, there are no commercial puppy foods in Australia which have been shown to do a perfect job of raising puppies in scientifically controlled trials.  Trials involving comparisons with a properly formulated, whole, raw-food diet.

• All products currently available in Australia fall far short of those exacting standards.

You could say, let’s forget about all that, and simply rely on the claims of the companies.  In fact most modern dog owners do precisely that.  They have this miskaken belief that commercial dog foods are the best way to feed dogs.  They believe the advertising put out by the dog food companies.

Unfortunately, all those claims which the dog food producers either make or allude to, are not supported by properly conducted trials on large numbers of litters of puppies.  It is all advertising hype.  Masses of empty words, hot air, designed by advertissing executives who have been paid lots of money to get people to buy the product.

If you think about it, and face to face in my surgery, so many people realise the truth of this, advertisers will say anything which they can get away with, to sell their product to a gullible public.  A public willing to put on their rose coloured glasses and believe anything they are told about dog food… because they want to believe it … for the sake of convenience.

• Let me stress that as a vet, I see the numerous problems on a daily bases that occur when commercial dog food is the only source of nutrients fed to puppies.  For more information on the problems inherent in commercial dog food, refer the Chapter 3.

You might now be asking.. what about all the diffenrent diets put out by dog breeders?

I have never yet come across a good one.  One based on the principles discussed in this chapter.  In fact I could probably fill an entire book, talking about all the different diets that breeders advocate and that people use to rear puppies.  We could pull these diets apart, analyse them, discuss the merits and demerits of each, and show how eath of them could be corrected to produce a diet which is reasonable to fair.  But what would be the point.

• All you need do, is feed your puppy using the simple and commonsence principles I have described, and all will be well.