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Is this forum still active??? I am new member and I feed my dog raw and have some questions but before I get into them I thought I would check and see if this forum still exist.

>>Is this forum still active??? I am new member and I feed my dog raw and have some questions but before I get into them I thought I would check and see if this forum still exist.

I'm here! I've fed my dogs raw for over 20 years. Ask away.
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Christie Keith
Caber Feidh Scottish Deerhounds
Holistic Husbandry since 1986
www.caberfeidh.com/
Dogged Blog

My dog is a 10.5lb Male Shih tzu who is 2.5yrs old. When I purchased him he was 8wks old and was being fed Eukunuba. After researching and joining different forums I discovered that this was not a good brand to feed my dog and he bacame overweight per the Vet. He also had very teary eyes and tear stains all over his face. So I switched him to Honest Kitchen which is a dehydrated raw food. I haven't really had any problems with the food but at the store where I purchased it they told me that I should try giving him raw bones. So I purchased a raw knuckle bone that was frozen. When I gave it to him he became very aggressive and protective of the bone. It scared me terribly (this is my first pet/dog) and I didn't want to give it to him anymore because he started growling. After about a day with the bone he calmed down and I was able to take it away from him.

My question is how often should I feed the knuckle bones and when do you discard it? It takes him maybe an hour to eat all the meat and marrow inside then he starts to chew on the bone itself. I am afraid that he may bite sharp pieces and it will get lunged in his throat. Please help me (Sorry for the long post).

Hey, I posted my question under the forum post and I didn't get a response so please answer my question. Or is it best to just copy and paste it to here?

If your dog is acting that possessive of a raw bone, discontinue giving that to him for a while. He needs some major training before that situation is safe again.

Honest Kitchen's food are wonderful and you don't have to suppliment it with raw bones. If you still want to, there are some other pre-prepared BARF diets on the market that have ground bone in them- Steve's Real Food is one I can think of at the moment. Dr. Billinghurst is another.

When your dog growled at you for attempting to take away his bone, he exhibited what's called "Resource gurading." My dogs have been taught a "leave it" command so whenever I want them to give me something they have found, I tell them to "leave it," they walk away, I investigate what it is, decide if they can have it, and either give it back to them or keep it.

This command is so useful because I don't have to reach my hand in to test if they want to comply with me or not, by following the command, I know I'm safe from a bite. If they are reluctant to give it up (whcih they were in their younger days and the behavior wasn't as well established), I would take note of what they had and practice more.

You start teaching this command with things the dogs typically don't find all that much fun. I used a pencil with one dog. The dog would sniff it, I'd tell him to "leave it" and he'd look away from it and at me, he'd then get a treat. After he figured out "the game" we were playing, I could do this with toys and then work my way up to food.

One of the most important aspect of this though is to make sure you reward your dog for complying and sometimes make sure the dog gets the treat back. I'd say in my house, 70% of the time I return the object to the dog. That in itself becomes the reward. My dogs know that giving up an object to me is no big deal. In fact, at this point in their training, I can put a piece of bacon in the living room unsupervised and A) they won't take it without the command "take it" and B) once they have it, I can get them to give it back to me with "leave it."

OK, now my post got long, but overall, if your dog wants to have something badly enough (and raw bones are worth keeping to a dog) they will exhibit this behavior. It's not that they are bad or anythign, they just really like what they have and they just need to learn that humans really don't like raw bones. We just want to check in with them on occation or sometimes enough is enough.
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Chelle and the rest of the crew including, but not limited to Kita and Taiko (the shiba inu wrestle maniacs), Adi (reserved and dignified tabby cat), and all 28 reptiles

>>My question is how often should I feed the knuckle bones and when do you discard it? It takes him maybe an hour to eat all the meat and marrow inside then he starts to chew on the bone itself. I am afraid that he may bite sharp pieces and it will get lunged in his throat. Please help me (Sorry for the long post).

I'm not a fan of marrow bones, other than for brief recreational chewing for puppies who have not gotten in their adult teeth yet. And even then, the minute they are done with the marrow and gnawing on them and there is any chance they might break one, I take them away.

So I'd take it away once the meat and marrow is gone, letting him chew on it just for a few minutes. Some dogs can gnaw on them for weeks, though, without breaking off any pieces, while others chow threw 'em in ten minutes. You need to figure the length of time that's safe on a dog by dog basis, but I wouldn't just let him have it indefinitely.
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Christie Keith
Caber Feidh Scottish Deerhounds
Holistic Husbandry since 1986
www.caberfeidh.com/
Dogged Blog

It's not very active, but a few people do post here on occation.
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PHReign
Email me: HReign@pethobbyist.com" target="_blank">PHReign@pethobbyist.com
Dear dog,
I can not buy anything larger than a king sized bed. I am very sorry about this. Do not think that I will continue to sleep on the couch to ensure your comfort. Look at videos of dogs sleeping, they can actually curl up in a ball. It is not necessary to sleep perpendicular to each other stretched out to your fullest extent possible. I also know that sticking tails straigt out and having tongues hanging out the other end to maximize space used is nothing more than doggy sarcasm.