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Originally Posted by UESyorkie  I know, strange isn't it? Well, we started out this past weekend and my little guy chomped down the bit of liver and the meaty ox tail the first night, so I thought all was well. But the second night he was hesitant to go at another piece of the ox tail, until the following day. The third night, he ate a piece of liver, which is the last "raw" piece of meat he's had since. I tried meaty lamb soup bones, even cutting off pieces of the meat for just a boneless meal, but my Chewy simply avoids his bowl when it's filled with raw meat, even after kicking it (empty) around for a bit, signalling he's hungry.
So since then I've had to blanch the meat, i.e. drop it in boiling water for a minute or so, in order for him to eat it. Even then he'll only eat it if I hand-feed it to him and if he's literally starving! Chewy is far from a picky eater; he was a pound or so overweight, but I'm certain he's lost some weight this week because of his lack of appetite for the raw meat (he's fine for veggies, fruit, yogurt, and cooked anything). However, I'm afraid that he's too well aware of what "cooked" meat tastes like since he gets table treats at his grandparents' house (where he stayed for three months recently when I was out of the country) and when he's overnighted at a yorkie friend's house, he and his friend get cooked pieces of chicken every night. I'm sure he'd be happy just going back to his Iams dry food, which is amazing to me, but I guess after three years he's gotten used to it.
Does anyone have any advice as to how I can entice my little guy to eat raw meat with gusto? I don't want to keep blanching the meat as this defeats the purpose of the raw prey diet, no?
Thanks in advance! |
Well the best way for me to get mine eating is to bring another yorkie into the room! Maybe you should get another?
But aside from that, you could try a few different things. Sometimes it's the texture and mine really like it when the meat is a little bit frozen. I frequently serve chicken this way. I just take it out of the freezer and when it's not frozen solid, more like a popsicle, I sometimes feed it and they really seem to like the change. I have a problem getting any of mine to eat liver. They love liver just not the raw. They will eat it either frozen or cooked. So sometimes I cut up the liver into little treat size pieces and freeze and other times I cook it in water. Then for a switch when I feed them I heat up just the liver and liver water and pour a little of that over the top of their raw food - they love that. If he really does not like the texture right now and none of those suggestions work, I would just sear the meat in a pan so that it is cooked just on the outside but so the inside is still raw. Good luck!