Changes in poop after switching to prey diet
 

Hi all - I promise one day I'll have more to talk about than poop. :D

I switched Oscar to the prey diet about 5 days ago. I'm feeding him raw chicken drumsticks in addition to small amounts of organ meat - chicken livers and hearts.

He is about 4 months now, and ever since I got him at about 3 months his poop has been the consistency of soft serve ice cream.

For the last couple days he's had much smaller, darker poops than normal. (They are almost black and about half the volume of his old poops). I know one of the benefits of the prey model is that the dogs poop less, the poos are dark and hard and it's not as stinky, which I've found to be true.

The one thing that did catch my attention and cause me to worry a bit are the shards of bone mixed in his poo - when he eats the drumsticks he tears off and eats the meat, and generally eats about 3/4 of the bone.

I'm assuming his system is capable of handling the raw bone and that I shouldn't be overly worried about seeing it in such an undigested state in his poop, but I wanted to check.

Thanks beforehand for sharing your diet & poo expertise with me!

Gosh, my girls are both on prey model raw. I can't say that I have seen what I knew to be bone in their poo but sometimes their poop is what I would call like chalk. If that's what you are experiencing, I would say that is perfectly fine. If it looks a little too hard like that, I will up the meat. Say give some boneless chicken along with. It is possible that your baby is getting a little too much bone. Good luck! I have only the best things to say about prey model raw.

Thanks for your advice! I'll just give him boneless meat for a day or two and see if it softens a little bit.

What have you found to be the greatest advantages of feeding the prey model diet? From everything I've read it does seem to be the most natural for them. I'm hoping it will be him super healthy.

I believe it is the healthiest choice for them. I've done a lot of research and have a fair amount of info to back me up. But of course, we all have to make our own choices....
The positive things I have seen are first and foremost with their teeth. My yorkies teeth are gorgeous! Even the vet remarked. Now granted, she's only a year and a half but I hope to keep her teeth white and sparkling. My 11 year old collie has made a big improvement with her teeth since we started feeding raw in April. I can't claim her teeth are white and sparkling but I do have photos of what her teeth looked like then and now and while not white and sparkling, they are at least 50% better. Last year the vet said we needed to think about putting her under for a cleaning and my goal is to eliminate the need for that now. They also both have shiny coats and are quite healthy looking. They are both very healthy looking and acting other than the fact that my collie has arthritis in her rear legs but that has been a problem for awhile. I'm working on researching suppliments that will help with this. Or course, they only go poop once a day and it's tiny, even the collies is not that big and that's always a plus for cleanup. And finally, my dogs were never very food motivated. They would always have kibble in their dishes but were always a bit underweight. They are both at a healthy weight and everyone remarks on how good my collie looks. That right there is one of the best things for me. My dogs actually look forward to eating. They are excited and happy to eat their dinner when before they just ate what they had to eat and never were very enthusiasic about it. I am hoping that the raw diet will extend my senior collies life although I know that probably all those years of kibble can't totally be reversed and also extend Zoe's life.

I feed raw medallions - and even with those, their teeth are just beautiful! Which is weird, bc it's not prey model. All I can attribute it to is they aren't getting so many additives, preservatives etcetera.

Interestingly, Wylie's teeth got a little funky when I was homecooking and it worried me. But after a while on raw, they cleared up. Isn't that weird? I almost think some of the live enzymes in the raw meat may digest some of the tartar on the teeth or something.

The vet is always all "Wow, do you brush" and I say "errrrr, no...." - and then there's a lot of silence and awe.......:p

Thank you for sharing your experiences! I've obviously only been able to observe the short term effects of the diet on Oscar, but am really happy so far. He was a pretty apathetic eater before, and I was having to change foods every 3 or 4 days to keep him eating. On the prey model, he is extremely exuberant at meal times and licks his bowl clean.

Last question ... sometimes Oscar goes more than 24 hours without a bowel movement. Should I be worried about this? His "once a day" seems to be a bowel movement closer to once every 1.25 to 1.5 days. I'm terrified of obstructions ...

Oh - and he get the worst smelling gas. :shocked7q

Will that eventually go away?

I wouldn't be as worried about every day and a half as long as he is not straining when he goes poo and it's not too hard. That's what I would go by and not worry so much if it's been a little longer than a day. Mine usually go once a day but sometimes they might make it a day and a half and I don't really worry about it. As far as gas.... not really sure. You don't give them any treats or things like veggies do you? Mine have not experienced that and even when they go poop it does not smell as bad as it used to with kibble unless they try something new and have a little tummy upset and diarhea - then it smells bad.
Here are some sites I have found helpful:
Jane Anderson's Raw Learning Site

RawChat : Raw Chat


There are others out there, even here on YT who know way more than I do about raw feeding. I'm still learning myself.:p good luck! Love to hear from other raw feeders!