Cooked food
 

Okay so we have had Rockie for about a week now and he'll be 12wks on on the 18th (his name was joey but we learned rockie grabs his attention so looks like he picked his own name lol and our 6yr old daughter wanted to name him rocket so close enough after she named him joey and he just ignored it)... we also have a 2yr old wauzer (westie/schnauzer mix) and i know in another thread I brought up about cooked food, and after thinking about it I'd like to start doing it again but have a few questions.

I'll also still keep kibble out 24/7 but cooked will be for the 2 feedings a day.

ok so scruffy (the westie mix) eats dry kibble: diamond naturals chicken and rice (i know not the greatest brand but is grain and corn free and the only kind that doesn't give him hives or red skin with his allergies and rockie eats it when he wouldn't touch all the puppy feed that we tried and got samples of from our pet store to find out what he would eat).

Prior to rockie we did cooked for scruffy of chicken quarter meat, rice, and yogurt and I would rotate the veggies in from peas and green beans. then once a week he would get a sardine and a few apple slices (which he loves lol). but had the issue where his stool got so loose he could barely hold it to get outside. that is why I stopped. but i would really like to start again because he did benefit from it before the lose poop and I'm sure rockie would benefit from it also.

my questions are:

could just chicken, rice, a little yogurt, and the veggies alone be a bad cooked recipe idea should I do something else (even though im leaving out the kibble 24/7 and we do, do a multivitamin that gets put on the food) as the reason to lose stools?

if not should it be balanced a certain percentage? ex. chicken 40% rice 30%, yogurt 5%, and the veggies 25% something like that.. as before i think the chicken may have been to high of a percentage and having to much protein I don't know if that will cause loose poop.

the other thing is if there is loose poop i know canned pumpkin (not pumpkin pie filling) is good we are growing pie pumpkins and I was going to pure them and freeze them for when we want pumpkin pie (I don't add any of the seasonings like you get in the canned stuff) could I use this when we would need to or would it be to strong?

has anyone ever made up some cooked food and instead of feezing it dehydrated it? we have a dehydrator and that thought came to mind but didn't know how good it would work out, storage wise, and if it would be better then freezing it in the normal cooked form.

any help would be great as its our first yorkie and we already have experience the allergy aspect of a terrier from our westiemix so we know how important a good kibble is and the benefits cooking their meals can be. once we get the hang on the cooked part and still have solid stools ill add their vitamins to one of the cooked feedings as right now its added to their morning kibble which they eat separate so they get the right amount for their size and then their other feeding they eat out of the same bowl together.

thanks in advance :)

I feel if you are going to home cook for your babies, you should talk to a certified canine nutritionist to make sure you are giving them everything they need.

A lot of YTers home cook so I know you can get lots of advise/ recipes, but I think it should be ran through your vet and then discussed with a certified canine nutritionist.

If you are going to home cook you need to consult a vet nutritionist or you could be doing damage to your dogs also puppies really need to be on a puppy food more then anything else. Also a little side note they are finding arsenic in rice and say human babies should at the max only have it twice a week.

our vet has given tips on this thats how i got the last recipe. but she doesn't specialize in cooked meals (nor raw or anything like that specifically) and we don't have a canine nutrionist close (we are in a small town the closest one is over 60 miles away and with 3 kids (non fury ones) under 7 it would make it a hard trip to try and even see that person let alone what they want to charge (ive already talked with them over the phone a bit but wont help unless i come in).

and we wont be doing cooked only as we will be having dry kibble out for them all the time for them to self feed. just the 2 daily feedings that we give to them personally is the cooked.

but thanks for the tips trust me before getting our baby yorkie, i thought of it all with the westiemix within our means and my husband's parents helped us out with the allergy treatments with him at first (we just can't ask for them help gain we don't like doing stuff like that unless we really need too :) ).

I don't think they should be getting both? Seems like too much

You can do a phone consult with a nutritionist but even half home cooking can be very bad for your dog if not done right so maybe for now it is best to stick to dog food.

thanks for that info on rice. they wont be feed solely cooked. and our vet gave me some of the tips i talked about and just said to give pumpkin if stools are lose that's about it we live in a small town so not to many options vet wise.

they will only get cooked 2 times a day they have a bowl all the time of dry kibble out to self feed all the time and we give them an als food (we are switching to 4health natural since it is grain, wheat, corn, and soy free and is almost identical to TOW brand just a bit more affordable).

If they are getting home cooked food twice a day they really shouldn't have kibble down at all times… way too much food for them. Home cook feeding is to take away the kibble… yes? So they get fed their home cook, then they can go to their bowl and eat more dry food?? I don’t think that sounds right.

Also if their stools are loose, something is going on- something is not agreeing with them.

You cant home cook without supplimentation chicken rice vegetables and yogurt arent a balanced diet for a dog and also if its giving them diahrea it sounds like something is not aggreeing with them

the only time they touch the kibble is in the middle of the day inbetween cooked feedings. they are not eating 24/7 they are still eating their needed feeding servings a day.

for example our westiemix gets 2 cups services total a day so that is 1/2 cup cooked in the morning, 1 cup kibble middle day, and then 1/2 cup cooked in the evening. our yorkie if i do give him cooked he gets maybe gets 6 teaspoons of cooked food in the morning and evening(this comes out to equaling 1/4cup total) , dry kibble wise in the middle of the day he may eat 1/4 cup to 1/2cup.



I also should have said the loose stool issue i experience was when it was just our westie and we had him on completely cooked food because we couldn't find a kibble at the time yet that agreed with his allergies and body. but since then that has changed and we have 2 kibbles now that work with him we just want to do a little cook for them during the day. as even studies have shown that dry kibble from the store is not 100% nutritional filling as it should be, so that's why we just want to give them the best.

To me it sounds like your Westie is getting too much food.. I would highly recommend you find a canine nutritionist to talk to. What you are doing doesn't sound right. There is way more to home cooking than you think.

Hopefully someone comes on and can talk to you a little more, I know we have a handful of members that home cook. I will ask some of my friends that I know home cook to see if they could respond to you.

I understand why you want to do this but you can cause more harm than good by not doing it the right way. You can cause skeletal problems or problems with the organs by not feeding a balanced diet' you need a recipe from a nutritionist

I homecooked for a while when my Wheaten terrier's allergies were out of control. I found probiotics in addition to the food was a great help with her scratching. We have been back on kibble for quite a few years and I use one that has a fish protein as its only "meat" and grainfree(pea or potato), with lots of probiotics and digestive enzymes. Lucy is now 12 and the vet is amazed at how well she has done (she eats only 1/2 cup day and 1/2 cup night)

thank you.

ive said that to my vet i think he's eating to much but the vet says its fine (our westie is a schnauzer mix so hes on the larger side not as small as the westie) we have been through a lot with him along the lines of his allergies and him keeping weight on so the 2cups a day feed rather all dry kibble or half cooked and half dry hes actually keeping weight on and at his weight he's suppose to be at.

i just went back and reread what i initially typed. i guess i should have worded it better. they dont have lose stools our westie did when we had to do solely cooked before finding a kibble that worked for him. i should of wording it asking if that little recipe that our vet gave us looked good or if the is another recipe that would be better or something we should be adding to that recipe since our vet isn't a complete specialist on it and the nutrionist i talked to on the phone said that would be okay and we give the multi vitamin that was recommended and still do dry kibble. I'm afraid to do completely cooked food only again since my past experience and the nutrionist over the phone that i was given the number for won't help me with that aspect without a sit down consult... im still looking for one that will talk with me over the phone more without requiring this to help me with my questions more (I dont mind paying for a phone consult but the one right now wont consult over the phone any more unless we see her so its just a pain lol).

we will be switching to 4health natural (grain free) it has all that you talk about: (they also have a white fish kind that has fish meat and fish meal in it as the only meat) oils, fish oil, dried peas, pea powder, and potato in it, and other good things better then what they are getting now as our westie was on 4health but their normal has to much grain so we had to switch. we were happy when we saw they came out with their new grain free line and everything it has in it, just waiting on the little bit of the old dog food to be done before we get more food.

when we switch i will prob stop doing cooked all together.

"lots of probiotics and digestive enzymes"? is this already in the feed you feed her or is it separate as a supplement?

when our westie/schnauzer was on 4health he ate less and kept his weight on he ate maybe 1/2-2/3cup in the morning and then 1/2cup at night sometimes leaving some and was doing good except the red skin due to the grains in the food so thats the only reason we switched.

since getting our yorkie (well not really getting someone dropped him off at our house with a note of his age and his shots that he got but we are happy hes a part of our family) and seeing 4health came out with the new line we talked about switching so that we dont have to do cooked any more along with the kibble once in a while with our westiemix with his allergies.

and yes i know the yorkie should be on puppy food we have tried even the kind left on the note that was said he was eating but he wont eat it (we have to keep our westie away from the puppy food when we tried to get rockie to eat the puppy food) he will not touch it the first day we had him he wouldn't eat so i gave him can food like the vet said because i was worried about him not eating.

he still turns his nose up to puppy food and wants to eat out of the bowl with our westie.

i just got off the phone with our vet and said that 4health grain free should work out good and would be okay for the puppy since its an als feed (all lifestyle) and we shouldn't have to do cooked also any more with our westie (only reason why yorkie was eating cooked to was because he eats out of the westies bowl and wont eat out of one given just for him). and to just still give a multi vitamin which is squeezed over the food once a day (which i do ever other with with the westiemix because everday the brand we are giving to him doesn't agree with him but every other does and the vet doesn't see this as a concern so i dont know what to do there or what else i can try).

thank you, also why ive been trying to find another nutritionist to talk to then the one ive already tried to talk with.

but we will be switching back to 4health since they have a grain free line now that is also corn free, wheat free and soy free and has some other good ingredients in it and i compared it to TOW (taste of the wild) and its really close and is more affordable to us. so once the switch which will be soon since what we have now is almost gone i wont do cooked any more as that was my fear of not doing cooked correctly. ive just been going off what the vet has told me to do since our westie mix has allergies and we've only maybe had the yorkie for a week (he was left at our house on the 3rd with a note of his age what shots he had and what he was being feed but he wont touch any more)so ive tried not to let him eat to much cooked even though our vet said even if he ate out of the bowl with our westiemix it would be okay.

The kibble that I feed includes probiotics and enzymes but I supplement if Lucy shows any sign of itchiness, smelly ears etc...
The TOTW pacific stream was one of the foods that worked for her- we just got caught in both recalls and had to switch quickly- we are now on the Earthborn Holistics- Coastal Catch. All my pups do great on it- Abby has eaten it since she came to us as a very small puppy- same problem-she wanted only the big dogs food!

Our one pet store carries a holistic line but want an arm, a leg, and a tail for it lol.

thats why when 4health came out with their grain free made us think again about going back to them as scruffy does really well on it.

we did TOTW before and he liked it did good on it but he would always bug for more of it to eat like he wasn't getting full and would have really bad gas on it and we tried all their kinds that our TCS has. That's the only reason we stopped getting that (we never tried the other brands as they are higher then TOTW).

what supplements are you using? I'd like to find one that agrees with our scruffy more then the one I found at TCS and the vet told me to get to use with him for his skin and gas issues.

I also figured since the little one wants to eat from scruffy's bowl and not one for him that if we got a good kibble that is balance in everything and really close to puppy food % or a good all stage feed he should be okay and also since we can't get him to touch any of the puppy food and we've tried many brands Rockie is just to big for his yorkie paws lol.

Eating just a little of the kibble is not going to give them the nutrition they need they need a recipe from a nutritionist and then a supplement.

I Home Cook for Taycie. I use Dr. Remilllard. I did a Consultation with her because of Medical Issues. Her diet is strictly formulated for her. However if your dog is healthy, you can purchase a diet for just $25 on her website.

PetDiets - VNC putting pets' health first!

As far as Supplementing I use Balance It. You can check out there website. You can also purchase recipes from them as well.
https://secure.balanceit.com/marketplace2.2/index.php?

Home cooking can be wonderful, but if not balanced correctly it can seriously do more harm them good. If not formulated correctly it can cause a wealth of problems!

Good Luck! I hope you find a Nutritionist that can help formulate for you!