Conditioning only on a Raw feed diet or a Kibble with Supplement added diet?

Thought today I would play the devil's advocate. See where this topic would go. LOL Near the end of my time in the dogs. Thought of just using a very good dog food kibble with added supplements. Try and by pass any raw meats. Can only wonder if other known dog men have went this route with good success over all. I had built some excellent mills and excess to private places to walk my dogs. I had planned to try out this method in some prekeeps. But never got around to it.

Now we know from Ca. Jack's kibble research,that a kibble with excellent ingredients like EVO kibble could be good. If the moisture content had not been to low. Not that Ca. Jack was advocating a kibble over a raw feed diet. Was just giving facts on the worse to the over all best kibble feeds.

Now it appears that even with good to a excellent ingredients listing and good moisture. What is lacking is what is destroyed in the cooking process. Mainly enzymes and the macrobiotic factor. I do not know for sure if a macrobiotic formula is added last or during the cooking process. If during the cooking process is probably made of no effect. Yet it will still be listed in the kibble fromula.

I would think the proteins and amino acid profile with the fats would be kept intact. Since boiled eggs are more beneficial than eating raw ones since a biotin deficiency can occur overtime.

So lets start with Dog lovers Gold kibble. Add depending on the size of dog, one to two boiled eggs. One to two heaping table spoons of Desiccated Liver and Debitter Brewers Yeast. These would help complete any incomplete proteins in the kibble. Fortify the B-Vitams and help build the blood count. A capful of liquid Geritol helps build the blood count as well. J. Crenshaw used Sorbitol,others used Red Cell.

Some cloves of crushed garlic/kale and spinach greens. The Green Tripe to enhance the macrobiotics formula and improve digestion. Some Flax oil etc. as needed to enhance the oils in the kibble formula. With that said. Work the dog to weight and add the kibble as needed to stay on weight through whole keep. On last forth into last three rest days. Dog is being fed on a 28 to 30 hour feed cycle to assure all stool is out of the lower bowels of the dog.

One of the reasons I have thought about this many times. Was when I got into the dogs as a green horn along with A. Howle. We knew nothing about feeding a dog for a keep. All dog men in our area,with what ever breed of dogs. Predominately used Jim Dandy dog kibble. The Fox and Coon hunters hunted their dogs a lot. With no apparent problems. Back then this Jim Dandy dog food had a lot of animal protein and used only corn kibble as the carbohydrate base/filler.

In our keep we used this dog food along with pretty much the supplements mentioned above. Even added one Hoe cake cooked in bacon grease in each feeding. Dog would about take your hand off to eat that hoe cake. LOL

We worked the dog hard. It held up real good in the keep. Stayed on weight and was very strong till three weeks near the end of keep. One thing we had no proper knowledge of and access too. Was the whip side worming medication. Our dog came down with the whip worms, gums went from blood red to pink. Took to vet and wormed, rested a few days and right back to the work.

This dog gave a excellent account of it'self, did not run hot. Mr. Teal told us later that a whip worm worming that late in the keep could be hard on a dog. Mr. Teal taught us how to worm out a dog,what medications to use at that time. Later Don Mayfield came out with a better worming schedule that was printed in SDJ. Access to better dog worming medications today and using that worm schedule of Mayfields. A dog should have no worm problems in any type of dog keep used today.

Said all that to say this. It seemed the more I thought I knew and was trying all sorts of things. When I knew nothing except for the worming knowledge. With hard work and giving the dog rest days we were doing much better over all. LOL Cheers

I think it would work. I am very close to saying it would work just as well. The only thing really missing is the easy digestability of the animal fats, especially the chicken fat. The other issue would be picking one of the higher end kibbles like you mentioned, one with a higher quality protein.

The basic requirements would be met with the higher end kibble, and then add the supplementation and it is a solid feed plan. I think the dogs would hold up very well with a good work/rest combination.

The dogs will adapt to most anything fed. My brother-in-law runs fox hounds, both on the inside and outside. (fox pens). He runs his dogs hard and often. These dogs go on 1/2 to 3/4 trots til they jump/strike and then it is an all out sprint til that race is over. This is four-five-six hour hunts. Not saying this is comparable to a bulldog show or a bulldog keep but it is a hard expenditure of energy for long periods of time. He feeds his hogs and chickens old bread and produce from the local food bank. He was getting a pick up truck load of bread for $8. He started feeding his hounds bread. First in addition to dry food (cheap dry food at that) and then to straight bred alone. I told him the dogs would fade in a couple three months of hard running and bread as a staple. It did not happen. The dogs were fed lots of deer meat thru the season and when the season was over it was back to bread. They never lost a step. They ran just as hard and just as long as they did on bread, bread and deer meat or bread and dog food.

Strange comparison. But sometimes we may over think these dogs some. The good Lord intended them to forage around eating what they found, sometimes killing for their next meal. Most of these dogs would eat the ass out of a dead skunk. It was just how they were built, how they were designed.

Great topic.

EWO

I remember Jim Dandy dog food. It was slightly more expensive than Field Trial. We fed Field Trial. Back then it was $6 for a 50lb. bag. The chunks would sometimes have feathers. One of the quality checks people used was to soak a chunk in water. The bigger it swelled the cheaper the food. Field Trial would double in size. We filled a 5 gallon bucket 1/2 way. Filled the rest of the way with water. In a short period of time it would be 5 gallons of mush. There were bulldogs and coon dogs on chains. Rabbit dogs, two bird dogs in pens and a monster of a Doberman Pinscher that ran the yard. All fed from 2-3 five gallon buckets.

These dogs performed with the best of them. The keep feed was this same food, but the supplements were added, along with chicken necks/chicken backs. Back then the supplement of choice was Clovite ( a horse supplement). Greens and jack cheeses.

When the dog dumped a stick was used to cut a turd in half. If it were brown and hard more greens were added. If it was a mush pile the dog food was lowered and the backs/neck were increased. When he pissed if it were dark or darker than the day before the Clovite was lessened from two spoon-fuls to one, the salt was removed and the water intake increased. When it lightened up the second spoon of Clovite was added and the salt was re-added.

This was just about a prehistoric stool sample and urinalysis. In a couple of weeks the feed/supplementation would be dialed in for that dog and the hard work would begin. An occasional adjustment would be made but it would be minor. From then it was all about work and rest.

One of the last really busy roads to be paved in our area was called the 'hog parlor' road. The road is at least 10-12 miles long. It has a real 'city' name now but anyone close to 50 or older still refers to it as the 'hog parlor road'. In turn, as a kid he used the 'hog parlor keep'. He had a 8ft. lead and a really nice 1975 Chevrolet station wagon. We held the lead out the side window and he drove up and down that road. He changed speeds as his side view mirror suggested. It is funny but I never remember a pad issue running on that gravel/dirt road. The next day it was slat mill runs followed by long slow walks. Sometimes pulling chains, some times not.

After that it was back to the Field Trial/chicken neck feedings. We would make the feed in a large dish and go work the dog and when we got back it was quite the soaked down concoction. Spoon in the Clovite/salt and off to the keep box for a night of rest.

These dogs competed very well back then. And looking back I would just about laugh at someone using Field Trial as any means of nutrition for a dog. And at the same time I would freak if I were riding in a car towing a bulldog down a road passing car after car, and car after car passing us. Prehistoric times.

EWO

I think it's safe to say that dogs have performed on kibble based dog food for many years without any problems. I've used various kibbles throughout, and the dogs won and lost on their own merits, not on the merits of what they were fed. Now, do I think the raw food is better for them? Yes I do, even if you give the supplementation with the kibble food, it's still better food for them as they use more and waste less of what's actually going into the dog. I don't think feed makes any significant difference in how a dog performs during show time. I've never thought that simply because I've seen both ends of that spectrum, and the differences that are generally noticed are genetic more so than feed.

Either way, if someone feeds their dog kibble, and the dogs do well on it, who am I to say they're doing it wrong simply because I think differently. Kibble will always have a place, just as raw will.

Well said, I remember one of my first posts on here was if a guy was winning feeding 'cornflakes and cabbage' one would be hard pressed to convince him other wise.

I'm sure a bunch of dogs have won on kibble alone. And with that said, I would venture the same the win was not based on the food choice as Frosty said.

EWO

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Originally Posted by FrostyPaws

I think it's safe to say that dogs have performed on kibble based dog food for many years without any problems. I've used various kibbles throughout, and the dogs won and lost on their own merits, not on the merits of what they were fed. Now, do I think the raw food is better for them? Yes I do, even if you give the supplementation with the kibble food, it's still better food for them as they use more and waste less of what's actually going into the dog. I don't think feed makes any significant difference in how a dog performs during show time. I've never thought that simply because I've seen both ends of that spectrum, and the differences that are generally noticed are genetic more so than feed.

Either way, if someone feeds their dog kibble, and the dogs do well on it, who am I to say they're doing it wrong simply because I think differently. Kibble will always have a place, just as raw will.

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You said that you dont think the feed has anything to do with performance during show time but my question to you and the other members is do you think with raw a lower pit weight can be called on a dog?

Ditto gotap_d. The raw diet should enable a dog to compete at a lower pit weight and remain strong. Could be a greater advantage in Hot and humid type weather. Was probably how Mayfield got the edge over Bobby Hall and others. Mayfield got those dog men to match their hard charging/hard biting dogs in that Texas summer heat. A deep game dog is still standing and scratching hard around the hour mark. The rougher harder biting dog could be in serious trouble at that point. LOL

Don Mayfield's keep that was posted in the SDJ, near the end of keep dog was on a all out raw diet. When Don went into Stinson & Glover's Ruby with his Easy bitch. Would be nice to know what Ruby was fed and what sort of work method was used. I saw both bitches up close and both were in outstanding condition.

In cold weather a dog may fair better with kibble added to feed. Been watching this dog sled competitor on the (Below Zero series). He uses whole dried salmon (any occasional whole squirrels he shot) cooked with kibble and plenty of the broth water. These dogs are worked hard. I like his dog chain set up as well.

Where I lived I learned the hard way, that raw fish was not the way to go. Even cooked was too hard on the dog's kidneys and produced to much heat in the body. In extreme cold weather Fish seems to work much better.

Even if one has had success with basically a kibble feed keep. The Protein & Fat content would have to be adjusted for the daily type weather dog was being exercised in.

Overtime for me it became evident that chicken necks and whole chicken backs with all the skin/fat attached with or without kibble worked the over all best for working dogs in my area.

EWO mentioned how versatile a dog's diet could be from his past experiences and observations. I remember reading a conditioning/feed article written by a dog man named Maffie in the SDJ dog journal. His feed was really different almost vegetarian. His dogs performed well and won. Cheers

I have been using Annamaet Extra kibble with a low dose of RF1 to round out any supplemental deficiencies as well as salmon oil almost every meal. I will add in a little anchovy/sardine oil, flax or a little olive oil from time to time. I add buttermilk once a week with a little bit of honey or bee pollen (I learned this form an old timer who swears by it). Throughout the week I will mix in a little green tripe, fatty chicken (bone-in), or ground sardines. Occasionally I add in a little cottage cheese too. The only thing I haven't really played with is adding in a greens, but will play with this soon. Any one else use RF-1 at all? If so just curious about your results. I only use it at half the recommended maintenance dose, maybe less. oh yeah, I add water to every meal in hopes of making the kibble more digestible and also because of the RF-1 powder.

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Originally Posted by gotap_d

You said that you dont think the feed has anything to do with performance during show time but my question to you and the other members is do you think with raw a lower pit weight can be called on a dog?

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I think that's true for most people, yes. The issue with that is most people are scared to go at a lower weight due to their, IMO, inability to manage a dog correctly at a lower weight. Your chance of error is greater as are the consequences for the dog if you miss at a lower weight. I've seen countless dogs over the years go at a weight that I figure is 1 to 2 lbs over their best weight, and that's on kibble. My take on weight is that most dogs are able to give up some amount of weight without any issues. We all see it during schooling, etc as rarely are both dogs of equal weight and equal size. Do I want to give up weight during a show? No. Would I? Yes, and I have, and the reasons vary.

I've always gotten dogs to lower weights on raw than kibble, and I think most people would also, but the convenience of kibble simply is too hard to give up for most people.

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Originally Posted by Milehighmisfit

I have been using Annamaet Extra kibble with a low dose of RF1 to round out any supplemental deficiencies as well as salmon oil almost every meal. I will add in a little anchovy/sardine oil, flax or a little olive oil from time to time. I add buttermilk once a week with a little bit of honey or bee pollen (I learned this form an old timer who swears by it). Throughout the week I will mix in a little green tripe, fatty chicken (bone-in), or ground sardines. Occasionally I add in a little cottage cheese too. The only thing I haven't really played with is adding in a greens, but will play with this soon. Any one else use RF-1 at all? If so just curious about your results. I only use it at half the recommended maintenance dose, maybe less. oh yeah, I add water to every meal in hopes of making the kibble more digestible and also because of the RF-1 powder.

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First thing Mile, is I must say you're basically feeding a raw diet now, so why even bother feeding the kibble with all you give? Just a question really :)

Bee pollen doesn't hurt anything, and there is some science to back the use of it, especially if it's coming from your general area of where you live.

I've used RF1 as a food supplement before during a keep, and I've also done a keep feeding nothing but RF1 throughout the entire keep. It works as it should IMO.