cazzaritch

Thanks squeak, I am hoping to have time to pop down for a bit.

Thanks Mrsdog, I will pop over. I took Andy for a walk on his own tonight and John took Lou and Andy heeled beautifully!! Hooray!!! I managed to have a piece of cheese in my hand - that had him focussed!!! We will keep up the individual training and then see how they go in class on Sunday together. Also - where is Waratah Park?

We crate our 2 overnight - this has been fantastic for toilet training and peace of mind that they aren't chewing up our open plan house!

We joined a club 2 weeks ago with our two labradors, and we are really enjoying it. We are having a little trouble with the boys as they are way to focussed on one another than OH and myself. This has made for some very embarrasing little panic attacks out of them both, the instructor just ignored us and carried on. In a way this was a good thing and I was totally embarrased by my little monster howling and yipping and carrying on, but I would have really appreciated a little extra help. I do appreciate that if they stopped teaching every time something like this happened, no one would ever get any instruction!! Next week, I will be asking for some advice on how to get our dogs to focus a little more on us. So far, our intructors have been really nice and encouraging during the 2 classes we have been too, and we plan to keep going, i would love it if one (or both) of our pups are good enough to trial. Mrsdog - I think its your club we go to - keep up the good work

Interesting, this is quite different to my own understanding and ratio's. Personally for the newbie BARFer I see no harm with supplementing their puppies diet with a premium puppy food, an ill-ratioed or constructed BARF diet can be problematic with growing puppies. As for percentage large breed puppies are fed around 5% of bodyweight. Belijae - My diet consists of 60% RMB, if fed separately (meat & bone) the bone matter should be at least be half (30% of 60%) What would your recommended ratio be? Today they have had the following each across the day..... 290g bones, chicken wings and lamb flap 450g barf mixture (2/3 meat 1/3 veggies) Oh and the odd schmacko

Thank you all so much for the advice. Since reading all of your comments, I have decided to stop the dry food, except to go in their buster cube for a bit of recreation. The only reason I kept it going was to make life easier for when we go camping. But instead we will be buying them their own esky and freezing batches to take with us instead. I have also changed the balance of my latest batch to /3 pet mince, 1/3 veg pulp. I also throw in 1/2 tub yoghurt, 3 eggs and 3 cans sardines. They are loving it so much!!! I will also be reducing the amount of the barf mix and increasing the bones a little, and adding some offal to the next batch, however, I think that there is some offal in the pet mince.

My 2 labrador puppies weigh approximately 15kg. At 3% of their body weight, they should have 450g of barf food per day. Is this correct? It doesnt seem to be very much at all when if I was feeding them purely dry food, they should have 660g per day? I am currently trying to feed them half advance anf half barf and I am worried I am feeding them way too much. They currently get 2 meals per day each meal containing 110g advance dry food (1/3 of recommended daily amount over the day) 450 g barf - 1/2 pet mince, 1/2 fruit/veggie pulp (2 times the reccomended daily amount over the day) They also get 2 chicken wings each per day. They dont look fat, but I have only been feeding proper barf mix since saturday, please help

I thought the idea is to feed veggies raw? Is there a special rule for pumpkin??

When mushing up veggies can you put the whole pumpkin through the food processor, or just the flesh?

We will be taking Lou and Andy to have a look in a couple of weeks time. We are all really looking forward to joining a club

I feed my two on a mixture of Advance growth large breed and chicken mince mixed together for breakfast and dinner, with a chicken wing as a mid afternoon snack. They also get any veggie prep left overs like broccoli stumps and the tops and tails of carrots every time we have veg for tea. So it is more of a filler for us too. I like advance and they seem to be doing really well, I just want to get them on to more of a raw diet. Wont give up on the dry totally so that we can fall back on it when we go on holidays. We camp alot and wont always have power sites to keep raw food fresh. If i was going to change (I think of it occasionally) I would like to try Nutro.

Mine get chicken mince, some veggies sometimes and advance growth large breed. Also a chicken wing each as a snack. Plase can I ask where you got your Barf recipes from?

They had some more chicken mince in their breakfast and so it seems that they are less gassy today, so i will persevere. We have swapped to chicken wings after they just inhaled their necks, it was just to scary to watch. They get a wing mid afternoon as a snack.

They did get about a table spoon each and the veggies came to about half a cup each, mixed with 1 cup of their kibble. I think I will leave the veggies out for a bit, (well the broccoli anyway - phew) and persevere with the chicken and maybe carrot for a few more days. I foolishly bought 10kg of the chicken - thinking they would be fine on it and really dont want to throw it away.

My dad's dog would never eat brussel sprouts as he knew that they made him fart and smell really bad. He would lick every gram of gravy off them but that was it!!! So, do I go back to just boring old kibble only diet, or keep going with the variety and the raw and veggies? <leaves to buy gass mask>

When we first gave them chicken necks, they got a bit gassy, but after a wile it stopped. Maybe its because there is other content in the mince like the entrails? They have started and it smells like broccoli!! OMG Lou just let one go and it made a noise - he woke Andy up!!!!!

OK, so I decided to add some chicken mince (pet grade) to thier meal. I mix it in with the kibble (I took some of the kibble out - dont want them getting fat). They are loving it..... ......I am not, it has made them very gassy and its truly revolting!!! Is this because its something new? Should I persevere? God, it is soooo bad. Also, tonight I added the tops and tails of the carrot from our dinner and the brocoli stumps very finely chopped). They seemed to like this too, I'm just sat here waiting for the gas to start again. Has any one else experienced this? I am just being too adventurous with their diet at too young an age?

Thats a good idea, I will try that. Is it ok to give them gravy?

I hadn't thought about giving them bit of veg - that will save me putting it in the bin, thanks for the tip. How about giving them carrots whole to chew?

Thats too funny - sounds like our house when I was growing up. I will try carrots, raw right? They have had the odd piece of cheese, mainly to help the working tablets go down. They also had some left over roast lamb once and I had to count my fingers after giving it to them!!!!! How about trying some sardines, or mince chicken? If I up the meat content, should I give more vegetables?

Well the number of meals sounds right..... I wonder if scaling back a little on quantity and (if you are willing) increasing variety might be the trick.. They also get the odd pig's ear and they are on Advance large breed growth. What else would you suggest? I am willing to try most things that aren't too time consuming. I don't think they are being over fed as they dont look over weight, they have a nice defined waist.

Guys, Thanks so much for all of your advice, as normal, it is brilliant and has stopped me panicking!! !! This morning we walked before breakfast and they went for the food straight away. Then this evening (before walkies) they just stared at it again??? But they will sit, drop, offer paw etc etc for kibble at all times!! Yes, it's definitely just me being paranoid - thanks again for helping me to calm down. Poodlefan, they are 14 weeks old tomorrow and get 2 bowl meals per day, plus chicken wings and their buster cube to supplement them and keep them occupied while we are all out.

Maybe it is the sleep thing. Tonight they were asleep before evening meal, and it took about 3 minutes for them to start to eat. I am currently feeding a small breakfast at about 6.10, then we take a small walk. They get their buster cube given to them (which is full of more kibble) as the kids leave for school to keep them occupied as they are outside all day. They then get a chicken wing when the kids get home from school and then their tea at about 6pm, then another small walk. Do you think I should walk before feed in the morning, to wake them up a bit? I did try it once and they didn't want to go and wined the whole way!! Yes, I am paranoid!!!

They are on advance large breed growth. We are about half way through a bag and they have only been doing this for about 2 days, before that it was head in bowl, food gone. We use the kibble for traning treats and they eat that fine. It just seems to be meal time they act a bit odd? Could it also be that they have just woken up? They get morning feed at about 6.10am

My 2 labrador puppies used to go crazy at meal times. Now I am putting the bowls on the floor and they just look at it as if they don't know what to do? Eventually after a bit of sniffing, the finally tuck in. Does ths mean they don't like the food, or are they just 'trying it on for something better'? They are on advance large breed growth. Should I change them to something else? They also get chicken wings and the odd pig's ear.