# Abbie



## meggels (May 30, 2010)

Was started on raw tonight and she and I are both so happy! 

I was sitting at work and reading the article I posted from Susan Thixton about trusting pet food companies, and how only a few companies (literally only a few) have signed her pledge and I thought to myself "Should I put Abbie on one of these few foods?? Can I really trust Earthborn Holistic and Fromm as much as I think I can???"

And then I just thought..."I am so sick of worrying about this stuff with kibble. Eff it I am switching her to raw tonight or tomorrow."

So I picked up several lbs of chicken drumsticks (on sale for 1.49/lb woo) at the store on my way home and gave her her first meal of one drummy (with no skin and a little meat trimmed off and given to Murph). 

She took to it like a champ, she is SUCH a natural (she should give Murph some lessons). I have been on a little "high" since I fed her like an hour and a half ago, it's a great feeling to see her crunching through that drumstick. 

And she has gone back to the kitchen a few times to see if there's any more food, something she hasn't done before haha 


Here she is right before her meal. I'm a dork and wanted to photograph or video the whole thing but she gets nervous around cameras so I had to just shut it off and put it away lol...











Love my girl!


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## catahoulamom (Sep 23, 2010)

Proud of you, yay for Abbie!!! You will be addicted to finding the best deals on meat before you know it.


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## magicre (Apr 7, 2010)

glad to hear it went so well....


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## Malika04 (May 14, 2012)

meggels and magicre:

Love the signatures on both of your posts! 

meggels, What are they chewing on in that picture?


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## MollyWoppy (Mar 19, 2010)

Thats so cool Meg, I love Abbie, I'm glad she's enjoying it so much.


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## BearMurphy (Feb 29, 2012)

that's great!

murphy followed me around for a while after eating when he first starting eating raw. it definitely reinforced the switch to see how much he enjoyed it!


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## Makovach (Jan 24, 2012)

Congrats on your switch!

I know how you feel. That was my main reason for PMR. I like to know the quality of what I am putting in my dogs mouth. Granted, it may not all be grass fed/finished, but its still meat! and it doesn't have tumors or defects that would make it not fit for human consumption of they wouldn't be selling it for human consumption.


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## meggels (May 30, 2010)

Thanks guys! Another drummy for breakfast and she did great.

Just waiting to see what her first stool is like lol


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## meggels (May 30, 2010)

Well, her poop at noon was pretty much perfect. Just curious as to whether it's a "kibble poop" from her last kibble meal at 4am yesterday, or if this was actually her first raw poop...


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## BearMurphy (Feb 29, 2012)

meggels said:


> Well, her poop at noon was pretty much perfect. Just curious as to whether it's a "kibble poop" from her last kibble meal at 4am yesterday, or if this was actually her first raw poop...


what kind of protein is in her kibble? if it wasn't chicken based than it is probably darker than a raw chicken poop which is tan in color usually


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## meggels (May 30, 2010)

her kibble is bison based. 


This poo was a little lighter i think, esp int he middle..

Yes...I dissected lol


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## NewYorkDogue (Sep 27, 2011)

How can you not love good some poop talk, LOL.

Anyway, it must be a good feeling to see her know exactly what to do with a raw bone-in piece.. and that you are feeling some piece of mind as well.

I believe if I were feeding kibble these days, my head would be spinning with all the recalls and subsequent label-reading/dissecting of ingredients. Too much stress for me...


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## InkedMarie (Sep 9, 2011)

rofl at good poop talk. I'm hoping to do a mix of pre made raw/ kibble with canned/The Honest Kitchen, all different proteins, should make for interesting poop!


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## meggels (May 30, 2010)

InkedMarie said:


> rofl at good poop talk. I'm hoping to do a mix of pre made raw/ kibble with canned/The Honest Kitchen, all different proteins, should make for interesting poop!


I hope everyone's stomach agrees with that. That sounds like a recipe for disaster to me LOL


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## Dude and Bucks Mamma (May 14, 2011)

It might take a day or two for you to really see the chicken poop. It's a funky color. Lightest poop I have ever seen! I was really thrown off at first. It's pretty interesting.


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## InkedMarie (Sep 9, 2011)

meggels said:


> I hope everyone's stomach agrees with that. That sounds like a recipe for disaster to me LOL


I probably should have clarified. One day, it'll be kibble for both meals. The next day, raw for both meals. Next day, THK for both meals.


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## BearMurphy (Feb 29, 2012)

InkedMarie said:


> I probably should have clarified. One day, it'll be kibble for both meals. The next day, raw for both meals. Next day, THK for both meals.


good luck! that still sounds rough on your dogs stomach. i'd take the kibble off the menu since it's not a whole food and could end up causing problems. the THK will cover you on having a balanced diet days if you are not confident in raw meat doing this for your dogs


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## magicre (Apr 7, 2010)

InkedMarie said:


> I probably should have clarified. One day, it'll be kibble for both meals. The next day, raw for both meals. Next day, THK for both meals.


is this a cost thing? or a preference thing?

i'm only asking out of curiousity, not attack mode LOL


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## InkedMarie (Sep 9, 2011)

BearMurphy said:


> good luck! that still sounds rough on your dogs stomach. i'd take the kibble off the menu since it's not a whole food and could end up causing problems. the THK will cover you on having a balanced diet days if you are not confident in raw meat doing this for your dogs


well, I have about 25lbs of two different kinds of foods so I'm sure not wasting it! I may not continue with kibble but I have to use up what I have


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## InkedMarie (Sep 9, 2011)

magicre said:


> is this a cost thing? or a preference thing?
> 
> i'm only asking out of curiousity, not attack mode LOL


is what the cost thing? feeding a variety? Sort of. I don't want to do "real" raw as you know so I chose pre made. I can't afford to do that as the only food. I also love THK, my dogs love it and I want to continue to feed it. I have read where many people feed a variety of types of food: raw, pre made raw, kibble, canned....don't know if many feed dehydrated but I do


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## meggels (May 30, 2010)

we had our first raw poo, hooray.


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## InkedMarie (Sep 9, 2011)

Meg, BearMurphy and Magicre: you three have me worried now! Someone help. My Darwins pre made raw just arrived today, yay! I have turkey in the fridge for over the weekend. I am going to add a little bit to each of their meals for a week or so. Take it slow. Now, here is my question. I said yesterday that I ultimately want to do a premade/kibble/The Honest Kitchen rotation. One per day (so they'd have the same thing for both meals). Since you have me worried about doing it all, what should I use for the transition? They are more used to the THK, the kibble they are on has only been in their diet for a few weeks. Should I skip the kibble for the time being and just do THK with the pre made, til they're all transitioned, then do a day of THK and a day of pre made?


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## meggels (May 30, 2010)

Do you want my honest opinion?

If you are willing to order things online and do all the Honest Kitchen stuff, I think you should just do PMR style raw and maybe with some premade if you wanna make sure things are "balanced" and they get vitamins and minerals (or just give a vitamin each day).


I see now how easy it can be when you have a dog like Abbie (or Ginger, or Boone) who have a throat and can actually chew and crunch bones.


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## meggels (May 30, 2010)

Or heck, just order grinds from Hare Today and do that.


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## BearMurphy (Feb 29, 2012)

InkedMarie said:


> Meg, BearMurphy and Magicre: you three have me worried now! Someone help. My Darwins pre made raw just arrived today, yay! I have turkey in the fridge for over the weekend. I am going to add a little bit to each of their meals for a week or so. Take it slow. Now, here is my question. I said yesterday that I ultimately want to do a premade/kibble/The Honest Kitchen rotation. One per day (so they'd have the same thing for both meals). Since you have me worried about doing it all, what should I use for the transition? They are more used to the THK, the kibble they are on has only been in their diet for a few weeks. Should I skip the kibble for the time being and just do THK with the pre made, til they're all transitioned, then do a day of THK and a day of pre made?


well you'll never actually "transition" since you are keeping with kibble for now. i did a cold turkey switch...fed kibble for dinner and pre-made raw the next morning. i'm really not a fan of mixing kibble and anything after my dog puked up honest kitchen and kibble once.....it was disgusting to clean up!

why don't you just finish out the kibble and feed the honest kitchen like you have been doing and start the raw once the kibble is gone? the kibble is going to prevent your dog from having good digestive juices for raw food and takes so long to break down in their stomach

by the way, i'm not knocking anyone's choice to feed kibble, just don't think you'll get the full benefits of raw or THK for that matter if you keep feeding it


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## InkedMarie (Sep 9, 2011)

BearMurphy said:


> well you'll never actually "transition" since you are keeping with kibble for now. i did a cold turkey switch...fed kibble for dinner and pre-made raw the next morning. i'm really not a fan of mixing kibble and anything after my dog puked up honest kitchen and kibble once.....it was disgusting to clean up!
> 
> why don't you just finish out the kibble and feed the honest kitchen like you have been doing and start the raw once the kibble is gone? the kibble is going to prevent your dog from having good digestive juices for raw food and takes so long to break down in their stomach
> 
> by the way, i'm not knocking anyone's choice to feed kibble, just don't think you'll get the full benefits of raw or THK for that matter if you keep feeding it


Ok, that makes sense. Looks like I'll have a large amount of pre made raw in my freezer LOL (small amount already came, 20lb coming next week)


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## InkedMarie (Sep 9, 2011)

steve wants nothing to do with pmr for now. Maybe, probably, at a later time but not now.


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## shellbell (Sep 24, 2011)

If you have leftover kibble you don't want to go to waste, just donate it to a shelter. That's what I did. They were very happy to get a hardly touched bag of Fromm Surf and Turf.


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## InkedMarie (Sep 9, 2011)

shellbell said:


> If you have leftover kibble you don't want to go to waste, just donate it to a shelter. That's what I did. They were very happy to get a hardly touched bag of Fromm Surf and Turf.


I thought of that but think Steve will put up a stink. I could always give it to our son but you're talking over $100 of dog food. Also, our shelter only feeds Science Diet. True story.


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## meggels (May 30, 2010)

I would say cutting out the kibble entirely would be a good idea, and maybe doing premade raw and honest kitchen.

Have you looked into Hare Today? That's premade technically lol


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## InkedMarie (Sep 9, 2011)

meggels said:


> I would say cutting out the kibble entirely would be a good idea, and maybe doing premade raw and honest kitchen.
> 
> Have you looked into Hare Today? That's premade technically lol


I saved the site and glanced....since I have Darwins here and my next shipment next week, I want to give it an honest shot.


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## meggels (May 30, 2010)

Well, Abbie is still doing amazing, and her poops are great as well, what a relief. 


I can't lie, I'm pretty nervous to take the "next step" after chicken...but we still have awhile to go on just the chicken...


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## lily (May 16, 2011)

Your dog will be so happy as will you watching the food going down so well and coming out the other end even better lol,karen


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