BARF Diet

The dogs in my house are on the Biologically Appropriate Raw Food diet, as are several of the cats. While there are many excellent books out there on BARF, including The BARF Diet by Dr. Ian Billinghurst, I thought it would be helpful to share my feeding program with others who might be wondering how hard it is to feed BARF both at home and on the road.

My dogs are fed twice a day. Mornings are for prepared mixes and supplements, and evenings are for raw meaty bones. This sometimes changes based on weather and food on hand, but the overall "average" is maintained.

Some basic principles that I follow:

  • Processed or cooked food is kept to a minimum.
  • Never feed cooked bones!
  • I try to feed approximately 2-3% of the dog's body weight daily. I'm often very inexact, especially with raw meaty bones--how do you feed exactly .15 pounds of chicken wings, anyway?
  • I try to keep the meat to bone ration below 2:1.
  • I try and rotate what the dogs eat for variety and to ensure exposure to micronutrients.
  • Wet, raw food is preferable to freeze-dried. Freeze-dried is preferable to canned. Canned is preferable to kibble. Anything is better than a malnourished dog!
  • It's easier to fine-tune the serving size of the prepared mix than the raw meaty bones, so add or subtract a little at breakfast.
  • I'd always prefer to err on the side of over-feeding, rather than under. But remember, you can always supplement with healthy treats if you give smaller meal portions.
  • Don't forget to account for treats given throughout the day when adjusting meal portions!

Here's how easy it is to feed raw to both my 68-pound Shepherd mix and my 20-pound terrier mix. For breakfast, I take half a tube of FarMore, or five nuggets of Prairie, and toss it in Glindy's bowl. 1/5 of the bowl gets taken out, and put into Spencer's bowl. This makes measuring inexact, but very easy to eyeball.

Next, I put a couple of spoonfuls of green tripe or raw pumpkin into Glindy's bowl, and a single spoonful into Spencer's. I add one full dose of liquid glucosamine to Glindy's bowl, and half to Spencer's.

Lastly, I sprinkle liberally with Dentatreat, and serve.

For dinner, I feed the dogs table scraps after we've finished eating (no begging is ever allowed or rewarded) and allow them to lick the dinner dishes clean. After that, they get their real dinners outside. I usually take four chicken wings, or half a package of lamb riblets, and put it on a plate. One wing, or one large riblet, is given to Spencer. Glindy gets the rest.

The dogs also get regular snacks at mid-day, and just before bed. I feed them crunchy, natural snacks like bovine cartilage squares, dried chicken strips with glucosamine, or dried beef wafers. Cubes of freeze-dried liver, lamb lung, or tripe make up typical ad-hoc treats, as well as moist buffalo strips for special motivation during training sessions.

And finally, I'll occasionally toss the dogs into the back yard with a lamb trotter or other softer chewing bone if I need them to leave me alone for an hour or so.

That's all there is to it, really. It takes less than 15 minutes a day to feed the dogs, and is a fairly simple routine to follow. Most of the "complexity" comes from rotating foods for variety and micronutrients, and from having to supplement canned or meat-only meals when necessary.

When travelling, I usually stick to the freeze-dried products for convenience, although I can often supplement with some raw meaty bones--or raw meat plus Call of the Wild--from the local grocery store. The freeze-dried food and powdered supplements barely add any weight to my luggage for short trips, and make things both fast and easy.

Prepared Raw Mixes

I rotate between the following, although I probably feed more FarMore than anything else due to the convenient tubes.

Prepared Freeze-Dried Products

The dogs and cats both love the Archetype Burger. The Prairie comes in more varieties, and is a bit more affordable.

Raw, Freeze-Dried, and Canned Green Tripe

This is a great source for the limited amount of vegetable matter that dogs really need. I prefer to feed the fresh, raw tripe, but it is often hard to find or to order in small quantities. The freeze-dried is a healthy, but expensive, alternative. The canned lacks a lot of the nutrients and enzymes because of the heating process, but it better than none at all.

Optional Supplements

Raw Meaty Bones

I often rotate through many of these when they're available, but wings and riblets are the most common in my area.

  • lamb riblets
  • chicken wings
  • turkey necks
  • chicken backs and necks
  • lamb shanks
  • ox tails

Final Word

Please don't make the mistake of thinking what I wrote here is a substitute for doing your own research, and understanding why certain things should get fed, and in what proportion, and how to tell if you're meeting your dog's nutritional needs. I just wanted to show that feeding BARF doesn't have to be as complex or as time-consuming as many people make it out to be. It also need not be expensive, although I often trade off my time and effort for money in the form of commercial products.

Your mileage may vary.