Few frozen raw questions before making the switch.

Alright so, before making the leap to anything raw. I've gone out and located a pet store in the area that sells Nature's Variety and also a brand I haven't seen spoken of on here called Stella & Chewy's. They only had beef and chicken medallions for NV and I'd rather stay away from the chicken and beef. They had Rabbit, Duck, Lamb and numerous other varieties in Stella & Chewy's brand in big patties.

If I'm going to choose one of these brands, which do you guys think is better and has anyone tried the Stella brand? Also as for feeding do you guys go by the weight chart or do you alter it at all? As for feeding, do those of you who feed Honest Kitchen and Natures Variety do you strictly feed just the raw or do you do raw one meal and kibble the next, I know NV comes in kibble also. I also have seen you guys say not to mix them together due to their digestion is different on the two types.

Please any more info you think I should know would be greatly appreciated before making this switch. I feel going with the frozen raw is a good starting point and I can go from there. I appreciate the help in advance…

I don't feed the raw patties, but I do feed Honest Kitchen-and just that, no kibble or anything else. Two of mine eat the Keen formula, and the other eats Preference which is just a base-has no protein source so you can add whatever meat you prefer, and I add canned 95% salmon from Wellness.

I think you're doing an awesome job researching all this before taking the leap, you'll get some great advice regarding raw from others on the board.

We've never tried Stella & Chewy's but the shop where I buy our Honest Kitchen from carries it & they recommended it when I was looking for a new food for Buster after his cancer diagnosis last year. They had nothing but good things to say about it and I trust their opinion - just decided to go with homecooked food for him instead.

I feed Honest Kitchen - and frozen raw.

I did use the NV medallions for a few months, but it didn't agree with my Ichiro and he threw it up a lot. I stopped using it. It was also expensive for us, because the average bag has 48 medallions, and I was going through 8-9 per day for my three pugs. It was lasting less than a week.

The store that carries my Honest Kitchen also carries a frozen raw by Columbia River Natural. I have used this for quite some time, and my pugs love it. The good thing about it is that it is strictly meat, bone, and organ. No other additives.

I always (my preference), do the raw meat in the morning, and THK in the evening.

Stella and Chewey's is a good brand. If I could buy their frozen raw locally, I would use it. It just isn't available locally for me. I think Kendie uses their stuff and has been pleased. I do really like their treats. The treats are strictly dehydrated meat.

We use Stella & Chewy's frozen raw. Fantastic company and great product! We feed raw at night (when I have time to clean up properly) and kibble in the morning (when my husband feeds because he's not so good about cleaning). Our pugs are on the fluffy side so to control weight, we feed 2 patties per feeding and add a bunch of no salt canned green beans. The Stella rep recommends for pugs between 18-25 lbs feeding 3 patties per feeding.

If you decide to look into Honest Kitchen, double-check the ingredients. All of their products contain either a grain or a sweet potato, or both. We were looking for grain free and potato free (due to yeast issues) so Honest Kitchen was not a good choice for us.

Tom&Onyx wrote: Also as for feeding do you guys go by the weight chart or do you alter it at all?

I don't think any of us go by the weight chart. It calls for way too much food and the pugs will get fat.

Someone correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe Alice once recommended and we've all pretty much followed the rule of thumb to feed 35 calories per 1 lb. of dog per day -- FOR AN ACTIVE PUG WITHOUT WEIGHT ISSUES. So for a healthy, active, young pug, that is 700 calories a day, including all treats. My pugs are older, overweight, and not so active, so I try to keep them at 500 calories a day or so.

The Stella frozen patties are either 70 or 75 calories per patty, and then there are the calories of anything else you add (I think a half cup of green beans is all of 35 or 40 calories) and you add the calories of any treats they get throughout the day.

Good luck!

Kendie, I think you are right about the calorie count. I calculated Ichiro's calories a few months ago, when he dropped too much weight - and he was only getting about 500 calories per day. The 500 is great for my less active (read: LAZY) pugs, but for Ichiro my active guy, he needs closer to 700 per day.

Renee wrote:
I did use the NV medallions for a few months, but it didn't agree with my Ichiro and he threw it up a lot.

I heard from someone that they use eggs in their products, and sometimes that doesn't agree with some dogs. Just a thought...

Yep, just double checked their website and they do use eggs-chicken, quail, pheasant etc depending on which protein it is. (Also, if you click on the chicken one, Tilly is there in her pretty green coat!)

Tyson&LuLu'sMom wrote:

Renee wrote:
I did use the NV medallions for a few months, but it didn't agree with my Ichiro and he threw it up a lot.

I heard from someone that they use eggs in their products, and sometimes that doesn't agree with some dogs. Just a thought...

Yep, just double checked their website and they do use eggs-chicken, quail, pheasant etc depending on which protein it is. (Also, if you click on the chicken one, Tilly is there in her pretty green coat!)

I'm not sure what it was that didn't agree with him, but he got to the point where he wouldn't even eat it anymore, because he knew they made him sick. The rabbit made him really sick.. and I kind of freaked out when I read the rabbit is sourced from China. We haven't used NV in a year now.

If you are going to feed 100% raw (no kibble or Honest Kitchen), the "rule of thumb" is to feed 2% of their body weight. I'm not sure if that amount would change when feeding both raw and kibble. ???? I feed my girls raw and they get a little over 6 oz a day. I found that 2% was too much for them (they gained a bit of weight) so they actually get about 1.8% of their body weight. I know that .2% doesn't sound like much but we are talking about 4 pounds difference in body weight when I lowered the amount. My girls are 20 pounds and I do notice that Emma's weight fluctuates about once a year. She'll gain about 2 pounds, I'll lower her amount of food a little, she'll loose the 2 pounds, then I'll go back to feeding her the same amount of food again and her weight if fine for the rest of the year. Anyway, I hope this helps. And let us know if you come up with any other questions. Glad to hear you're researching everything. I researched the raw diet for 6 weeks before I switched my girls. I do it all myself at home though. Good luck and glad to hear you're going the raw route.

ETA: While I've never fed Stella's brand, I did look in to it when I was going to buy it rather then make it myself. They are a good brand from what I've heard as well.

Tyson&LuLu'sMom wrote:

Renee wrote:
I did use the NV medallions for a few months, but it didn't agree with my Ichiro and he threw it up a lot.

I heard from someone that they use eggs in their products, and sometimes that doesn't agree with some dogs. Just a thought...

Yep, just double checked their website and they do use eggs-chicken, quail, pheasant etc depending on which protein it is. (Also, if you click on the chicken one, Tilly is there in her pretty green coat!)

Yep--WAY too many eggs for my guys. I use Healthy Paws, Tollden Farms, and Carnivora (Urban Carnivore)--but I'm not sure how many, if any, of those are sold in the US.

I'm an Honest Kitchen feeder, and tried doing one meal HK and one meal kibble when using up some old kibble when I ran out of HK over the holidays. Sammy did fine with it, but Jackson got an upset stomach and pretty pukey one day. I can't say for sure that's what caused it (because Jax is famous for eating things he shouldn't-- usually fabric or paper-- but I never found evidence of such dietary indiscretion) but I will avoid running out in the future.

I know that Lisa/Not Afraid often uses Stella & Chewie's also, and she knows lots of different food options too. It might be worth PM'ing her.

For awhile now i have my 2 boys on Natures Variety frozen raw. I buy the big patties because not all "flavors" are available in the chub. I always have the chicken and i rotate the others. Every morning i split a chicken patty between Tiny and Bubba, and then at night they got the other flavor ie: beef,lamb,bison,rabbit and there is one more i cant remember right now. Also i have Taste of the Wild kibble, and i use that for treats,potty rewards, when they listen and are good boys for instance when i leave and they go into their crate when i open the door on their own without me coaxin them. The whole patty a day per dog = 1 cup per day then with the kibble it comes to roughly 1.5 cups a day per dog and sometimes a lil more and sometimes a wee bit less. Now I use Natures Variety because all the places i went didn have stella and chewies FrozRaw. I have seen on forums that they certify all their batches pathogen free. So nowhere conveinent had Stella and Chewies so it came between bravo and Natures Variety and Natures seemed or was more posted positive on the dog food rating website and the store closest to me had it also. It costs me roughly 38 dollars per week to feed both dogs. But since the switch they seem way happier, and way more energetic(not destructive but more playful). Their poos are way better to deal with and almost odor free and tiny little nuggets. Also when its time for me to feed them both come runnin and crash into me bout as hard as adam sandler hits his teacher Mr. Sanders an the movie Waterboy, and they cant wait to eat it and never leave any left.

Namgupehtnad32 wrote:For awhile now i have my 2 boys on Natures Variety frozen raw. I buy the big patties because not all "flavors" are available in the chub. I always have the chicken and i rotate the others. Every morning i split a chicken patty between Tiny and Bubba, and then at night they got the other flavor ie: beef,lamb,bison,rabbit and there is one more i cant remember right now. Also i have Taste of the Wild kibble, and i use that for treats,potty rewards, when they listen and are good boys for instance when i leave and they go into their crate when i open the door on their own without me coaxin them. The whole patty a day per dog = 1 cup per day then with the kibble it comes to roughly 1.5 cups a day per dog and sometimes a lil more and sometimes a wee bit less. Now I use Natures Variety because all the places i went didn have stella and chewies FrozRaw. I have seen on forums that they certify all their batches pathogen free. So nowhere conveinent had Stella and Chewies so it came between bravo and Natures Variety and Natures seemed or was more posted positive on the dog food rating website and the store closest to me had it also. It costs me roughly 38 dollars per week to feed both dogs. But since the switch they seem way happier, and way more energetic(not destructive but more playful). Their poos are way better to deal with and almost odor free and tiny little nuggets. Also when its time for me to feed them both come runnin and crash into me bout as hard as adam sandler hits his teacher Mr. Sanders an the movie Waterboy, and they cant wait to eat it and never leave any left.

That is A LOT of food you're feeding them. Watch their waistlines carefully now that they're neutered, their metabolisms WILL go down. It's much easier to prevent weight gain than to facilitate weight loss.

Mandy pug you were right. I double checked my math and it turns out i doubled everything. Each day each dog gets one full patty. Half in am and the other half pm. That totals 8 oz for the day. Then i give them average 1 to 2 handfuls of ToTW kibble for this and that etc. So that = less than 1 cup per dog per day. But i will take your advice and keep an eye on them now that they got tuned up at the neuter shop. Vroom vroom!