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Old April 3rd, 2011, 08:33 PM
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Myka Myka is offline
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Nature's Variety frozen raw for dogs

What does everyone think about this food?

Peewee always gets one meal of Orijen adult kibble because I need a travel food each day. In the morning he gets a meal of canned food which I rotate brands...Evo 95%, Nature's Variety, and Before Grain 96%. Always chicken and/or turkey which he does best on. Along with his canned food he gets wild salmon oil, a tbsp Tripett, a tsp plain yogurt (on occasion). I'm considering replacing half the canned meals with this Nature's Variety frozen raw.

What do you guys think about this? Six of one, half a dozen of the other? Doesn't really matter?
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Old April 4th, 2011, 07:49 AM
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Love4himies Love4himies is offline
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I am so glad you are considering raw, to me it is food in it's natural form, the way nature intended.

My experience with it has been that it had too much bone in it for some of my kitties and made them constipated so I added a bit of raw fresh muscle meat. The other thing (and this is nothing about NV, but the store I bought it from), I found the patties sometimes were freezer burnt and the cats wouldn't eat it.
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Old April 6th, 2011, 02:00 PM
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Well...kind of the cheater's raw, eh? I wish they would list the meat, offal, and bone content separately...they just list that combination as 95% (can't remember exact percentage). They don't list the calcium content either which would indicate the amount of bone. I have a feeling they add a bit much offal and bone than desirable just because it's cheaper.

I would like to get the kibble right out of his diet. He gets constipated sometimes and I think it is from being slightly dehydrated sometimes, although adding a bunch of bone isn't going to help either! He's not a big water drinker, so I do add some to his feedings. I think if he is on 50/50 on these raw nuggets and good quality canned food that might help with his constipation. Worth a shot anyway. His turds from the raw nugget feedings are half the size of his kibble turds.

As far as freezer burn goes, I don't think dogs are as picky as cats in general. The ones I have now aren't freezer burned at all, but the store just started carrying them, so maybe as time goes on the supply won't be as fresh. Good thing to keep in mind, but I would try to return the food if it was freezer burned. Did you try to return it?
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Ella - Jun '20 - Reg AmStaff
Squeak - '15/16? - Tabby cat (adopted Nov '18)
Streak - '18 - Black cat (adopted Nov '18)
Peewee - Jan '06 - 6.5 lb Chi (adopted May '09)
--------------------
Roxy - Feb '05 to May '20 AmStaff (adopted Jul '11)
Myka - Nov '98 to Jan '10 - APBT X
Lacy - Sep '92 to Jul '03 - Sheltie
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Old April 6th, 2011, 02:12 PM
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Love4himies Love4himies is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Myka View Post
Well...kind of the cheater's raw, eh? I wish they would list the meat, offal, and bone content separately...they just list that combination as 95% (can't remember exact percentage). They don't list the calcium content either which would indicate the amount of bone. I have a feeling they add a bit much offal and bone than desirable just because it's cheaper.

I would like to get the kibble right out of his diet. He gets constipated sometimes and I think it is from being slightly dehydrated sometimes, although adding a bunch of bone isn't going to help either! He's not a big water drinker, so I do add some to his feedings. I think if he is on 50/50 on these raw nuggets and good quality canned food that might help with his constipation. Worth a shot anyway. His turds from the raw nugget feedings are half the size of his kibble turds.

As far as freezer burn goes, I don't think dogs are as picky as cats in general. The ones I have now aren't freezer burned at all, but the store just started carrying them, so maybe as time goes on the supply won't be as fresh. Good thing to keep in mind, but I would try to return the food if it was freezer burned. Did you try to return it?
No, I didn't try to return the freezer burnt ones, the foster kittens would eat ones that weren't too bad, but I needed favours from the store to adopt out my fosters on behalf of the humane society, so I didn't want to complain .
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Rose semi feral, a cpietra rescue, female tabby (approx 13 yrs)

Jasper RIP (2001-2018)
Sweet Pea RIP (2004?-2014)
Puddles RIP (1996-2014)
Snowball RIP (1991-2005)

In a cat's eye, all things belong to cats.-English Proverb

“While we are free to choose our actions, we are not free to choose the consequences of our actions.” Stephen R. Covey
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Old April 6th, 2011, 03:03 PM
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Myka Myka is offline
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Hehe, ya good call!
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Ella - Jun '20 - Reg AmStaff
Squeak - '15/16? - Tabby cat (adopted Nov '18)
Streak - '18 - Black cat (adopted Nov '18)
Peewee - Jan '06 - 6.5 lb Chi (adopted May '09)
--------------------
Roxy - Feb '05 to May '20 AmStaff (adopted Jul '11)
Myka - Nov '98 to Jan '10 - APBT X
Lacy - Sep '92 to Jul '03 - Sheltie
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Old April 6th, 2011, 04:45 PM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Myka View Post
They don't list the calcium content either which would indicate the amount of bone.
The amount of minerals in the raw Instinct is listed on their website if you're interested:

http://www.naturesvariety.com/InstinctRaw/dog/chicken
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Old July 1st, 2011, 12:48 AM
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For those interested, I switched to a brand made locally called Urban Carnivore, recently renamed Carnivora (I liked the first name waaay better! haha). They have several "flavors" some are just meat (and bone and offal), and some have added veggies and fruit. They offer several meat types; chicken, beef, lamb, elk, bison, duck, rabbit, and quail. Carnivora is proud to use whole carcass products meaning they grind up the whole carcass minus the intestine and offal. They offer offal patties and tripe patties separately.

They have a great website, and interesting information on each meat type when you click on the nutirional information.

www.carnivora.ca
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Ella - Jun '20 - Reg AmStaff
Squeak - '15/16? - Tabby cat (adopted Nov '18)
Streak - '18 - Black cat (adopted Nov '18)
Peewee - Jan '06 - 6.5 lb Chi (adopted May '09)
--------------------
Roxy - Feb '05 to May '20 AmStaff (adopted Jul '11)
Myka - Nov '98 to Jan '10 - APBT X
Lacy - Sep '92 to Jul '03 - Sheltie
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