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dog is just a pup. 8 weeks old right now and will be another 2 before I get her. Everything I read mentioned there would be a 4-7 day period where the dogs digestive tract was getting used to the new diet.

probably longer, but that's about right

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I wondered about this too. Now, from what I read a dog will digest raw food faster than the time it will take for a parasite to take hold and a dog's stomach has stronger acids than ours. And that the times dogs get something like salmonella is when they are fed raw food shortly after kibble, because the kibble takes longer to digest the raw food behind it is in the stomach for longer.

wow, that is sort of hearsay, but I posed this question to two of the top gastroenterologist specialist in the country,(one from UTa, then other from NC St.), and they both had sort of the same feeling about it

1. Why switch from whats on the market? Dogs eat healthier food than we do, there is no doubt about that. Why would you feed them raw meat that cost 2-3 times as much?

2. The majority of breeds should not consume raw meat on a daily basis. i.e small/toy breeds and other non-sporting breeds.

again, i'll have to consult with them or others on this

but i was talking to one of my dad's clients yesterday and we we're talking about how the religiously feed their dogs boiled chicken and rice everyday and they do great with it. Is it ideal? No, not at all, but THOSE dogs do great with it.

My maw maw for years used to do the same thing, she use to cook top of the line food for her dogs and she would wonder why they wouldn't eat their purina planned diet food in the morning, she refused to believe that they wouldn't eat the purina food becuase they had a taste for chicken/chicken broth, forget that her son the vet of 25+ years was telling her the contrary, she just wouldn't accept and his dogs became obese because of it.

After she died my aunt adopted the dogs and quit feeding them the chicken and rice. My aunt started freaking out about 4-5 days of them not eating she was freaking out, but as papa Biff put it,"if they are hungry enough, they will eat..", a day later they ate the food and started shedding the pounds. Just like in humans, it's about a proper diet and portion control.