Average Reviews:
(More customer reviews)This is a very good book from which I learned a great deal; however, I don't like so much emphasis put on supplements. The book is closley linked with the B Natural supplements. Nutritional philosophies are sure to vary on supplementation but according to my holistic vet, if 1/3 or more of my dog's diet is raw food, there is no need for me to add digestive enzymes. Digestive enzymes and/or vitmain supplements + (sometimes other supplements) are big parts of all her recipies, raw or cooked. I've been advised by other well recognized canine nutritional experts and by my vet not to add vitamin supplements or digestive enzymes supplements to my healthy dog's cooked food meals that make up 1/3 of his diet since 2/3 of his diet is already completly balanced with the highest quality commercial raw and Instinct kibble foods I use. This book recommends much more supplementation than that.
Raw food already has enzymes and beneficial bacteria in it and a lot of bio-availabe nutrients, so it makes no sense to me to include digestive enzymes to raw food for a dog with no digestive problems to begin with. And there's no need to add vitman supplements like Berte's Daily Blend when adding fresh food to kibbles like Orijen or Instint or Wellness; they already have plenty of vitamins. (Whatever your feelings are about high-end kibbles, postive or negative, lack of vitmains is not a problem with those kibbles, and using vitmain supplements like Berte's Daily Blend that include vitmain D along with kibbles that are already high in vitamin D, is not advisable accordng to very reliable sources in my research.) Why add a supplement that includes vitmain A when you're feeding meals that include liver and other organs? Liver is already high in vitmain A. In short I think this author over supplements and that the book was too much of a means of getting people to buy the Berte's supplements, and no other company's supplements, rather than to provide a truly fresh food natural diet.
My idea of a natural diet is one in which as many of the nutrients come from the foods as possible, not from powders and capsules. I learend much from the book and found the chapter on the history of dog food interesting. This book served me as a good step forward to improving my dog's diet, but it is not a way of feeding that I strictly follow. I just use basic supplements like fish oil with vitmain E and use egg shells at her suggested dosage to balance the boneless meat meals calcium to phospherous ratio. But I even try to use salmon most of the time instead of resorting to fish capsules.
When I was using the Berte's Daily Blend for a month, it did not agree with my dog at all. (He had small loose stools for a month and he's never had a problem like that before or after using the supplement.) Maybe this was because of the whey that's in it, or it was too strong at the suggested dosage -- I don't know for sure. But without the Berte's Daily Blend supplement, the approximate 1/3 portion of my dog's diet that is fresh cooked foods (eggs, wild salmon, bison, etc.) has been working out great.
The book makes for good reading, it brought about positive changes in my dog's diet; it taught me a lot, and I'm glad I read it.
Update six months later: I've read the author's comment to another reviewer in which she says that she does not sell or make money from the sales of the B Natural supplements. I believe her, but it came across that way to me too from the book because the B Naturals are such an integral part of her feeding concept. I think it is a flaw of this book to have limited her supplementation recomendations to B Naturals and to have never even mentioned products from other companies that enhance a fresh food diet and that make fresh food feeding so easy. There are good options from other companies. I no longer feed any kibble at at all. I mostly feed fresh meat meals with an excellent product called Wysong Call of the Wild, which is a powder that is added to fresh meat,(and I feed some commercial raw). It's okay to supplement a fresh food diet, if it's not overdone. I think that anyone interested in feeding a homemade raw or cooked diet should read this book, read Unlocking the Canine Ancestral Diet by Steve Brown, and read the site Dogaware. Put the knowledge of those 3 together and you'll get good results.
Click Here to see more reviews about: Raw and Natural Nutrition for Dogs: The Definitive Guide to Homemade Meals
***The first guide to both raw feeding and healthy homecooked meals for dogs.In the whirlwind of information about local, organic, and whole foods, it's easy to forget that our canine companions can also benefit from—and deserve—a more natural and nurturing diet. Preparing Fido's food at home may seem daunting, but it's really not, says Lew Olson in Raw & Natural Nutrition for Dogs. Olson discusses canine nutritional needs and explains the research on how home-prepared foods, particularly raw foods, can meet pets' needs better than commercial, processed dog food. Step-by-step instructions and recipes make preparation easy. The book includes charts with the recipes, instructions on keeping diets simple and balanced, guidelines on preparation, suggestions for finding ingredients, and how much to feed a dog by body weight. There are recipes for healthy adult dogs as well as guidelines for puppies, senior dogs, and dogs with health conditions including pancreatitis, renal problems, gastric issues, allergies, heart disease, liver disease, and cancer. Pet owners seeking to give their dogs a better coat, better skin, and healthier teeth and gums, as well as longer lives and more stable temperaments, are sure to welcome this book.
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