Of course, there is phosphorus in meat and organs too, so the diet overall isn't balanced – good thing I balance over time. If I’m feeding a meat and organ only meal, I’ll often add green tripe because it offers the perfect balance of calcium and phosphorus. There are a lot of foods that offer calcium, however, it’s important to understand how much calcium your dog needs on a daily basis and compare that to the foods that you are considering. So what do we give them instead? Alternative Sources of Calcium for Dogs Some dogs can’t have them or won’t eat them. The drumette doesn't break down enough for me so I grind duck wings instead.ĭespite my list of “safe” bones (of course, this is just for my dogs) and the benefits of feeding bones to dogs, there are still going to be many reasons why someone doesn’t want to feed bones to their dogs. Some will tell you that this is normal, for me, it's scary. After eating whole duck wings, I found big pieces of bone in my dogs' poop. Why? Duck bones seem harmless, right? NO! They are NOT harmless (and I say this as a paranoid dog mom). An example that immediately comes to mind are duck wings. What do I mean by “having trouble with a bone?” Glad you asked! If I noticed that when one of my dogs is eating a bone, they're trying to swallow sharp pieces, then I'll offer a trade and take the offending bone away. Raw bones are a high valued treat and while most of the time if I say “drop it,” my dogs will let it go, it’s a lot easier for me and less stressful for them if I say “drop it,” and give them something as a trade. If I notice my dogs are having trouble with a bone, I will offer a trade. I don't have an issue feeding rabbit, quail, chicken, or duck leg bones because they are easy to grind, which, to me, means that they're easy for my dogs to chew up and consume.

Often, I see people attribute this warning about weight-bearing bones to all animals. Recently, I saw a tip on Facebook about feeding raw bones to dogs – the person wrote: “if the bone won’t bend over your knee, then it’s too hard for your dog to eat.” This is a great tip, however, when I thought about the bones that I give to my dogs, there are several that don’t meet this guideline, so I stick with the rule of never feeding my dogs bones that were intended to keep a 2,000-pound animal standing. I love the sound of the crunch, I love when they zone out, I love that they love eating their bones. Now that we have a routine, I continue to supervise their time with bones for safety (you never know) and it’s wonderful to watch them being dogs. I also supervised this time to make sure Rodrigo and Apollo don't steal bones from the other dogs – they can both be a dick. I did this initially to figure out the bones that are a good fit and which are not. Each dog has a space that they prefer for eating and I sit on the porch and watch them enjoy their bones. work out our dogs' neck, shoulder, and back muscles (as they chew).clean their teeth and freshens their breath.add a natural and fresh source of calcium to our dogs' diet.calm our dogs down it's fun to see them zone out and relax as they're chewing their bones.satisfy our dogs' chew drive, allowing our dogs to be dogs.I feed raw bones to my dogs to keep their teeth clean by scraping tartar from the tooth and flossing between the teeth (as our dogs tear at the remaining meat on the bone), but that’s not the only benefit. Plus, I was assured that my dogs would LOVE to eat raw bones, so I took some steps to make sure that my dogs safely consumed their bones. The bone will splinter and puncture my dog’s esophagus, digestive tract, or stomach.īasically, I was afraid that my dogs would die if I fed them raw bones, despite knowing that raw bones are part of the raw diet and would help keep my dogs' teeth clean.My dog will break a tooth and I won’t know about it until an abscess develops.I held out on feeding raw bones to my dogs because I had a long list of fears… One of the biggest fears about raw feeding surrounds feeding raw bones.

Happy bones for pets