Think Outside of the Bag - Dehydrated Dog Food

When your chickens and ducks lay a gazillion eggs a day and there are only 2 humans in your family, you need to start getting creative with how you use your eggs! Currently on the most productive day we could get 9 chicken eggs and 5 duck eggs a day, but we average 8 chicken eggs a day and 3 duck eggs, giving us just about 7 dozen eggs a week.  Beauties, aren't they!?

 

Most people know by now that I feed our dogs a homemade raw diet, where raw eggs are included on a frequent basis.  Dog's Naturally Magazine has some good info about feeding raw eggs to your dogs.  Because our eggs are fresh and from birds that free-range in our 9,000 sq ft garden, I'm comfortable feeding them a few times a week to our dogs.  I would not feel the same about store-bought eggs that come from chickens living in terrible conditions.

 

Since feeding a raw diet, I still included one day a week where I fed just regular grain-free kibble that they used to eat daily.  I want their bodies to still tolerate kibble for when we go on vacation and someone else watches them.  But I decided to move onto bigger and better alternatives and purchased a box of Honest Kitchen's Base Preference at my local Pet Club. This 7 lb box of dehydrated food will make a total of 29 lbs of food once we finish it.  I chose the Preference Base because you add your own protein (which we have lots of!) and this will replace our kibble day every week.

In preparation, the other week I scrambled up a bunch of duck eggs, dehydrated them in my Excalibur dehydrator at the proper temperature and time, and then stored them in my Reditainer Extreme Freeze containers (perfect for long term freezer storage).  This morning was our first Honest Kitchen meal and I used the feeding guideline on the back of the box.  I should have known better, especially since I was once a food rep for a high end kibble company, but the feeding amount recommendations were a bit too much. Just a word of caution, Know Thy Pet, adjust their food if it seems too much or too little.

I measured out the base mix and my dehydrated duck eggs, added the proper amount of water, stirred and waited a minute or two.  All while anxious dogs tried to be patient for breakfast.  I have to say, I think the base mix smells really good ... I was getting hungry ;)

 All mixed in and ready for some hungry dogs!  I threw in their Omega 3 fish oil capsules, which they think is doggy candy, and all 3 pooches started slopping up their breakfast!

For dinner, I will use canned sardines in place of eggs to try out a new flavor.  The dogs adore their sardines and they are super healthy for them!

Sweet potatoes, peas, cabbage, organic coconut, apples, spinach, pumpkin, bananas, celery, organic kelp...

The base mix can be a real timer saver for some.  Can you believe I make my own veggie/berry mix for our dogs? I steam veggies in a large pot, add canned pumpkin, sardines, and raw berries, then blend everything down and freeze into ice cube containers, then store in ziplock baggies.   It really isn't a lot of work, it just takes effort.

Kitties, you're not forgotten about! Honest Kitchen makes complete meals for you with Grain Free Chicken and Grain Free Turkey flavors!

Check out some of the many different flavors below!

Think Outside of the Bag: Different Pet Food Options

There are quite a few different food options out there besides kibble.  Yes kibble is cheap and very convenient but there are much healthier options out there.  When you look at kibble, do you see fresh chicken, veggies, and fish?  No because the ingredients have been so highly cooked and processed that the healthy stuff has been cooked out of it and preservatives and color dyes have been added to form little brown balls of kibble.

Let's take a look at some different feeding options...

Dehydrated Pet Foods... The Honest Kitchen is one of the best known dehydrated pet foods. The Honest kitchen produces dog and cat foods, grain-free and grain foods, and a full complete meal or a veggie/fruit 'base' where you add your own protein. Foods are reconstituted with water (at each meal, not all at once), so a 10 lb box makes 40 lbs of food in the end. This particular brand has been on my radar for a long time and I have ordered the 7 lb box of 'base' where I can add my own raw protein.  Even though I feed a raw diet, I have been feeding 1 day of kibble every week simply to keep their bodies used to it if we ever needed to feed kibble in an emergency situation.  Using The Honest Kitchen's dehydrated food once a week can now replace kibble all together.

Homecooked foods... There are a number of excellent resources out there for you to prepare your own cooked pet food.  The nice thing about cooked foods is that you can re-freeze after a large food prep day, so no daily cooking for your pet.  Cooked foods are a great fresh option if you are skittish about feeding a raw diet.  Like feeding raw, you can buy ingredients in bulk when prices are low, and freeze them until you're ready to food prep.  Homecooked and raw foods both share the benefit of knowing exactly what you're feeding your pet.  In a time where pet food recalls are almost a weekly occurrence, it's reassuring to know you're in control of what your animals eat.

Chubs...  I often hear people refer to chubs as raw food... it's not.  Chubs are refrigerated pet food sealed just like the ground beef/turkey chubs in the grocery store.  Chubs are essentially the commercial version of a homecooked diet.  FreshPet is carried in PetSmart stores and I have seen other stores like Target carry different brands.

Raw Food.. Raw food can either be homemade or commercially made.  It can also be 100% raw meat, or also contain fruits and veggies.  There are several commercially made raw foods like Nature's Variety and Stella & Chewys. I've found that feeding commercially made raw can be difficult when you live in a smaller town and maybe only one or two pet food stores carry it.  Homemade raw is how I've feeding the past 18 months or so.  It is more affordable if you have freezer space to stock up when prices are good and if you do your homework on buying options.  I currently feed about 12 proteins in rotation - some of these are store bought products like chicken quarters and pork, some I get from my raw feeding co-op where we using buying power to lower prices.  Can you believe I get ground elk/deer at only $2/lb!!  This is the benefit of belonging to a non-profit (volunteer) co-op. Homemade raw food requires doing your homework so you know your pets are getting a balanced diet, it requires freezer space to stock up when prices are good as well as storing the prepared food, it also requires you to be on top of keeping your kitchen sanitary.  Many people are concerned about salmonella and e.coli when feeding a raw diet, but fact is when you feed your pets raw meat you're a lot more meticulous of keeping your kitchen clean.

Ultimately these options all have 2 things in common: higher water content which helps with renal health, and ingredients that are not cooked until they form brown balls otherwise known as kibble.  One thing I need to stress if you decide to prepare your own pet food - Do Your Homework! Read read read, join a group of others who have been feeding homemade so they can help guide you, and ultimately 'know thy pet'.  This means all pets are different, have different nutritional needs and react to foods differently.  You know your pet best and need to be an advocate for their health.

If you want to slowly introduce fresh foods to your pet, you can start by adding steamed veggies, or cooked (and bland) meats.

There are also several books out there on home prepared foods - I recommend books by Steve Brown,  Dr. Karen Becker and Beth Taylor.  (I have been to Dr. Becker's nutrition seminars and Beth Taylor was a hydrotherapy client when I lived in IL).

Dr. Jean Dodds has an article on the 6 Forms of Processed Pet Food

Intro to Raw by Steve Brown

WebMD on raw food 

Here are some great books to check out...


 

Babies on the Farm!

We had some new additions this past weekend!

We had 6 babies hatch from our birds.  3 come from our barred rock hens (black chicks) and 3 came from our rhodebar hens (2 blonde chicks and a 'chipmunk' chick).  Rhodebar's are an auto-sexing breed which means they have the rare ability to make babies where boys and girls are different colors.  As soon as they're born, when they're still wet and not at all cute, I can tell if it's a boy or a girl before it even fully emerges from their egg!

 The 6 chicks are now in their brooder in the garage - a 4' baby pool set inside a playpen.  They have a heat lamp to keep them warm, fresh food and water, and I'm starting to introduce natural elements like sticks to start climbing on, fodder to start 'finding' greens to eat etc.  Because these babies were incubated and didn't have a 'mother' sitting on them as eggs, I can't add them to our flock until they can fend for themselves.  Adult chickens tend to bully new additions into their pecking order, so without a mother to protect them, they have to be slowly introduced when they're large enough to run/flap away.

 I plan on raising them until they're more able bodied then will find homes for most of them.  The 2 blondes are boys and will go to a friend.  The chipmunk chick is a girl and will probably stay with us.  The 3 black chicks are unknown so I won't know if they are boys/girls until they are a little older.

 Even with them living in the garage, Nova and Naveen continue to be perfect hosts like they were with our ducks.  They watch the chicks occasionally but do not try to harm them. Zoey and Pepe come in the garage with me occasionally and Pepe looooves baby birds, they really bring out a sensitive side to him.  I always joke that Pepe wants to be a mommy when we have new baby birds around ;)

Eggs for Sale!

Now offering chicken eggs for sale!   

Our chickens free range in our 9,000 sq ft garden, allowing them to live as chickens should.  During most of the year, they forage for bugs like grasshoppers, june bugs and grubs.  They also eat whatever plants look delicious in the garden like grass, mallow, weeds, and whatever garden veggies I toss their way (tomatoes are their favorite!).

In the cooler months when there aren't many bugs or greens to eat,  I supplement both!  I grow fodder for them as well as raise mealworms, so they get to be happy chickens all year.

Our hens lay light brown eggs that come in different shades, and sometimes have a few 'freckles' on them. Shell color is strictly a matter of pigmentation, there is no nutritional difference between white eggs, brown eggs, blue eggs etc.  The only thing that makes an egg healthier is by the way chickens are raised and what they get to eat.

If you are trying free-range eggs for the first time, there are a few things to know that make them different than store bought eggs:

• The yolks will be much brighter/vivid in color than store bought eggs.  This is due to their free ranging diet of eating bugs, plants, and fresh veggies. Commercial eggs in the grocery stores are from chickens kept in horrid conditions, being fed only grain.
• They are much fresher than store-bought eggs.  This means they are not ideal for making hard boiled eggs unless you let them sit in the fridge for a week or two, or unless you know a few tricks.  Store bought eggs are SEVERAL days old, which means they have more air inside the shell than freshly laid eggs.  Air is what is needed to cleanly peel a shell after hard-boiling.  Don't worry, there are still lots of tricks out there for us to cleanly peel a fresh egg after it's been boiled.  My trick involves using a thumb tack to poke a small hole in the shell, introducing more air before I boil it.  Others steam their eggs.

I will have 2 dozen eggs per week for sale, though their laying changes with the seasons so it may be more or less depending on the month.  One dozen eggs are $3.50.  If you use your own egg cartons or return mine, they are only $3 a dozen.  Amazon has some great durable plastic egg cartons, or you can return your egg cartons each time I come to bring more eggs.  

Contact me for some delicious eggs!

Think Outside the Bag: Healthy Options for Treat Dispensers

I love food dispensing toys! Love, love, love 'em!  And I love how they can quietly occupy our 3 dogs.  The way I prepare them has changed over the years, to a much simpler healthier way.  Luckily the pet supply industry has learned that us dog and cat owners are happy to pay for all sorts of things that make our pets happier.  Companies have created dozens of treat dispensing toys in all sorts of shapes and sizes, allowing dogs to really use their brains on how to get food out of all the nooks and crannies.  Gone are the boring days of the classic kong , hello to Caterpillars, Biscuit Bouncers, and Goodie Bones !

All stuffed with Banana and frozen

Companies started cashing in on the treat dispensing toy craze and started producing treats specifically for these toys.  The problem is, most of this treats either look like cardboard (and are probably made with more ingredients than real cardboard is made of) or come in a can resembling spray cheese and no one wants to know what chemicals make up the can ingredients!

Peanut butter was the stuffable treat of choice for the longest time but for me, I didn't like my house smelling like peanut butter from all the dog licking.  Especially when my house smells of peanut butter from all the Breakfast Biscuits I make :)  I tried pumpkin but quickly realized that it makes orange spots on the carpet!  I often stuff them with the treats I make, but not many people have dehydrators so I came up with 3 great options that are extremely cheap, healthy and no special equipment needed.

Scrambled egg patties!

It should also be noted, the best way to utilize a food dispensing toy is to freeze them after stuffing.  This makes your dog work that much harder to get their goodies out!

1. Healthy Treat Option #1: Shredded chicken.  If you pick up a rotisserie chicken from the store and have some leftovers, keep them for the dogs!  Neither my husband or I like breast meat much, so I clean the chicken of whatever we didn't eat, discard the skin (very important!), and keep the leftovers to use in the dog's treat toys.  If there's a lot of leftover meat (like a huge Thanksgiving turkey) you can freeze some in a ziplock bag for future use. Fill the toy with the shredded chicken and freeze - your dogs will love it!
2. Healthy Treat Option #2: Bananas.  Yep, as simple as bananas!  These work best when they are still fully yellow and very firm. The toys that work best for these are those with larger openings like the classic kong, or the larger openings on the Barnacles.  Just slide a chunk of banana right in and freeze.  Our dogs are big fans of the frozen banana!
3. Healthy Treat Option #3: Scrambled egg.  We have a LOT of eggs these days between the chickens and ducks. Though I do occasionally use the duck eggs for baking, they primarily go towards our dog's food.  I will scramble up a few dozen duck eggs at a time and freeze them for the dog's food.  For easy container storage, I use silicone molds to cook the scrambled eggs as 'patties', which also makes them easy to stuff into their toys.  You don't need a silicone mold though, just scramble them into large enough pieces so they don't easily fall out of the toy.  Again, freeze after filling with egg.

There you go, 3 simple and healthy ways to fill your dog's treat dispensing toys.  I personally have 6 toys, 2 for each dog, so that I always have some ready in the freezer :)

Visit the links below to go straight to the toys I recommend!