Bones!

As you may or may not know, my dogs are fed a raw meat diet, something that I started doing over 20 years ago. At least once a week the dogs have a raw meaty bone in place of their usual meal, this has several benefits some of which are, a few hours entertainment, a meal that involves a bit of effort and lovely clean white teeth. I must stress that the bones are totally raw, cooked bones (including the greasy deep fried bones available in some pet shops) have a high risk of splintering and causing terrible damage. I give my girls pretty much any type of bone, this includes - chicken, duck, lamb, venison and beef, these are not totally without risk, but neither is any food and a greedy dog can choke on a mouthful of dry food as well as a bone, but as long as you can supervise your dog I really feel the very small risk presented by a diet including raw bones is one that is heavily outweighed by the various benefits it offers. I will tempt fate now and say that in all the years I have fed a raw diet, the only time I had any issue with bones was with a pup from one of the last litter, he swallowed a chicken neck whole, gagged on it for a few seconds and promptly vomited it straight back up, he then proceeded to eat it in a far more methodical chewing fashion :-)