So you have decided you would like to give fresh food a try, but you are overwhelmed by the jargon and don’t know what’s going on! Here we will discuss different methods commonly used for fresh food feeding.

Bear in mind, it doesn’t have to be all or nothing – you can use some kibble and some fresh food. However, it is really important that both the kibble and the fresh food are correctly nutritionally balanced – the kibble does not act like a balancer to compensate for an unbalanced raw meaty meal.

Prey model

Prey model is when your dogs or cats are fed whole prey species and they eat the whole thing – including fur, bones, and gut contents. Generally speaking they should be species that it would be possible for them to catch (so quails and rabbits for cats, the same for dogs but potentially increasing in size up to deer for bigger breeds). There is actually a lot of scientific research into prey model nutrition because this has been used in zoos for decades in a variety of feline and canid species. Often prey model diets are remarkably well balanced, however bear in mind that the food species are unlikely to have been through a slaughter and meat inspection process, so parasite risks are higher. Also, if you are giving your dog or cat a large meal that they take several hours or days to finish, the bacterial growth on their food is going to be much higher than on meat stored in a freezer then defrosted carefully before immediate use.

Ratio diets

You may have heard of 80:10:10 or other ratio type of feeding. These generally refer to the percentage of muscle meat, offal and bone in the food. This seems like a nice easy way to feed your dogs and cats, and many advocates of this style of feeding will be able to produce various tables of percentage of muscle and bone in various foods (like duck neck or pizzle) so you can get your ratios correct. However, ratio diets do not address nutritional balance and they are responsible for a lot of nutritional disease in dogs and cats. Rotating the proteins and offal does not guarantee balance – in fact it rarely achieves it. I do not ever recommend feeding a ratio diet, or a commercially available raw food that says it is both a ratio diet and balanced. I delve further into this here.

BARF: biologically appropriate raw food

This refers to feeding recipes of raw food that have been nutritionally balanced to meet all of your pet’s individual needs. This may be commercially produced raw food, recipes produced for you by a professional, or DIY. Although the internet can be a minefield when it comes to raw feeding, the Facebook group Raw Fed and Nerdy is a great resource if you would like to learn how to do this yourself. Alternatively we can formulate BARF recipes for you, to find out more contact [email protected]

Fresh cooked foods

If raw feeding isn’t for you, your pet can still enjoy many of the advantages of fresh food by having cooked meals. One important thing to note is that cooking changes the nutritional composition of foods, so you can’t buy commercial raw food and cook it (unless it has been specifically designed that way, which some are) and expect to achieve nutritional balance. There are also commercial companies such as KatKin, Different Dog and Butternut Box who provide fresh cooked foods. Nutritionists and vets here at The Veterinary Wellness Centre can also create balanced fresh-cooked recipes for you to follow: [email protected]

If you want to try fresh food for your dog or cat, give it a go! Remember that if the fresh food makes up more than 10% of your pet’s daily calories that it must also be balanced correctly to avoid nutritional disease.