# Staples of Raw Feeding



## Jesus Alvarez (Feb 6, 2009)

I think it would be interesting to see what all the raw food feeders are giving their dogs. What are the staples of your dogs diet? Do you change them as your dog ages?


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## Connie Sutherland (Mar 27, 2006)

Jesus Alvarez said:


> I think it would be interesting to see what all the raw food feeders are giving their dogs. What are the staples of your dogs diet? Do you change them as your dog ages?


I use poultry for most of the RMBs, with a lot of variety in the added muscle meat, including some canned mackerel and no-salt-added sardines, lamb, a little beef, bison, etc. I give some live-culture plain yogurt, a small amount of low-sugar low-starch produce, the occasional whole egg, etc. I give daily fish oil and E. I give 5 to 10% of the diet in organ meat.

The only change I might make for age is to adjust amounts (maybe, if the dog slows down a bit). 

Ailments, though, like OA, for example, are different, and I reevaluate supplements.


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## Konnie Hein (Jun 14, 2006)

RMBs = chicken frames
Muscle meat = venison (hurray for roadkill!), moose, elk, beef, pork and whatever else I can get for free
Green Tripe (yum!)
Organs - varies between the Bravo Beef Blend and Turkey Blend or freebie deer organs
Blueberries
Whole Egg in shell 3X/wk
Beef fat (recent addition - around 2 tblsp/meal right now)
Salmon Oil
Vitamin E
Occasional steamed veggies if left over from dinner
Occasional organic whole grain good for you type bread
Occasional canned no-salt added sardines

I'm sure I'm forgetting something, but that's it in a nutshell. Oh, and they eat horse manure whenever they get the chance, but I'm not sure that should be considered an intentional part of their diet. I certainly don't stop them from doing it.

The only change I made for our older dog when he was still alive was the addition of Ester C and a Glucosamine/Chrondoitin supplement from Costco. Not sure if I would add that if I had to do it all over again. It seemed to make a difference, but it could have all been in my head.


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## kristin tresidder (Oct 23, 2008)

large meaty chicken quarters
venison meat & bones all deer season
i buy rolls of ground up beef heart/liver/lung/tripe/kidney for organ meat when i can't get deer organs
green tripe fairly often
bananas when they get too ripe for me to eat
plain yogurt occasionally
mackeral/canned salmon (not ground)
ground up beef & bone when i'm feeling lazy

i also give kelp a few times per week, salmon oil, vitamin e & canola oil daily, royal jelly almost every day, & folic acid every few days - esp for the bitches


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## Connie Sutherland (Mar 27, 2006)

I forgot about green tripe -- my favorite way to give produce, by far.


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## Connie Sutherland (Mar 27, 2006)

kristin tresidder said:


> i buy rolls of ground up beef heart/liver/lung/tripe/kidney for organ meat when i can't get deer organs


Where do you get that?


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## Connie Sutherland (Mar 27, 2006)

Connie Sutherland said:


> I forgot about green tripe -- my favorite way to give produce, by far.


I forgot to say that I occasionally make up some THK on the thin side (Force or Embark are the two I buy) and pour it over RMBs like gravy, just for the added variety and to make sure that THK is a familiar food because I use it sometimes when traveling.


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## Gerry Grimwood (Apr 2, 2007)

Connie Sutherland said:


> Where do you get that?


That's the ingredients for offal, minus the tripe.

Hey Connie, what's the optimal calcium/phos ratio ? I feed some whole carcass patties that claim 1.31/.76 for lamb and bison is 1.28/74, what is just backs and necks ??

If you feed a variety with these ratios, are you overdoing it ??


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## Anna Kasho (Jan 16, 2008)

My two main RMB's are chicken and pork, they are the cheapest. Cyko is sensitive to chicken, so for him it's no more than 30% of total diet. For variety I get whatever is old and discounted (beef, lamb, turkey) as well as eggs, beef and chicken liver, beef heart, pork and beef kidney, "marrow guts" which is cleaned small intestine pieces, fish, whole mice/rats/chicks, green tripe. I also add powdered greens, kelp sometimes, or a piece of fruit or vegetable for those that will eat it. Sometimes canned pumpkin. Yogurt or kefir, too.

I add fish oil and vit E everyday, and glucosamine, vit C, for those that need it.


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## Connie Sutherland (Mar 27, 2006)

Gerry Grimwood said:


> ... Hey Connie, what's the optimal calcium/phos ratio ? I feed some whole carcass patties that claim 1.31/.76 for lamb and bison is 1.28/74, what is just backs and necks ??
> 
> If you feed a variety with these ratios, are you overdoing it ??


It's between 1.2 parts calcium to 1 part phosphorous and 1.3 parts calcium to 1 part phosphorous. 

Meaty chicken backs are approximately this ratio. 

But I believe that variations between 1 to 1 and 2 to 1 in the variety work fine. That is, if the RMB part of the diet is varied and generally between 1 to 1 and 2 to 1 or if it's not so varied and generally between 1.2 parts calcium to 1 part phosphorous and 1.3 parts calcium to 1 part phosphorous, then you are approximating a natural diet's ratio.

So if I had those patties, a tad high-ish in calcium, I would mix them with items closer to 1 to 1, and/or feed some muscle meat with them.


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## Jesus Alvarez (Feb 6, 2009)

Konnie Hein said:


> Oh, and they eat horse manure whenever they get the chance, but I'm not sure that should be considered an intentional part of their diet. I certainly don't stop them from doing it.


And I thought my dog was the only one eating horse poop. I swear it must be a delicacy. My younger one can't eat enough of it.


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## Jaimie Van Orden (Dec 3, 2008)

Im thinking it must be right up there, with Sheep poop!


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## Jennifer Coulter (Sep 18, 2007)

Konnie Hein said:


> Oh, and they eat horse manure whenever they get the chance, but I'm not sure that should be considered an intentional part of their diet. I certainly don't stop them from doing it.


As long as they aren't rolling in it:evil: 

I had a malinois x once the reveled in the opportunity to roll in many types of poop. I would much rather he ate them...cleaner that way.

And now back to your regular schedualed programming...:-#


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## Michelle Reusser (Mar 29, 2008)

How many of you all have a in with a butcher or store? I have tried asking to buy old stuff they want to throw out at discount and they wont, fearing I will sell it or eat it myself.  Can't get squat for free anymore, they'd rather throw it in the dumpster, nice huh? I'm now paying $5 for soup bones the butcher would give us free as a kid


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## Dan Long (Jan 10, 2008)

Michelle, I had the same response when I asked at the local grocery stores about what they do with scraps and stuff that is past date. 

Staples here are:

chicken leg quarters
pork shoulders with the bone- I use the bone with meat attached as a whole meal, and the boneless meat I cut off as muscle meat for other meals.
whole broiler/fryer chickens
deer ribs, shoulders backs, necks, whatever my brother gives me
whole beef sirloin roasts. I buy 10-15lb ones, cut all the fat and outside stuff off for the dogs, cut the rest up for people food.
ground turkey and ground beef
frozen whiting fish fillets

lesser fed things:
whole turkeys, cut into meal sized pieces
pork neck bones and ribs
beef neck bones, ribs, and short ribs
beef shank/shin meat
beef briskit when i can get a good price
pork hearts
beef heart
chicken gizzards and hearts
canned mackerel

Things I use as supplements
eggs- 2-3 days a week
canned tripe once a week (need to find a good local source of raw tripe)
beef liver
grizzly salmon oil

l


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## Konnie Hein (Jun 14, 2006)

Michelle:
I'm all about cheap or free raw food items. Grocery stores and butcher shops around here in general don't want to sell anything at a discount either. They'd rather pitch it too. One of my teammates checked with Whole Foods and they'll sell him organic beef scraps for a great price. Something to look into. 

A lot of what my dogs eat is roadkill deer. Also, we have a lot of friends who are hunters and they give us leftovers/carcasses and meat that's been in their freezers for a while. 

The chicken frames are from a place that has graciously given me and my teammates a nice discount when we buy in bulk as a group. 

I recommend looking for hunter types to sponge off from. That's the best gig aside from roadkill that I've found yet.


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## kristin tresidder (Oct 23, 2008)

Connie Sutherland said:


> Where do you get that?


from these guys: http://blueridgebeef.com/products-raw-beef-chicken.html it's their "natural mix" product.


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## Maren Bell Jones (Jun 7, 2006)

Also check with the local producers at the farmers market. I get humanely raised grass fed lamb bones for ~$1 a pound for the spinous processes off the neck bones, the humerus and the hock, and some of the wimpier looking ribs. One of the bison and chicken producers will also sometimes hook me up. A couple years ago, I got something like 70 lbs of bison because the bison didn't bleed out correctly to be sold for for USDA inspected meat, so me and a couple other folks got ~200 lbs of bison for $1 a pound. Including some filet mignon that normally sells for like $23/lbs.


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## Carol Boche (May 13, 2007)

Michelle Kehoe said:


> How many of you all have a in with a butcher or store? I have tried asking to buy old stuff they want to throw out at discount and they wont, fearing I will sell it or eat it myself.  Can't get squat for free anymore, they'd rather throw it in the dumpster, nice huh? I'm now paying $5 for soup bones the butcher would give us free as a kid


Our meat locker is great. I visit once a week with a 50 gallon rubbermaid trash can and pick through what they throw out. 
Only thing that they can't give me is the tripe. Illegal. 

They also save me a box of knucke, leg and hip bones every two weeks and freeze them for me. 

Holidays bring me turkey necks and organ meat.....about 60 pounds of it at Thanksgiving and then Christmas. 

All free....  

Other stuff that I feed...

Chicken quarters
Venison 
Buffalo
Elk
Moose (just got some of this on Saturday from a friend, won't be ready to feed for another couple weeks)

Rabbit, Antelope (although most of my dogs don't like it), pheasant, grouse.....

Steamed veggies, mackerel, canned salmon, Honest Kitchen (when traveling or a good grain free kibble), salmon oil, vitamin E, plain live cultured yogurt, eggs, bluberries, bananas, beef liver, heart and kidney.....and the list goes on. 

This year I had to turn down a bunch since I now have three full freezers just for dog food and Doug will not allow me to buy a fourth.....or invade our people food freezer....bummer.


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## susan tuck (Mar 28, 2006)

chicken frames w/necks; pork necks; venison necks; lamb necks; organs; tripe; vit e; salmon oil; canned mackeral (which I have had trouble finding as of late).


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## Anna Kasho (Jan 16, 2008)

susan tuck said:


> canned mackeral (which I have had trouble finding as of late).


Its not just you - I've had the same problem. I bought the last couple of cases to be found in my area and have not seen any new stock. From what I can tell there's a shortage, they are just not making the cheap 15 oz cans anymore. I switched to sardines in tomato sauce, at least those are still available...


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## Meena Moitra (Jul 11, 2008)

I use sojourner farms european dog food mix as my base.
At the grocery store I buy yogurt, grape seed oil, molasass, eggs, fish oil, brewers yeast, green powder (spirulina, whatever), chx necks, liver, giblets, ground beef, cottage cheese, sometimes tofu, rarely ground lamb, as it got too $$, and whatever veg du jour looks good-is cheap/in season. Veg and meat is rotated. And I give them marrow beef bones when I work. And getting meals ready takes about 3-10 minutes to fix for two dogs. Easy.


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## Connie Sutherland (Mar 27, 2006)

Meena Moitra said:


> I use sojourner farms european dog food mix as my base.
> At the grocery store I buy yogurt, grape seed oil, molasass, eggs, fish oil, brewers yeast, green powder (spirulina, whatever), chx necks, liver, giblets, ground beef, cottage cheese, sometimes tofu, rarely ground lamb, as it got too $$, and whatever veg du jour looks good-is cheap/in season. Veg and meat is rotated. And I give them marrow beef bones when I work. And getting meals ready takes about 3-10 minutes to fix for two dogs. Easy.


You might want to consider a switch to unsweetened live-culture yogurt (instead of cottage cheese); you'll eliminate a lot of added salt and add probiotics.

About ground lamb being spendy (it sure is!): I found this thing called "lamb flaps" that's really cheap (and fatty) that I grab when I see it to add a little to the low-fat RMBs. At least it's a cheap new-protein-profile thing.


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## Sarah Atlas (Dec 15, 2008)

CHICKEN 
BEEF TRIMMINGS
HEART (BEEF AND PIG)
TRACHEAS (BEEF AND PIG)
BEEF LUNG
PIGS FEET
TRIPE/GREEN PHEWY 
VENISON
LAMB HEADS
FRESH OR CANNED MAKEREL
SARDINES
JACK SALMON
1500 MG GLUCOSIME PER DAY
COCONUT OIL
APPLES, BANANAS, spinach, peas,carrots, sweet potatoes,
sea meal from solid gold

i ALSO ADD A CUP OF CHICKEN SOUP FOR THE DOG LOVERS SOUL KIBBLE. CAN'T DEPLOY WITH RAW
in winter/honest kitchen dehydrated veggies


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## todd pavlus (Apr 30, 2008)

Anyone feed beef tongue. Walmart always has it, but does it have any nutritional value


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## Connie Sutherland (Mar 27, 2006)

todd pavlus said:


> Anyone feed beef tongue. Walmart always has it, but does it have any nutritional value


Is it cheap?

I think I read that it carries a risk for Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy. 

No dogs have been diagnosed with "Mad Cow," but I think we don't know whether it's actually transmissable in some form to dogs or not.

Is it US-grown?

I don't know whether the FDA is reliably on top of the at-risk countries in their import banning. They say they are.

http://www.cfsan.fda.gov/~comm/bsefaq.html


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## Mary Lehman (Oct 2, 2008)

We have fed raw for about 8 years now. Started out making our own but with 9 dogs it just got to be too much. We currently ship in Common Sense - premade Diet from the northwest. We really like it as it comes in 3 different proteins -beef, buffalo and chicken. All are complete diets. They also get buffalo bones, chicken leg quarters and up until this last fall I was able to get elk and moose scraps from a local guy. I didn't want deer because of the increased chance of tape worms. I know they can get them from the elk as well, but it doesn't seem nearly as bad. With that said, we tape worm our dogs every other month just to make sure.

As for combining raw and kibble it's not a good idea. Here's why for those that dont' know. Raw is quickly digested, i.e. 4-6 hours so there is less chance for bacteria to proliferate and cause illness. Kibble, on the other hand, takes 12-18 hours depending on the amount of fiber in it. Fiber acts differently in dogs than it does in us and really slllooowwwsss things down. So, I would be very careful combining them.

I too have a FEMA dog and so we feed raw in the morning and kibble at night. That way there isn't any mixing going on and she is used to kibble for deployment.

JMHO on what we do and why.


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## Konnie Hein (Jun 14, 2006)

Hi Mary:
I wasn't aware that dogs could get tapeworms from eating deer meat. I thought tapes were acquired due to ingestion of fleas:
http://www.marvistavet.com/html/body_tapeworm.html

Regarding deployment meals, I feed my dogs a freeze-dried "raw" food on deployment. I just switch him over cold turkey, which is fine for him but might not be a good idea for other dogs with more sensitive stomachs.


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## Connie Sutherland (Mar 27, 2006)

I agree about not mixing kibble and raw in one meal.

Although some K9 diet sites have changed their ideas about this, I have not, and I have not read any convincing reason for anyone to have, except for "well, my dog" anecdotal stuff. :lol:

BTW, dogs don't get tapeworms from meat, except for a particular kind that can come from eating a rabbit that ate a flea that ate a tapeworm egg. In the house that Jack built. :lol:


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## James Downey (Oct 27, 2008)

It's funny some of you mention the word deploy...Research the invention of dog kibble. It was made for the deployment of military dogs. Then it became a fad....Before that, dogs ate what?


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## Connie Sutherland (Mar 27, 2006)

James Downey said:


> It's funny some of you mention the word deploy...Research the invention of dog kibble. It was made for the deployment of military dogs. Then it became a fad....Before that, dogs ate what?


They ate what they could find or beg. I'd guess that rural dogs probably did better than urban dogs, since they had some hunting opportunities.

http://hubpages.com/hub/history-of-dog-food

I didn't know kibble was invented for military dogs. Didn't some patent lightening rod guy dream it up and base it on the hardtack that ships carried as food for the latter parts of voyages in the 1800s?


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## Meena Moitra (Jul 11, 2008)

I thought kibble was related to making money off by-product from slaughter houses.
But yes, what ever did Fido eat for 10,000 years before Purina?


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## Connie Sutherland (Mar 27, 2006)

Meena Moitra said:


> I thought kibble was related to making money off by-product from slaughter houses.
> But yes, what ever did Fido eat for 10,000 years before Purina?


I think that it started as dry biscuit-type (hardtack-type) stuff, and then in the 1930s became a canned-food industry:
http://www.pet-food-choice.co.uk/pet_food_history.htm

Then when materials for canning became scarce (in wartime) and people became reluctant to buy/feed horse meat, dry food came back into favor.


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## Tina Rempel (Feb 13, 2008)

With the mention of horse meat. I noticed it wasn't on anybodys raw list. Pretty much everything but.... Does anybody feed horse meat? Prices are in the give away range right now but finding someplace to process may be the problem?

Not trying to start any big discussion on the horse slaughter ban.... :-$ I'm just curious why it's never mentioned in raw diets for dogs.


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## Bob Scott (Mar 30, 2006)

Horse meat for dogs was not uncommon when I was a kid. I remember one lb packages. 
I also remember the canned food, Strongheart, that had a pic of Strongheart, a movie dog from the silent movie Rin-Tin-tin era. Don't really remember that though. :lol: 
The Strongheart dog food had a % of horse meat if I remember correctly. Blue and white can with Strongheart's head shot in a circle. 
I think Purina was the first producer of dry dog food.


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## susan tuck (Mar 28, 2006)

Bob Scott said:


> Horse meat for dogs was not uncommon when I was a kid. I remember one lb packages.
> I also remember the canned food, Strongheart, that had a pic of Strongheart, a movie dog from the silent movie Rin-Tin-tin era. Don't really remember that though. :lol:
> The Strongheart dog food had a % of horse meat if I remember correctly. Blue and white can with Strongheart's head shot in a circle.
> I think Purina was the first producer of dry dog food.


Remember Ken L Ration? I'm pretty sure they used to say "horsemeat" on their cans too, at least back in the day.

edited to add: Oh yeah, here is one of the old commercials where they talk about lean horsemeat:
http://tesla.liketelevision.com/liketelevision/tuner.php?channel=862&format=tv&theme=guide


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## Mary Lehman (Oct 2, 2008)

Only one of my dogs has shown a tape problem and we don't have fleas in our area in Utah. They can also get it from eating infected feces, raw deer, etc.

Here are a couple of websites that talk about other sources of infection/ingestion of tapes.

http://www.naturalhealthtechniques.com/SpecificDiseases/tapeworms_files/tapeworms.htm

http://www.google.com/search?source...US232US232&q=tape+worms+from+eating+deer+meat

It's not too big of a deal if you are aware of it and just tape worm them periodically.


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## Connie Sutherland (Mar 27, 2006)

Mary Lehman said:


> Only one of my dogs has shown a tape problem and we don't have fleas in our area in Utah. They can also get it from eating infected feces, raw deer, etc.
> 
> Here are a couple of websites that talk about other sources of infection/ingestion of tapes.
> 
> ...


That first site is about humans, I think.

The huge preponderance of tapeworm infestations in dogs is from Dipylidium caninum (the double-pored dog tapeworm), a tapeworm that uses fleas as its intermediate host.

But you're absolutely correct that other tapeworm species (Taenia and Echinococcus) use rodents, deer, etc.

I tend to jump on this because of the fear tactics that some vets (and folks with commercial food interests) use.  I have heard incorrect info many times that blames raw feeding for parasite sources in instances where the source had nothing to do with food.


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## Mary Lehman (Oct 2, 2008)

Yup Connie you were right, the first site was for humans. Oops.

I tend to agree with you about the commercial food industry, etc. My vet hates that we feed raw, but when he sees what good health they have - I have 2 GSD's, littermates, that will be 14 in May - they are doing great. He can't argue with that. I also don't follow a yearly vaccination schedule either. After the pups have hit their one year rabies and other vacs I just repeat whenever the rabies is due which I think is every 3 years. I probalbly wouldn't do it then either, but..............


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## Dan Long (Jan 10, 2008)

I mix raw and kibble once in a while. I usually sub kibble in for muscle meat. So they might get leg quarters and a small amount of kibble, a cup or so. I use Innova Evo Red Meat and Taste of the Wild bison/venison formula. The only thing I notice is on kibble days they drink a lot more water.


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## Maren Bell Jones (Jun 7, 2006)

Connie Sutherland said:


> That first site is about humans, I think.
> 
> The huge preponderance of tapeworm infestations in dogs is from Dipylidium caninum (the double-pored dog tapeworm), a tapeworm that uses fleas as its intermediate host.
> 
> ...


Yeah, like Connie said, the most common is the kind that come from fleas (_Diplydium caninum_), so if you get a dog in with a flea infestation, good chance of having tapes as well. Had a couple of foster dogs with this, and the fleas on them weren't even particular noticeable, but the little white bits of rice looking stuff in the poop were! :-& The one that dogs can get from eating rabbit and rodents is _Taenia pisiformi_s, so if you're feeding rabbits, probably best to freeze them solid first. 

Another parasite concern for dogs is _Neospora caninum_, which is a protozoa (instead of a tapeworm) related to _Toxoplasma gondii_ that dogs can get eating the raw muscle meat of cattle. Seems most of the work on this organism has been done in cattle due to the abortions it causes, but it seems like it works on the neurological system instead of the reproductive as in cattle. But talking to my parasitology professor, freezing the meat seems to be adequate for *MOST* parasites, like Neospora and Sarcocystis (found in tons ofspecies and the cysts can be visible in game bird meat like ducks). I do 3 weeks to catch the _Trichinella_ spiralis in pork. The big baddies that don't die from prolonged freezing (like, for 2+ years!) are the species of Trichinella found in wild game, such as bear and cougar. So case in point, if you are feeding bear or cougar to your dog (or making jerky for yourself), cook it all the way first.

Just for fun, the two kinds of tape worm that man typically gets is the pork tapeworm (_Taenia soleum_) and the beef tapeworm (_Taenia saginata_). If I recall from my public health class, I don't *think* dogs or cats can get either as I think it is human host specific.


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