I’ve researched online. I’ve bought books. I’ve subscribed to magazines. I joined forums and email lists. I have friends who feed raw. I’ve spent a lot of time over the last 15 years learning about feeding your dogs, cats and ferrets a raw diet (yeah, I just might be a bit of a nerd). There have been short periods of time where I’ve fed raw. I don’t right now. I just can’t afford it at this time (I know I hear everyone who feeds raw saying how can I afford NOT to. Don’t worry I know all the arguments. I’m comfortable with my choices for now). While I don’t feed raw now, it’s something I’m plan to do in the future.
I’ve been reading Kimberly’s posts at Keep the Tail Wagging about her research and considering switching her dogs to a raw diet. She taking her time and learning. There is a lot of information out the and a lot of things to take into consideration when making a decision to make a change like this.
One thing that people wonder about is where are they going to find the meat to feed. If you are making the effort to switch to raw is feeding the meat from the grocery store counter-productive? I’m lucky, even though I live in town, Northeast PA is mostly rural so finding a local source shouldn’t be too difficult. But how do you find these sources and where can you find good sources of meat if you live in the city? It might not be as hard as you think.
There are several places to you can go to for help in finding local sources for your pet’s raw diet.
DogAware.com- One of the first email list I belonged to was K9Nutrition. While I was a big time lurker, I still learned a lot. One of the most knowledgeable members was Mary Straus who moderated the list for a time.She now writes about nutrition for Dog World magazine and the Whole Dog Journal*
Eat Wild- Eat Wild promotes the raising of grass-fed animals and maintains of listing for producers who meet their criteria for how the animals are raised. The lists includes those in the US, Canada and some from outside North America.
Local Harvest- Local Harvest has a directory of organic and local farms in the US. It’s like an online farmer’s market! You can search to find those farmers near you.
Yahoo Groups- Yahoo groups are where I spent a lot of time learning about feeding raw. You can find a group for anything- raw feeding a specific breed, raw feeding for those who compete in a certain dog sport. You can also find email lists for raw feeding in a specific geographical area (like NaturalFeeding-MD_DC_VA_PA) which is great for finding local sources or a co-op to join.
Along with these sources you may want to look for any raw feeding forums online or groups on Facebook. You never know, sources might be closer than you think!
Great post Dawn! On my quest to find out more information on feeding raw I was amazed when people started sending me links to suppliers in the area that had raw food for dogs and how many co-ops are there are around!
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There are a lot out there and once you start looking, it’s amazing how many more sources pop up!
This is a great post Dawn!! We feed raw and I buy from Oma’s Pride. I use it because the woman I work with is knowledgeable, and gives me a great price. But truthfully, I am just taking someone’s word that they are a good quality food. Maybe I do need to do a bit more research. I was wondering where to find the resources and then BAM you did it for me.
Thank you so very much!!
Jodi recently posted..Longer Days
It’s been awhile since I really looked at the different raw food manufacturers, but Oma’s Pride was 1 I remember as being a quality one. I know for me the cost of getting food shipped added a lot to the price, so I was always figured I would try looking for local producers to keep the cost down a bit.
I think you can check and see if there is a distributor near you. Once when I was in there though there was a man that had come from New Hampshire. I don’t know how frequently he drove down, but he bought in huge quantities. He said he had a couple of freezers at home and would stock up. It makes sense because if you buy the larger quantities you get a good discount.
Jodi recently posted..This ‘N That Thursday – March 7, 2013
Unfortunately nothing real close :>( Closest is about 1 1/2 hours away. At least living in a rural region makes it easy to find some of the more common meats and then I’d just need to order some of more unusual ones to add some variety. Of course if there’s enough people in the area, it would be worth starting a co-op.
It was a little more that 15 years ago that I first researched feeding raw and I’m amazed at how the resources have ballooned since then…The looks I got when I would visit a distributor to buy a case of turkey necks were so funny…I think it’s great that those considering it have so many more options available now…Like you, after having done all the research I choose to feed a kibble these days and I’m comfortable with that choice for me and for my dog, but for others raw may be the answer
Gizmo Geodog recently posted..Wordless Wednesday Fun in Orlando
The sources have definitely grown with so many people switching to raw or even to cooked. There’s a lot more information available on feeding a raw diet too which is great because I feel everyone should at least read a little about nutrition from different sources before making decisions on what to feed no matter if it’s raw, cooked or kibble.
Thanks for the mention and the article! Someone was kind enough to ask me if I knew anyone who went hunting – our neighbor. So I took some elk that he gave us out of the freezer and I’ll be feeding that to our dogs. I think we’ll mostly be feeding our dogs The Honest Kitchen, because as I learn more I realize that we just don’t have the time to feed them raw appropriately. Raw bones in the yard aren’t safe – I want to monitor them first. And raw bones in the house is just gross.
I’m keeping my eyes open to opportunities, like what you shared above.
Kimberly, The Fur Mom recently posted..Dog Nutrition Week | The Yin and Yang of Dog Food
One of my friends gives a calcium supplement rather than feeding bones every day. DogAware has some good articles and recipes for raw with bones, raw without bones and cooked diets. But it’s not for everyone. I don’t like doing the marrow bones and worry about about the smaller bones so I often consider doing cooked. I don’t cook for me, but for the critters I’d do anything!
just wanted to write thank you
loved your article.