I am just repeating what was said by someone who has far more of a cluenthan I could ever hope to have! Made sense to me.

There's so many ways to feed raw, some supplement and some don't. as long as it works for you and your dog and he/she is healthy

The method I use consists mostly of raw meaty bones and as a guide I do.

65% made up of bones = 35% of that will be made up of chicken and or rabbit (which will also be muscle meat at=20%)
20%= Lamb bones
10%= Beef Bones

I feed liver once a week, Kidney also once a week(sometimes will skip a week)

I feed fish x1 a week

Offal x1 a week

Heart x1 a week sometimes x2 a week (if using as part of muscle meat)

Eggs x2 a week (I remove x1 egg white)

Minced meat x 2-3 a week in small quantities.

Occasional vegetable scraps.

As treats natural yoghurt, cheese and occasionally mice, rats that go uneaten(by the snakes that is, which isn't very often really and PS:I never feed live)
I also feed other meats to and this is what works for us.

I think over-supplementing may have as negative an effect as anything else.

I will give the odd fish oil capsule as I dont often feed fish, a little slippery elm bark powder if the dog has a tummy upset, thats about it really.

I dont give a vitamin or mineral supplement.

I dont think I'm harming my dog by not supplementing his diet with 'artificial' vitamins and minerals and feeding every mineral he will need through feeding raw bones, vitamins through meat, enzymes etc

I'm no expert but I do not think you are harming them by not feeding specific supplements for no good reason. Variety over time will be providing what your dog needs IMHO.

If you rotate a varied raw diet covering the meat bone and fat range occasional eggs(don't worry that egg whites remove biotin from your dog it would have to be eating dozens to make any real difference).Vit.e. gets mentioned quite a lot give it naturally with eggs and olive oil.Give fish oil capsules that do not contain added vitamins.A thought for you is natural vitamins in food work with the nutriants within the complete food.Also your dog can deal with natural vitamins if too many are eaten but synthetically added vitamins can be overfed and become toxic.

I give Shamus Glucosamine & Chondroitin because he gets a bit stiff in the evenings.
Other than that, I don`t supplement.

Extra Vitamin E is required if you give dogs fish body oils etc as the latter deplete the body of the latter, Vit E is an antioxidant.

Therefore you MUST either give fish body oils with Vitamin E added or ADD Vitamin E separately.

Cod Liver Oil is different to Fish Body Oils, it contains Vitamins A and D which in excess are toxic and can cause the very problems you are trying to erase.

It makes NO difference if these vitamins are synthetic or natural, the results are the same!

Supplementation may WELL be required for certain dogs, eg performance dogs are usually recommended to have extra Vitamin C. Also, some dogs are not able to metabolise certain things.

Olive oil is rich in Omega 6, but dogs (and us) already have sufficient or a surplus, it is Omega 3s that are required.

If you go onto Nick Thompson's website he recommends a mineral vitamin supplement because, as an earlier post mentioned, many meats grown from grain, are deficient in trace minerals due to the over cultivation and over fertilisation of soils.

If you want to know if your current diet provides sufficient nutrients including minerals and vitamin identify what dogs need and then what foods supply them and ensure that your diet includes them!

For those who are interested in nutrition the following course may be of interest.

http://www.sheilaharper.co.uk/canine...op-p-1916.html


The vitamin/mineral supplement Nick recommends is Super Dog ultimate nutrition (I give this to my dogs)

http://www.holisticvet.co.uk/products.html#1

Why we might need supplements is explained here:

http://www.holisticvet.co.uk/images/...upplements.doc

Yours is a very long winded reply and nit picking yet again.--------- I will try to keep mine short and word it so you do not jump on it. Synthetic vits. esp. the fat vits. ARE MORE toxic and can be the cause of other ills.
Dogs do require a certain amount of omega 6 no one said it was more important than omega 3 and why not throw in omega 9 for good measure. Also healthy dogs produce there own vit.c unlike us humans and giving to much can cause them flatulence and diarrhoea. Do you really need to be so patronizing with your posts.

I prefer to call it thorough, rather than long winded. One person's nit picking is another person's "complete and accurate"

And whilst dogs DO in fact produce their own Vitamin C, (as they do insulin etc ) THEY like other animals often require EXTRA vitamin C when required during times of illness, stress, performance.

It is well documented in several canine nutritionists works.

Omega 6 is needed by the body but there is little need to supplement usually unlike with Omega 3!

As for Omega-9 this actually decrease the concentrations of omega-3 and omega-6 fatty acids in the body! ;l)

But I expect you know all this and this will be seen as another "patronising" post, but some people may find the information useful.

ok so have only been feeding raw for three months and they get a varied diet of different meats and I am introducing more bone each month.

Two of my BCs compete in agility and need to be in tip top condition. The two older ones have Joint aid and they all have Fish4Dogs salmon oil - so am I correct that because I feed fish oil they need more vitamin C especially as they are competition dogs?

If so what is the best thing to find this in or am I looking at a supplement which is something I would rather not do?