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Chicken Wings
By
Janet Finlay (as
posted to the Wellpet List)
It
seems time to post about chicken wings again ....apologies
to those who have seen this before but there seem to have
been a number of recent queries on the subject. Hope this
answers some questions.
The
idea for chicken wings comes from a diet explained in the
book "Give Your Dog a Bone" by Australian vet Ian
Billinghurst.
He
advocates feeding dogs a diet based around raw meaty bones
(50-60%), together with smaller quantities of vegetables (completely
crushed - I mince mine - or use a juicer and feed the pulp),
meat, offal (heart, liver, kidney), dairy products, eggs,
fish and some cereal.
He
suggests that 80% of the bones should be chicken wings - but
mine get mainly chicken wings with some chicken carcasses
- occasionally other bones (usually beef ribs once a week
and a rabbit once or twice a fortnight - when available).
Other bones can be turkey, lamb, beef (the least useful as
most dogs cannot eat them completely), and rabbit. Everything
is fed raw (except rice, beans and tinned fish).
The
benefits of feeding raw meaty bones (generally) are that:
- they
contain calcium and phosphorus in balance + other minerals
- they
contain good quality protein
- they
contain essential fatty acids
- they
contain vitamins A,D & E in the fat
- they
contain copper and iron in the marrow
- they
contain anti-oxidants and enzymes
- the
action of eating bones cleans the teeth and provides exercise
The
benefits of chicken wings in particular are all of the above
plus they are a good balance of bones and flesh to be able
to provide the above benefits. The bones are from young animals
so bones are soft and free of toxins and dogs of any size
and age can easily manage them. They have the best fatty acid
content of all bones and they are very high quality proteins.
In
case you are concerned about the safety of this I should emphasize
that the bones must be RAW. Cooked chicken bones are very
dangerous as they become sharp and hard. Raw bones on the
other hand are quite soft and the dogs simply crunch them
up. Add to that the fact that a chicken wing is bones inside
a good coating of chewy flesh and skin - so the bones are
well padded.
Other
concerns are with salmonella etc. from feeding raw food. While
you need to be careful handling raw meat yourself dogs are
unlikely to have problems with organisms such as salmonella.
Their digestive systems are designed to cope with raw meat.
If you are concerned you can treat meat before feeding using
grapefruit seed extract which you soak the meat in. Personally
I do not do this and have had no problems.
How
many wings/bones you feed daily will depend on several things.
One is whether you are adopting the complete bone-based diet
(so that the bones are the majority part of it) or using the
bones as a kind of treat. For maximum benefit the diet should
be followed but wings are a healthy treat. It also of course
depends on the size of your dog and its metabolism and activity
level.
The
bones should make up 50-60% of the whole diet (with veggies,
meat, offal, dairy, cereals etc making up the rest). As a
guide my 80/90lb, fairly lazy Maremmas each have 8-10 wings
a day + 1 or 2 carcasses - or 12 wings and no carcasses. You
may need to experiment to see what your dog needs to maintain
a healthy weight. A friend with Yorkies and a Border collie
pup who feeds this diet says she worked out how many to feed
the pup
by watching to see when she stopped eating them and started
hiding them away!
You
are not limited to wings. The wing is simply a convenient
and often cheap part of the bird where the bones are manageable
by dogs of any size. But if you have reasonable sized dogs
there is no reason why they shouldn't eat drumsticks/legs,
carcasses or even the whole bird! I have given mine whole
chickens (literally), legs, carcasses and complete wings (not
just tips) without any problems. But the wings are perhaps
the best place to start for the nervous - they are completely
padded by flesh - the bones are small and soft - and they
are a relatively easy proposition for even the smallest dog.
Get
whatever bones are available cheaply in your area - if it
is not chicken then try turkey or rabbit or lamb. But chicken
parts are usually cheaply available if you get them in bulk
(I freeze about a fortnight's worth at a time which I get
for 10 pounds sterling (about US$15) - which is cheaper than
the kibble I was feeding!)
In
addition to the wings (which mine have daily for one of their
two meals), I feed minced veggies mixed with meat, offal (sometimes
minced), eggs, cheese, milk, sardines, tuna, table scraps,
or baked beans. The veggies are minced first to crush them
and then are mixed with one or more of the above. You can
use just about any veg - and also the stuff that you would
throw away like the outside leaves of cauliflower and pea-pods.
In
terms of quantity - again it is a bit of an experiment, but
I generally give mine the equivalent of two medium sized carrots
a day each (made up of different veg) + 0.25-0.5lb meat/offal
or 1 egg or 0.5 pints of milk or 1 tin of sardines or 0.5
tin of tuna or beans. I watch their weight and reduce or increase
accordingly.
Once
or twice a week I give them a porridge made of rolled oats
(1-2 cups), milk (0.5 pint), eggs (1) and honey (1 tsp). I
sometimes add minced fruit (apple, coconut, raisins) to this.
I
supplement at the moment with Hokamix - a natural herbal supplement.
Before that I gave regular Brewers Yeast (Vit B), Kelp (Iodine
and minerals), Wheatgerm (for Vit E), Cod liver oil (Vit A/D)
and parsley (Vit C). I sometimes give garlic tablets also.
Hope
that helps - I have found that this natural, raw food diet
brings great benefits to the dogs - I've noticed improvement
in coat, teeth cleanliness, stools and weight (they are less
prone to be overweight) since I started with this diet.
Cheers,
Janet Finlay
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