From Jenny Julian on Facebook from October but not seen until now. I have a hard time reading the Facebook interface posts sometimes when my vision is being uncooperative. So I'm answering this for your dogs and Sheila's cats here on the blog. I can always eee stuff when it pops up here.
Jenny Julian: Hi Catherine, Would you be willing to let me know what you feed your dogs in addition to raw meat? I am hoping to benefit from your dog nutrition wisdom. Gilbert is on a raw food diet now, with fish oil. I have an elderly Pom foster dog with "chemical burns" over a lot of his body, nearly blind, and whose labs don't look great, who could really use top shelf nutrition. Thank you!
Sheila Coonerty: And can you throw in any cat advice?
Jenny -- Best place to start for dogs is this by Lew Olson, Natural Nutrition for Dogs. Link is to Amazon. Lew Olson also has a website where there are newsletters organized by condition. Easy to navigate, great for quick research. I've found it to be reliable and generally follow her advice except for the herbal stuff. Used to but don't now. No particular reason -- just not my thing now.
Sheila -- the very best cat book I've ever seen is by veterinarian Elizabeth
Hodgkins. Your Cat. That book helped me figure out how to manage my own cats and it was especially good when one of them needed surgery for hyperthyroid -- explained the why and how a lot better than anything else I had around. I cannot say enough good about that book and Dr. Hodgkins's advice.
I started feeding raw about 20 years ago and have been reading and studying for all that time -- it's my passion. I've modified over the years and have concluded that raw or cooked isn't that big of a deal -- it's more important to limit carbs. So everybody gets raw (I'm lazy, don't even cook for my husband, let alone 13 or so dogs and the cats) from the human supply stores. I buy beef heart by the case (It's a muscle meat, nutritionally like a roast) and also give some liver and kidney. For the minerals I get whole chicken or chicken frames (what's left when the machines take a chicken apart, so there's bone). Sometimes neighbors slaughter goats or beef and I get this and that. I feed the larger dogs by handing each a big hunk o' meat. I grind including the bone for the small dogs, the elderly dogs, the cats. Raw matters for bones -- chicken, pork neck bones, ribs and so on so not to splinter.
Hope this helps. And sorry it took for long for me to become aware the queries were there
Here's the deal. It's not rocket science. Like feeding kids there are many ways to do it right. If you think I can help, ask questions. I am fascinated by this whole topic, still.