Dog Food

Goal: Get Yakko on homemade food diet

Status: Complete!

At one of the workaways in Australia, I was dog walking for a woman in Cairns. She had three large dogs (one being a puppy) and she mixed their food every night. It was rice and pet burger (which is way more popular there than here in the States). But it really made me consider what I was feeding my dog.

As soon as I can to Bethel, I started experimenting with some recipes online. I have used the Balance-It website a lot. You can enter in your pet’s details, choose the carb source you want to use, then select a protein. The site then generates recipes tailored to your pet. I have also used a few blog recipes from people who have tried formulas for a while. Yakko really liked a cottage cheese based recipe, but the cost is really not feasible to do very often. He liked the chicken and sweet potato mix as well. He didn’t like peas very much, but I am going to try mashing them in the food processor (like many suggest) before adding them again.

I was very lucky to collect several salmon from the free fish box in town last week. I cleaned them and have a full freezer of salmon for me, and I boiled all the extra cut pieces for the dog. He was really digging the rice and salmon mix, even though he had it for about a week straight. He hasn’t liked anything made with oatmeal yet.

I placed an order with US wellness, and tried out some of their pet burger. I mixed this with rice made with beef bullion and he hasn’t hesitated once. I also talked to a friend in town who’s had their dogs on homemade food for over a year now. They sent me the recipe and I tried it out. 

Bubba's Food Recipe

Yakko has been all over it! I make him do a trick before he gets to eat. Usually it's just 'stay' as I set the food down and walk away. But 'jump' seems more appropriate for his excitement at dinner time.

Mid flight excitement!