Dog - Your Guide To Feeding An Adult Dog

Under normal circumstances your dog will be able to eat and profit from almost anything you give him, including almost all of the food items forbidden by rumor and fear. Milk, for example, will not cause worms in dogs, any more than it does in you. Raw meat will not cause worms any more than cooked, (which is not at all), nor will it make him vicious.

If you feed your dog nothing but raw meat he will thereby suffer from an unbalanced diet, malnutrition, and may get irritable and touchy. One item that is not recommended is pork in any large amount. Pork and particularly pork fat, is an extremely rich meat and can easily overburden a dogs system.

One superstition concerns raw eggs and the dog's coat. People will go to considerable expense to feed a pup or the adult dog raw eggs, sometimes two or three a day, in the hope that a shiny coat will result. There is, unfortunately nothing to it. It just does not work. Neither will garlic or onions have any effect on intestinal worms; they can only be stopped by medication. In short, what you feed him nourishes him. If he needs medical treatment, give him medicines.

On the positive side, beef and more fresh beef can do him nothing but good. Beef is the best source of protein, and good beef muscle cuts can be bought relatively cheap. Beef bones are almost without exception good for dogs, especially the heavy long and knuckle bones. The only exception being to smaller breeds that may become choked due to their smaller throats.

Bones will also provide mouth exercise and aid in removing plaque build-up on teeth. Once in the stomach, bones are rapidly dissolved and digested. The dog's stomach acids work things over rapidly reducing almost anything to digestibility. This, incidentally, is why you should not worry if your dog wolfs his food without seeming to chew it all. All the digestion goes on in his highly durable and efficient stomach.