Mother Nature's Diet for Pets
Mother Nature's Diet for Pets
How much to feed
How much to feed
Whether you feed your furever pets once or twice a day, the amount to feed is easy to calculate, and represents the total food requirement per day.
Firstly, find out the IDEAL weight of your pet. You need to be brutally honest here, as we want you to find and keep your pet at their ideal weight for optimal health, vitality and fitness. No added stress on their joints or heart, and giving them the best chance of a long and healthy life.
There are 3 basic scales to use for determining how much to feed your pet:
Weight Loss - 1% of the ideal weight
Maintain - 2% of the ideal weight
Weight Gain - 3% of ideal weight
So if you have a dog who has an ideal weight of 50lbs, then you would need to feed:
50 (ideal weight) x 2% = 1 lb of food daily
If your dog was a tad overweight then you would need to feed:
50 (ideal weight he needs to be) x 1.5% = 3/4lb of food daily
If you dog was really skinny and needed to gain weight you would need to feed:
50 (ideal weight he needs to be) x 3% = 1.5lbs of food daily
If you are feeding puppies, the ratios remain the same, divided over several meals per day. Usually 4 meals a day to 4 months old. 3 meals a day up to 6 months old and then 2 meals per day thereafter. Feeding once daily is a personal choice and whatever suits your lifestyle is the right choice. Dogs are natural carnivores and can happily deal with one meal per day. In the wild they may hunt, gorge and not feed for 3 more days. Its all about balance over time.
The above ratios are meant as a base guide for you based on the natural prey model of carnivores . Clearly, metabolism and exercise levels will affect these ratios, so we always say "know your dog". Feel around his body regularly. You should be able to feel his ribs easily but not see them sticking out. If you feel he is losing weight then increase the food ration slightly. If he is gaining weight, then cut back slightly. Tweak as necessary. You will soon become the expert on your pets raw diet needs.
The above ratios are based on using poundage weights. Its difficult for us to convert to cups, as a cup of feathers doesn't weigh the same as a cup of nails. My raw diet is sold by the pound in easy to use 1, 2, 4 or 16 pound packs, making the diet easy to manage and easy for you to tweak as necessary.