Sixty-one cents

I just finished cutting up over 75 pounds of meat, and I realized that I haven't done a cost post is AGES!

Yes, I am a bit tired, thanks for asking :)

I've had a few large cuts of beef and pork in the freezer, that I bought on sale a while ago, as well as two turkeys and one whole chicken.  And chicken legs are on sale this week for $1/lb, so I picked up ~20 pounds yesterday.

And I decided to portion everything out today, re-package and re-freeze it, in an attempt to organize the freezer a bit better!

One night in cold water (the meat, not me!), and 3 hours later of cutting and bagging later...

I have almost 11 weeks worth of meals for both dogs.  And I still have 3 huge pork shoulders in the freezer, and will be going back to get more chicken this week.

I didn't realize I had quite that much meat in the freezer :)

And after adding everything up... each meal costs 61 cents.  (Actually, one of the turkeys was free, and I estimated that is would have cost $15 to buy.  If I take that $15 out, then each meal works out to an amazing 51 cents!)

Sixty-one cents.

I can't even get a box of Kraft Dinner (Kraft Mac & Cheese for you Southerners) for 61 cents anymore.

In all honesty, I haven't been keeping track of the cost any more, but I do know all the meat I have bought since starting this has been $2/lb or less, and some of it was free (some venison from a co-worker, so freezer-burned and/or old meat from others, plus the turkey).

I am WELL under my target of $1 per meal :)


I started keeping track of costs, mainly in order to dispel one of the myths of raw feeding, that it is more expensive than kibble.  Obviously, it depends on the kibble, but I think I've shown how cheap raw feeding can be!

Gotta love it!

Nothing much going on...

Things are fine in our little raw world.  Katy's eating beef now, again with absolutely NO issues, which is fantastic.  And let me tell you, she LOVES her food.  She's still eating in her kennel (while Kip eats in the kitchen) and when I tell her to "kennel up", she gets so excited, she literally spins her way into it.  Silly girl!  I have to try to get a video one of these days.

I don't know if she's lost any weight or not, but I'm going to call the vet next week, and see if I can bring her in just to get weighed.  And now that the nice weather is here, we should be more active, which will help move those extra pounds. 

The one thing we do have to work on is her food "aggression".  It happens with toys as well - if she has something in her mouth, she will NOT give it up.

When this issue comes up on many on-line dog fora, I often see advice given along the lines of "it's their food, they deserve to eat it in peace and quite, and it's their right to defend it".

I couldn't disagree more.

I got Kip as a puppy, and one thing I worked on was being able to take anything out of his mouth at any time, for any reason (along with "Drop it", of course). 

It's not some control thing, it's not about being "dominant",  it's not about being mean - it's 100% about being able to safely remove something from your dog's mouth that could possibly harm them if they were allowed to eat it.

And so I will be working on this with Katy.  It will also help with eventually being able to feed them both in the kitchen, un-crated, without her stealing Kip's food, which she will do now, and he just lets her, the wimp :)

So yeah, there's not much going on here right now.  Makes for a boring blog, but a nice calm life!

One year in, and a new addition!

I can't believe it's been one year already.

One year!

And Kip is doing so well - happy, healthy and full of energy.  He's doing so well, in fact, that we've decided to take on a new project:

 

Pudgy little no-name

This little girl was brought in as a stray - you can read more about her here.

She's a sweet dog, and is doing great.  The one issue - very overweight.  So we will be working on that, using, of course, a raw diet.  She's been here just over a week already, and has taken to raw like a pro.  

 

First meal

If I didn't know better, I'd say she was fed raw by her previous owners.  She's had no problem with bone-in chicken breasts, and no poop issues at all!  In fact, the night I brought her home, I put down a beef roast for Kip, and she attacked it with vigour!  She's currently being fed in her kennel, for two reasons - to make it her "good" place, and to deal with any food-guarding issues she or Kip may have.  Eventually, I'll try to feed them both in the kitchen.   

She is much shorter than Kip, and her ideal body weight is probably somewhere around 15 pounds, compared to Kip's 20-22 pounds.  She currently weight a whopping 23 pounds, but that will be decreasing with proper food and lots of exercise - play time with Kip included!

One thing this will change is my organization methods.  I have taken to giving Kip large hunks of meat, for multiple days, and letting him set the pace at which he eats.  For example, a 3 pound roast should take him 6 days to eat.  If he eats in it 5 days, then he fasts for the 6.  If he takes 7 days to eat it, so be it.  It save a lot of work in portioning the meat ahead of time, as well as giving him a good "chew" workout.  I want to continue to do this with Kip, but may not be able to with the new GirlDog, depending on what feeding issues she has  - I have noticed she is ALWAYS hungry, so a "gorge" model may or may not be right for her.  Then again, if she is allowed to eat as much as she wants, it might make her issues better.  We'll try a few things, once she has settled in more, and see. 

So that's what new around here.  And hopefully I'll be posting here a bit more, with up-dates on how she is doing with her new diet and new life :)

SCORE!!!!

This is why I desperately want a freezer.

Chicken drumsticks and thighs - $1/lb.

Pork shoulder - $1/lb.

Beef liver - $1/lb.

Whole chicken - $1.50/lb.

Beef roast - $2/lb.

I bought over 42 pounds of meat for slightly just under $55.

That averages out to ~$1.30 a pound, and brings my running average to around $0.93/day.

Counting the meat I already have in the freezer, I have enough meat to fed Kip until September, and really cannot fit one more ounce in the freezer. But I am SO tempted to go back and get more - really, $1/lb!!!!!

(And yes, I actually bought some meat for me too!)

Organization, you continue to elude me

Organization, organization, organization. Sigh.

I'm still working out the best system for me. I was putting each portion into a small ziplock bag, then each meat type/cut together into a larger, labeled ziplock bag. The bags don't take up a lot of room in the freezer (bonus!), but the masking tape labels didn't stick, the larger bags are hard to reseal after a while, and the bags leak blood all over the fridge while thawing (that's what I get for using cheap bags, I guess). Additionally, since the bags were leaking, I stopped saving them for re-use, meaning I am throwing away a LOT of plastic.

Also, I'm not great at remembering what I gave Kip to eat yesterday, the day before, etc., making it a bit harder to keep track of bone amounts, organball numbers, etc.

So, on to Plan B. I bought some cheaper plastic containers, large enough to hold 4-5 days worth of food. I got 2 to start with, as I don't want to waste a lot of money on a system that won't work any better then the one I'm currently using, but it gives me something to start with. Below is one container with 4 days worth of food - a large turkey drumstick, some bone-in chicken and boneless beef, along with some organballs.

In theory, I can load these up with a few days worth of food, freeze them, and then put them in the fridge to thaw and feed from. If I get enough (and if this system works for me), I could prep a number of them at one time, and then have 1-2 months worth of meals ready to go, all in reusable containers. It just means freezing whole cuts when they are on sale, and thawing a bunch at a time to portion out and re-freeze in the container. Which is doable. Again, the lack of freezer space really needs to be addressed soon!!

The heart of the matter

I am a lucky person, really. Kip is a GREAT dog. He's easy to train, he has a great temperament, and he has had no health issues to date (knock on wood). Kip has never destroyed anything except his toys, was a breeze to house-train, and loves every person he meets.

For my first-ever dog, Kip is a blessing.

But he will NOT eat his organs. Sigh.

Again, I should really count my blessings. He eats chicken, beef, pork and turkey now, with no problems. But the three things he had either refused or had issues with - beef heart, liver and kidneys - we are still trying to deal with. Heart is a meat, not an organ, so the fact he won't eat it isn't a big issue - but I had a few pounds of it, and didn't want to throw it out. The fact that he refuses kidneys, and doesn't deal well with liver, however, are bigger issues - he needs organ meat as a necessary part of a balanced, healthy diet.

I decided to grind up the heart, kidneys and liver together, freeze in 1 ounce portions, and feed one or two a day as "treats". My thinking was that he will eat liver, and will eat tiny bits of heart as long as they are frozen solid, so this might work.

Yeah.

Day one - ate one in the morning, no problem.

Day two - ate one in the morning with some convincing on my part, ate a second that evening, and promptly vomited. Okay, let's limit it to one a day, until he gets used to them.

Day three - ate one in the morning, no problem.

Day four and five - no way, not eating that.

So, last night, I thawed one, and spread it on the turkey he was getting for supper. That worked - as he had no way of getting the ground-up meat off the turkey meat.

Keep you paws crossed that that continues to work, and hopefully I'll find some chicken organs to try him with next. I really don't want to have to continue to make organ pate for my dog...

Have a heart

ARGH.

This is how last week went:

Monday am: last of the kibble (yippee!!)
Monday pm: beef heart, whole chunk - wouldn't eat, so I removed it after 15 minutes or so, put it back in the fridge.
Tuesday am: ditto beef heart
Tuesday pm: ditto
Wednesday am: cut up the heart - no go
Wednesday pm: tried freezing the cut-up heart a bit - no go
Thursday am: ditto
Thursday pm: was at Mom and Dad's. Mom caved in and gave Kip some raw chicken
Friday am: wouldn't eat the beef heart
Friday pm: ditto
Saturday am: ditto
Saturday pm: I caved in, and gave Kip chicken to eat

Out of 10 meals (from Monday night to Saturday night), Kip ate once.

He will NOT eat beef heart. ARGH. It is a cheap, readily available form of beef, and he will literally starve rather than eat it. He eats chicken, he eats pork, no problem. He eats other beef cuts, no problem. But not heart.

And he can survive without eating beef heart - but it is so affordable for beef, that I'm loath to give it up. Plus I have a bunch in the freezer that I'm sure as hell not eating!

I also have to solve the organ dilemma, to stop Kip either not eating the organ at all or vomiting them up everywhere. I'm tempted to grind up some of the heart, kidneys and liver in appropriate ratios, freeze the resulting mixture in small "meat balls", and see if that works - give one or two every day as a treat, or as Kong stuffing.

Finally, Kip has out-stubborned me in something. One thing in two years - that's not too bad, right?

The last supper

Okay, not really. But this is how supper went last night:

Me: Kip, supper time.

Mr. Potato Brain: This is a beef rib. I had a beef rib last night too.

Me: And?

MPB: It's, um, leftovers. I don't want leftovers. Can't I have some chicken instead?

Me: No. Eat your supper.

MPB: FINE. Ohhh, look, Squeaky Squirrel.

Me: Kip, get your supper!

MPB: squeak squeak squeak squeak

Me: Kip, get your supper!

MPB: squeak squeak squeak squeak

Me: {picks up beef rib, puts it back in the fridge}

MPB: HEY! I was eating that! I want it back! STARVING!!!

Me: Nope. You had your chance. Breakfast will be at 8 tomorrow morning.

MPB: STARVING!!! I'm calling Animal Control and telling!

Me: Fine - but how are you going to manage the phone without opposable thumbs??

MPB: Damn you and your logic. *#&$*#@ opposable thumbs!!!!!!


Now note, this is the first time Kip has EVER passed up food. EVER. I'm thinking he just wasn't hungry enough to work for his food. He still gets kibble for breakfast (until the bag is gone), and I'm sure if I had given in and put kibble down, he would have scarfed it up in seconds. But sorry Kip, but I'm more stubborn than you are. You want your supper, you work for it. Silly boy.

Update: Supper tonight:

Me: Kip, supper time.

Mr. Potato Brain: Num num num. Chew-gnash-chew-chew-chew-gnash-smash-chomp. Can I have some more please??

The Poop Report

If you spend any time around people who feed raw, eventually, the talk will turn to poop. I understand that what comes out of your dog is indicative of what went it, and what happened to it on the trip from one end of the dog to the other, but...

Or should that be "butt"?

I really don't want to talk a lot about poop. It really isn't my favourite topic. Really.

Butt...

I've screwed up already. Sigh.

I still have a half a bag left of kibble, which I don't want to throw away. So, I thought I'd slowly transition Kip to raw, by feeding kibble for breakfast, and raw for supper. Similar to how you would transition from one kibble to the other. Sounds good, right?

Except, I ignored the advice about how to start feeding raw - you start with chicken. Bland, boring, beige chicken.

Butt...

I got a couple of beef steaks on sale this week. So that's what he has been eating for supper for the past 2 days. Since I haven't actually started feeding raw yet, that's okay, right??

Butt...

Poor Kip had diarrhea last night. Not bad. Not uncontrollable. Not in the house, fortunately.

He's fine now.

Butt...

Back to kibble for a while - until I can go get some chicken parts!