* Read my story and why and why I changed the way my dogs eat!

* Are  we barking up the wrong tree ?   by Dr Ian Billinghurst

* What I feed my Goldens ...with photos!

* BARF related web sites.

  My dogs have always been healthy, and fit without too many trips to the vet. Being a nurse myself I usually treated the dogs before rushing off to the vet. Our usual visits were for vaccinations, x-rays, when the time came for hips/elbows, and occasionally for other reasons.

  As you may already know, if you have looked at this web site, I breed Golden Retrievers and my daughters have 2 Jack Russells and 1 Irish Setters that make up our happy family.

A few things that have happened to the dogs over the years had often made me wonder about what I feed the dogs. After reading more and more information about diet I began to understand how I could have improved or even prevented some of these things from happening.

My first Golden “Ned” was very healthy and well he lived until he was 14 years old. The first bitch that I bred myself “Buffy” was very allergic to many things and suffered a lot during spring and summer months. I had a skin test done and it showed up many allergies. She was treated with cortisone for some time until I decided to have her desensitised. This helped her tremendously.

The 2 Jack Russell Terriers we have had always been very sensitive, constantly scratching, rubbing their backs under rungs of chairs causing bare patches, their skin always looked red.

And lastly one of our Irish Setters, ”Jamie”hated food, yes he just did not want to eat. We would let him go for days until he got hungry but even then he would nibble and he looked soooo thin, just a bag of bones so the only way to get him to eat was to make hamburgers of meat and soaked dry food and stuff them down his throat! He didn't mind being fed this way! But it was very time consuming for us.

  After purchasing my first Ian Billinghurst book:

“Give Your Dog A Bone” I became very interested in what Dr.Billinghurst had to say. Then I got my hands on his second book:

“Grow Your Pups On Bones” which I loved even more.

Well now I am converted!

B.A.R.F. is the only way to go it makes so much sense. If you care about your dogs health you will read on.

And to reflect now on some of the problems I mentioned above even though I have only been feeding this way for 13 months I have seen a great improvement. The Jacks no longer scratch, their coat is shiny and thick (they are the broken coated variety). “Jamie” is just amazing HE EATS BY HIMSELF!! He loves chicken necks and he eats the meat and veggie mixture by the dish full and for a dog that had hardly had any coat it is actually growing. I do believe coat is inherited but you can improve the quality and condition of it by feeding this way. I wonder how much better my old girl “Buffy” could have been if I had fed her BARF.

Since I have changed to BARF I have feed my lactating bitches, who have never looked healthier, and brought up 3 litters of pups that have done really well and I have been lucky enough to have some of my puppy people convert to this method of feeding.

The other thing I have noticed is that my now oldest golden.... my darling “Fern” (who has been spayed for a few years now) would eat all day long if you let her, but gained weight easily. Since BARFing she can eat more and more and does not put on the weight that she used to any more. I modify her diet a bit but she loves her veggies and can eat as much of this a she wants..…Well within reason!!

When Fern was spayed a very small pea size tumor was found in one of her mammary glands. Fern had to have the whole mammary gland removed and the one next to it. She recovered well and is now fit and healthy, I look forward to having Fern for many more years to come now that I have changed her diet!  

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