Feeding Fish to your dog...Jimaya input?

Jimaya I know you feed whole raw fish to your dogs. Do you buy them frozen? Fresh? What types of fish are you choosing? We have Pacific Coast Salmon, Steelhead and Trout around here that are often sold whole...but I know I can't feed that..anything else to avoid? I must admit..the type of bones fish have are making me nervous. Do you have any links to sites that address feeding fish, something with guidelines?

 

It's probably much easier for you to get fish where you are. I live in Kansas (ugh), so my choices are limited. I get whole, raw, frozen tilapia from Wal-Mart Marketplace and feed it once a week.

I will have to look for the sites that tell you which are safe to feed. I'll post again when I find some good links. It's too bad that we have to be careful about fish because of human pollutants.

I don't think the fish bones are a problem. That's your grandma's warnings coming back to you. Fish bones are incredibly soft and the dogs just munch them right down. Heck, if they can bite through a turkey thigh bone, fish bones are no problem.

 

Here is one link with some general info: http://www.rawlearning.com/fish.html

Here is a chart showing mercury levels of different kinds of fish: http://www.cfsan.fda.gov/~frf/sea-mehg.html

I know you should avoid Pacific Northwest salmon. Large fish generally have more mercury as well. Albacore tuna has more mercury than canned light tuna. I used to feed canned light tuna once a week or so but twice Bonnie threw it up (which was very icky) so I stopped feeding it. It could have been coincidence, but tuna vomit is fairly nasty especially when it is mixed with raw egg!! :-&

I also make sure when feeding canned fish that I get as little salt as possible. I am able to find tuna and sardines with no salt. I also feed canned jack mackeral and alaskan salmon and they both have salt, but since the dogs do not get any other salt in their diets it is probably okay.

I used to feed canned fish maybe 2-3x per week for the small morning meal plus whole, raw tilapia (approx. 1 pound each fish) once per week for the large evening meal, but I got worried about the mercury and such. Now I only feed canned once a week and the whole raw fish once a week as well.

Here are guidelines for pregnant women, which could be useful in a more general way:

Farm-fed fish are less nutritious than wild fish, for the same reasons that kibble-fed dogs are less healthy than raw-fed dogs or grain-fed cattle are less nutritious than grass-fed cattle.

Because I can't get enough fish here and the dogs won't get their omega-3's through meat unless I could afford to buy them grass-fed beef and such, I supplement with wild fish oil tablets. You want deep sea, cold water fish. I like the ones that are taken from a variety of fish but sometimes I buy the salmon tablets if that's all I can find.

 

Oh! And certain fish - the wild salmonids (salmon, trout, steelhead) - can be potentially infected with a flukeworm that can lead to "salmon poisoning." To combat this, make sure you have deep frozen the fish for at least a month. This kills the fluke worm and renders it safe to eat.

Commercially caught fish is usually already deep frozen before it gets to stores, but I would rather be safe than sorry and do it myself, just to be sure.

Make sure it is DEEP frozen, though - like solid all the way through.

 

Thanks Jimaya. I don't have room to deep freeze something for a month and I'd rather just not take the risk. I do give them Salmon oil. I had an offer to get free Halibut belly(quite a bit of meat on them) and trim for the dogs but I am not sure about halibut. The worry about bones isn't about whether they can crunch them up or not ..it's more that I see it as a needle kinda thing, I see it as something they might miss chewing because it's so thin, swallow and then puncture something. I am also worried about polluted fish and parasites. I know I am a worrier.
They got their first mackerel meal this week, I used canned mackerel and made a veggie glop using romaine, radishes, cranberries, banana, green beans, ginger, mackerel juice, salmon oil and water. The veggie glop was not planned..I just pulled out what I had on hand. I was pretty sure they were not going to eat it...but to my surprise they LOVED it. For an hour afterwards they kept asking for more. I saw the mackerel on sale and bought it, then when I forgot to defrost a meal decided to use it.
I just haven't done much research on feeding fish and now I am looking and getting very generalized info. I knew you fed it and I am glad I asked. Thanks!

 

Not a problem! There are people on the Yahoo raw feeding list who have been feeding raw fish for 20 years or more and never had problems with the bones. My dogs have only been eating it for a year or two, but likewise, no problems. Well, except for the stinky fish breath right after they eat. :-&