# Diet



## Olaf_standardpoodle (Mar 9, 2018)

Hello,

I have a 5 month old Spoo and I try to feed him a good diet. I'm looking for suggestions and advice I would like to feed him the best I can. In the morning he gets an cooked egg with yogurt and a small amount of kibble (blue buffalo) for dinner he has either cooked chicken or salmon with rice and kibble. Any suggestions on diet would be greatly appreciated!


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## Asta's Mom (Aug 20, 2014)

His food sounds very appetizing - can you come cook for me?


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## Skylar (Jul 29, 2016)

It’s wonderful that you are trying to feed him a good diet, but be careful that it’s balanced so he’s not lacking things like calcium for good bone growth. He’s a handsome spoo.


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## fjm (Jun 4, 2010)

There are lots of good ideas on adding interest to a commercial diet, home cooking, etc here:DogAware.com: Diet & Health Info for Man's Best Friend

As a general rule, adding around 10-15% of suitable human food won't unbalance the diet, but more than that and you need to make sure you are balancing calcium and potassium, and that all the vitamins and trace elements are covered. This is particularly important for a growing puppy. Eggs and yoghurt are excellent (the egg shells, well washed, dried and ground are a good source of calcium if you decide to go further along the home cooked path). I would use the chicken and salmon as just a topper for high quality kibble, and the broth to soften it, while you look into nutritional requirements in more detail.


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## peppersb (Jun 5, 2011)

Sounds like you are off to a great start! I think your pup will do much better on a home-cooked diet than on a commercial diet. As fjm says, you should give him a calcium supplement if the home cooked food is a major part of his diet. I am using Animal Essentials Seaweed Calcium now. I have used ground egg shells in the past, and I will probably alternate back to that for a while.

The eggs, yogurt, rice and chicken or salmon sounds great. For variety, you might want to try:

-- Potatoes or sweet potatoes (I get frozen spuds or frozen hash browns)
-- Bread (dogs love it if it is soaked in broth)
-- Egg omelet made with bread or hash brown potatoes or leftover rice.
-- French toast (I make it with just eggs and water because I usually do not have any milk in the house)
-- Tilapia or fish sticks
-- Beef or turkey/chicken liver or beef kidney (but not more than once every 10 days or so)
-- Turkey/chicken hearts or gizzards
-- Beef hearts
-- Ground beef, turkey or chicken.

I also occasionally give them pasta or other grains (millet, couscous, etc.). But the carbs that they like best are potatoes, sweet potatoes and bread.

Sometimes I cook enough chicken for 3 days. The chicken for the 2nd and 3rd days gets taken off the bone and mixed with bread and stock (and sometimes a few veggies). The stock gels in the refrigerator, and I serve them "chicken and stuffing" the next day. No need to heat it up.

Stewing hens (spent egg-layers) are an economical choice if you can get them from a local farmer. But you need to boil them for 5 or 6 hours to get the meat off the bones. 

See eatwild.com for farmers who sell sustainably raised (and humanely raised) meat directly to consumers.

I boil all bones twice to produce as much stock as I can. They love it.

Hope this helps.


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## fjm (Jun 4, 2010)

I should have said balancing phosphorus and calcium - comes from posting before finishing my morning coffee! Other good things to add are canned sardines and healthy left overs from your plate (nothing fatty or salty). Avoid grapes and raisins, macadamia nuts, chocolate, cooked bones (especially small sharp poultry and chop bones), onions, and anything containing xylitol - there are lots of other things to avoid, but these are the most dangerous.


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## Olaf_standardpoodle (Mar 9, 2018)

Thank you so much for all the advice, I really appreciate it! Looking forward to using your wisdom to spice up my spoos diet and making it more balanced.


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