Merry Christmas!

Raw Meaty Bones = Dog Heaven

I was raised with a heightened awareness of nutrition and my entire family is dedicated to eating high-quality, organic, whole foods. I remember complaining in elementary school to my mom that I wanted white bread like the other kids, and that I didn't want to eat any more "toe-food" (tofu). Matt's been a wandering vegan for several years now and has given a lot of thought to his food choices. The consequences of a well-balanced and thoughtful diet have remained an important topic in our lives. Not surprisingly, we couldn't help but get into detailed discussions about what we were going to feed our first puppy.

We initially fed Okra the Kirkland brand kibble he was being fed when we got him as a puppy.  We changed to a higher quality kibble within a few weeks, but he didn't do very well on it an we reverted back to the Kirkland.  Okra wasn't really interested in eating his kibble from the onset.  As I started looking into raw food as an option for Okra I found that there are several schools of thought on the raw food diet. Some people think you should not feed dogs vegetables, ever; others think it is imperative to do so. Some folk think that if you go raw, you should never combine raw meat meals with kibble, even in separate meals, or on separate days. I even heard of one family who fed their dog an exclusive diet of Chinese food leftovers! Regardless of the dogma, I felt like it was important to provide a variety of foods to my dog to ensure he had an array of vitamins and minerals and amino acids and all that stuff.

The one thing that was consistent throughout all the literature and websites I read was to NEVER feed your dog cooked bones! I think a lot of people are turned off from the raw-meaty-bones diet because they're terrified of giving bones to their dogs.  There are plenty of horror stories out there about expensive surgeries needed to remove splintered bones from a dogs' throat, or even dogs dying after splintered bones pierced their intestines. These fears were evident when I attempted to purchase chicken backs at a local store, and the butcher steered me towards the beef marrow bones, explaining that it was very dangerous to feed my dog chicken bones and asking if I had ever had a dog before!

After deciding that it was important to us to pursue a raw diet for Okra, we needed a plan that was cheap, nutritious, and practical. The pre-packaged frozen meals are great, but at $5/pound it is cost-prohibitive. I read somewhere that if you can keep your dog's meat to less than $1/pound it's actually cheaper to feed raw than to feed your dog top-of-the-line kibble! I had heard that he should be eating a lot of bone, and that chicken wings are a great way to start your dog off on the raw food diet. Since whole chickens are 3x less expensive than purchasing wings-only, I've settled into a groove of just picking up some chickens for Okra when I head to the grocery store.  This way it's not even difficult to keep our freezer stocked with meals for the pup.

At this point, Okra’s eating 70% chicken carcasses (breasts removed), 10% raw egg and/or pork ribs, 20% miscellaneous cooked vegetables and raw organ meat (chicken organs ,pumpkin, yams, parsley, spinach, or other green veggies tossed in a food processor. Sometimes I add cottage cheese or yogurt). I’ve found that the chicken and raw eggs are convenient, and try to make an organ meal whenever I get a chance, but I probably don’t do it as much as I should. When we travel, or run out of food for him, we feed him high-quality kibble, and he likes that too.


The best parts? Okra doesn't stink anymore! His breath smells like it did when he was a tiny puppy and his gas and stool no longer smell. His stool is small and firm, and he no longer has to strain to go. His system appears to be functioning like it is supposed to, very well!  AND he loves loves loves food! All of it. I think the variety keeps things interesting for him. It’s also fun to watch him take a new cut of meat and figure out how to eat it. It takes time to eat, sometimes up to ten minutes for a particularly puzzling or bony meat. You can see his little brain working on it.

Photos from our trip... more to come soon

The St. Louis Arch after a very pleasant trip through parts of Kentucky, Southern Indiana, and Southern Illinois.

An unknown crop in Kansas after spending the night in Lawrence. We wandered around Lawrence all morning looking for various essentials (internet, fedex, coffee, library, etc.). We had a good time in Lawrence.

Driving through the Colorado

Our beautiful campsite in central Colorado, Okra eating dirt

A very relaxing morning at the campsite in Colorado

Driving along the Colorado River on our way to Arches and Canyonlands National Parks

At this point in the drive, the temp was somewhere above 95ºF and we pulled over to swim in the Colorado River. The water was amazingly cool and refreshing. We talked about the water for the next three days...

Sunrise near the Island in the Sky section of Canyonlands National Park

The pack in silhouette at sunrise near Canyonlands National Park

One last photo before driving from Moab, Utah to central Oregon

Okra Update

I don't have an excuse for my summer blog hiatus. But due to popular demand I decided to break my blog-silence for a quick photo update of our fun with Okra.

Pudge and Okra have come to be good friends this summer

He's tall enough to check out what's on the table or counter. He hasn't learned to graze off them yet, but it's only a matter of time!

Okra loves Matt's neice Maeve, he tries to play with all her toys and I caught him here sleeping in her chair. So cute.

He's a retriever!
(That's Gonzo barking in the background, he loves to play fetch too)

Okra is starting to really get into trouble after learning to jump. He's found out how to jump onto the couch and climb up the back, then jump to this table where the cat food is kept. Pudge is seriously annoyed by this.

Okra found a dried fish carcass at the waters edge and carried it around proudly for about a week. It was super stinky, but he was so happy we couldn't take it away from him.

Oh, puppyhood is so much fun!

Road Trip

We headed out to Michigan last Monday. Skipping the hotter parts of the US, we drove east through the Columbia Gorge, up through eastern Washington and on to Yellowstone and the Grand Tetons. From there we booked it to Michigan through North Dakota, Minnesota, and Wisconsin. The weather was mild and Okra spent most of his time in his crate on the back seat of the van, or on my lap, or on the floor. He was obviously bored.

Nevertheless, Matt and I had a great time.
We spent two days in Yellowstone and the Grand Tetons on the way.

We came into Yellowstone from the west entrance:

Günter enjoyed the hot springs, he seems to enjoy foul smells. I wonder where he got that?

A mud volcano

Old Faithful looking ominous against the storm clouds

The beautiful Grand Tetons, as seen from our camp in Coulter Bay, WY

A view from Mammoth hot springs on the North side of Yellowstone

Every morning we tidied up the van before taking off for the next state. We were amazingly well organized during the trip, which I think aided in our getting along so well. :)

Drowned forest in North Dakota

We stopped through Theodore Roosevelt National Park in North Dakota on our way. Apparently this park was built on Teddy's old hunting grounds. This was an unexpected gem.

Everyone loves a Prairie Dog

Buffalo are just cool, I couldn't resist putting at least one shot up...

Apparently this is one of the few places in the US where wild horses roam.
We were pretty stoked to see a few.

The Mackinac Bridge, a 5 mile long suspension bridge that connects the upper and lower Michigan peninsulas, was the final sight to see before heading to Matt's home in earnest.

Okra doesn't even know how exciting his life is about to be. As soon as we arrived he was overcome with joy at being able to play with Gonzo (resident lab) and Pudge (dog-friendly cat)!

Summer Rocks: Post 3

The post title is a misnomer. Actually, the last week has been exceedingly busy, stressful, exciting, and hot. I should probably be unpacking at the moment, but we thought it was time for an update.

First things first: Okra has gained at least 1 lb this week. He's now at 10.8lbs! He looks so little, we guessed 8-9lbs. I wonder what Maeve weighs...?

Few respectable dogs would find themselves in this position.

Little guy in a big crate.

We've been bonding with puppy, he loves playing tug and wandering between our legs and underfoot. He heels perfectly, doesn't run more than ten feet from us, and absolutely loves to run into, roll, and attack tall grass (obviously a natural upland hunter). He's doing really well with potty training, though he's scared of the yard in the dark and has taken to peeing on the porch (we're working on it). He crossed his first stream, played in his first ocean wave, and snorted his first nose-full of sand and generally seems ok with water (except in bath form). Although he is totally exhausting at times, we appreciate that he sleeps 20 hours a day and we're enjoying the "age of attraction", as these first months are commonly described.

Secondly, we've moved!

The surf shack has been emptied and cleaned out. I spent a quiet moment with the view and moved on. We now have a full kitchen, our very own yard to garden and mow, cherry, plum, and fig trees, an incredible abundance of birds, and great views of the coast range foothills.

I might miss the ocean view, but I'm loving the new space. I don't think Matt will miss the view, he seems much happier in the quiet country space we now occupy.

Here's some pics for now, but it would be even better if you came to visit! We have a spare room and a loft, so there's plenty of space.

This first one is of our bedroom/office.





Here's a shot of our living space, including the loft.
















Our new wood stove (inserted into a fireplace).

Third, we're road-tripping out to Michigan on Monday, I hope to be able to post another blog before we go, so stay tuned!

Meet Okra

After months of searching nearby shelters, rescues, and craigslist we finally found our perfect puppy. He's 7 weeks old and a mix of black labrador retriever and German wirehaired pointer. We drove up to Olympia, WA to pick him up (and missed Shawn and Kevin sorely while we drove though OlyWa).

After an entire day being toted around in the van and only managing to paint the inside of his crate with excrement once, Okra (after a thorough cleaning; thanks for the hose Lida!) has made it home. He seems to be much more partial to grunting and sneezing than to barking, which we like. The video that follows is from last night when we got back to Newport.

Puppies are notoriously hard to take photos of because they never stay still. Here's a couple of our best attempts.

Summer Rocks: Post 2

Summer has finally begun for Matt. 3 hours post-MCAT and he's already asleep. I think that bodes well.

Summer Rocks: Post 1

I love berry season. I love walking through a forest on a warm day and smelling the blackberry blossoms, thimbleberries, and salmon berries.
And I love strawberries.

The wild coastal strawberries are just starting to come out and they are very small, like 1cm in length, at their biggest. And munching those wild strawberries got me itching for large, juicy, valley strawberries. So I went and picked some 15 pints today, yumm!

In other kitchen news, Günter now has his very own cast iron skillet.
Stay tuned for new recipes.

Clammin'

Memorial Day weekend is usually a time to get out of town and avoid the hordes of tourists that show up in Newport. They clog the streets (ok, one street), and make cycling around town dangerous. Granted, they also enable our small coastal town to exist by bringing in much needed appetites and shopping habits. Anyway, we stayed home and took advantage of the negative low tides by clamming in the Yaquina Bay.

Day One we met Vero at the beach directly in front of our house at 6am. We wandered around the surf looking for razor clams, which we had no idea how to find. After about an hour of jealously eyeing our fellow clammers who were nearing their catch limit, I ran out of patience and suggested we head to the mudflats where Matt and I have had extensive training seeking and finding clams of a dozen species. So, we drove 8 miles upstream to dig for soft shell clams, Mya arenaria, which are somewhat of a delicacy along the Atlantic coast.

Day Two we drove a mile or so up the bay and dug for gaper clams. After about an hour of digging up and crushing a half dozen gapers, Matt and I perfected our technique and dug up several whole clams, and two enormous ones. I hear they can live up to 20 years. I estimate these were at least 5 years old! We were pretty stoked.

It took us over an hour to prep the clams, Matt strung them up by their necks outside so we could stretch out the meat. I guess the necks can be pretty tough, and these "old boys" were extremely strong.
We cut, cleaned, and cooked them. Then I made a pretty awesome non-dairy clam chowder with all the bits. mmmm.