Hi Judy ... thank you so much for your response. I've heard other people mention adding vegetables, eggs, yogurt, etc. Is that just over complicating things?

The other thing that I'm trying to figure out is what the bone to meat ratio is on a a chick thigh or drumstick? If I was going to make 10 pounds of food, could I use 9 lbs. of chicken thighs (bone-in) and 1 lbs. of chicken livers? Would that satisfy the 80% meat and 10% bone ratio?

Thanks again!

its very simple....80% meat(your choice chicken,turkey,pork) 10% bone....and 10% organ meat...
thats how simple it is....dont add anything...i use code liver oil for my omega...i also use a teaspoon cottage cheese and a teaspoon of yougurt....i also give 1000mg of vit c every other day...
a good book is.... "Home prepared diets for dogs and cat" by donald strombeck...
this books gives you a break down of calories needs ect....a nice starter book...goes into alot of detail....
when you start stay with your main protein for at least 30 days...before mixing them up....
any more questions just ask...their are alot of raw feeders on this board...i think their is something someone wrote about raw feeding on the home page....you might want to take a peek...

give a day or so and i will get you more info on bone.....i dont really spend alot of time on how much exactly...becasue i crush egg shells for calcium....i do grind my bird bones...they get pig feet...that has bone and tendon...they get lambs ribs for good bone content....i also get newborn or aborted lamb legs....not alot of meat but good source of bone and tendon....
i stay with....cows and lamb heart...also the liver of both....
dogs dont need vegetables and alot of additives....so when i first started .....i started with chicken and lamb as my protein nothing else...then i added one thing a month...and i dont add it every time....
i will steam carrots,brochlie, they love watermelon in the summer...i give apple and oranges...
they weigh 52 and 56 lbs...so get 1 to 1 1/2 lb of meat a day...i feed twice a day...with a light snack..in the afternoon....
you can also join raw chat...they ave good info...maybe a touch extreme in my mind some times....but they have good info...also raw feeding is good....

charlie and his pig foot...

charlie and wilson

Thank you so much for the articles. This is exactly what I was looking for!

Thanks for the mention, Judy. I haven't had much time to frequent the boards like I used to, unfortunately, so I rarely have time to respond.

Brandon, I've been feeding a completely raw diet for probably 6-7 years now. The article Judy mentioned was written by me a few years ago. It used to be linked to the BDW home page, but Dave (original webbie) had to remove the link because it conflicted with the dog food sponsorship he was receiving at the time to help support the website. The article can still be found at the following link:

http://bulldogsworld.com/rawbymel.html

Best of luck to you!