B.A.R.F. Diet

Has anybody heard of this? It stands for Bones And Raw Foods and is for dogs. It totaly excludes commercial dog food, canned or dry. The most common ingredients are raw chicken, yogurt, whole raw eggs, fruit and vegetables.

Most vets say that this isn't good, because the dogs need the proteins from grains, too. The other concern is food-borne bacteria. For years, we have been told to be careful with poultry, ground beef and eggs because of salmonella. It seems to me that, if this stuff isn't good for people, why would you feed it to your pets?

I, never feed raw meat or eggs, to my cats and dogs, for that very reason. I keep a spray bottle of bleach water, to clean up chicken and raw beef juices. The hand soap, on my kitchen sink is antibacterial. Not that I'm a total clean freak but, a few precautions don't hurt.

The proponents of this diet have a website: http://www.barfers.com I believe that THIS family will pass.

aside from the fact that i agree with you about the health concern of raw eggs and meat, i can't IMAGINE feeding my pets anything called the BARF diet. wow.

Some breeders also feed it to cats. I am not one but I do know of some who do.

I actually love the RAW/BARF diet, while it's not for every owner, and not every animal will take to it. It's still my diet of choice disreguarding any time or money it might take.

Raw egg yolks are actually very good for cats. And this diet isn't just exclusive to RAW foods, you CAN encorporate other things such as fruit/veggies AND cooked meat, depending on the animal you are feeding.

I know many people who feed this diet, and I feed it as often as I can to my cats and ferret. Another advantage to it, is because you get to control the portions of nutrition they get, not every pet food (kibble) is exact, and often times just not enough. That just shows you how much the AFCCO really knows eh?

I guess if you really want to know more, you could sign up with a BARF mailing list, and the people who have been feeding this full diet for years can tell you better then I can.

really? i had a cat who liked raw eggs. i never thought it was good for him, though, so he didn't get them very often.

Auburn: Yes, the egg yolks are great for a cats skin and coat, dogs as well.
As for the whites, I think that's still up in there air, some people thought it was bad so they didn't feed it. But now there is findings showing that it just has no nutritional value, not that it's unhealthy to feed the whites.
People who typically feed a kibble diet, will give one whole egg yolk per week.

There is also eggs in many kibble/canned foods, however those are cooked.

I've fed a raw diet to my dogs for 2,5 years now, and to my younger cat since I got her (1,5 yrs now). They are all magnificently healthy, I got rid of several small, often considered "normal" health problems they were having, and finally the dogs are enjoying their food. It's not for everyone, but I would never go back to kibble, and still hoping to switch my older cat to a raw diet one of these days (she's very picky). Btw, dogs and cats are carnivores, they have no need for grains, but even those can be incorporated into a "raw" diet if the owner so wishes.


Raw eggs are excellent nutrition, the whites are not considered good by some people because they contain avidin (I think it was, it's been a while since I talked about this...) that binds biotin. However, it can only bind a certain number of biotin molecules, and the egg yolk in itself contains more than enough of biotin so that the egg white cannot "rob" the body of biotin.

Even though many people still refer to a raw diet as BARF, the term is now a registered trademark, and so it is better to use the term raw diet which is also better because it covers a variety of ways to feed raw foods.

angel and eeva, thanks for the info. glad this thread got started. i won't be so leary of giving my cats meat and eggs now.

i certainly have egg on my face for my earlier comment, don't i?

I just heard of a new store that opened up that makes up the raw food for dogs and cats and sells it by the pound. It's fresh, not frozen. It will probably do well in the city it's in.