Raw Food Diet for Dogs

Written by

Shell & Katy

Pet Photographers & Dog Lifestyle Writers

Updated 31 August 202613 min read

About Shell & Katy

Shell & Katy are two style-savvy dog mums celebrating the best in pet-friendly living. A pet photographer and dog lifestyle writer, together they share trending pet products, recipes, inspiration and expert tips with discerning dog lovers around the world.

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A raw food diet for dogs is one of those decisions that sounds simple until you actually stand in the butcher's queue trying to remember what percentage of the bowl is meant to be liver.

We feed raw to our two boys, and we had a great many questions at the start. This guide is the one we wish we had found then: what goes in the bowl, how much of it, how to make the switch without a week of upset stomachs, and the risks that raw-food companies tend not to mention. It sits alongside the rest of our dog nutrition guides. It is deliberately not a sales pitch. Raw feeding suits a lot of dogs and a lot of households, and it genuinely does not suit some, and you deserve to know which one you are before you fill a freezer.

A raw food diet for dogs is made up of uncooked meat, edible bone, organ meat and usually a small proportion of vegetables and fruit, fed either as a home-prepared mix or as a commercially prepared frozen or freeze-dried product. Most dogs eat roughly 2 to 3 percent of their body weight daily, split across two meals. The two things that decide whether it works are nutritional balance, which is difficult to achieve at home without help, and hygiene, because raw meat carries bacteria that affect the people in the house as well as the dog.

What Is a Raw Diet for Dogs?

Raw feeding covers a range of approaches rather than one recipe. What they share is uncooked food. What separates them is how much structure they impose and how much of the work you do yourself.

The BARF diet

BARF stands for Biologically Appropriate Raw Food, and it is the model most beginners meet first. It builds in a small proportion of plant matter alongside the animal ingredients. The commonly cited breakdown is 70 percent muscle meat, 10 percent raw edible bone, 7 percent vegetables, 5 percent liver, 5 percent other secreting organs, 2 percent seeds or nuts, and 1 percent fruit.

The prey model raw diet

Prey model raw aims to approximate the composition of a whole prey animal and leaves out plant ingredients almost entirely. The usual breakdown is 75 to 80 percent muscle meat, 10 percent raw edible bone, 5 percent liver, 5 percent other secreting organs, and up to 5 percent animal-based fiber.

Treat both sets of numbers as a description of what these models specify, not as a prescription you should follow unsupervised. Hitting a dog's full nutrient requirements from home-prepared food is genuinely hard, and published analyses of home-made raw recipes routinely find them short on calcium, zinc, copper, iodine or vitamin D. If you plan to prepare food yourself long term, have the recipe checked by your vet or a board-certified veterinary nutritionist. That single step is what separates raw feeding that works from raw feeding that quietly causes deficiencies over a year or two.

Pre-made, freeze-dried and air-dried raw

Commercially prepared raw takes the formulation problem off your hands, which for most households is the sensible route. Frozen complete meals thaw and serve. Freeze-dried and air-dried versions are still considered raw because they are made without high-heat cooking, and they store on a shelf, which makes them useful for travel and for toppers. Look for products formulated to meet a recognized nutritional standard, and check the label says complete rather than complementary. A stainless or ceramic bowl from our bowls and feeding directory is easier to sanitize than plastic, which scratches and harbors bacteria. Complementary means it is a topper, not a meal, and feeding it as a meal is a common and expensive beginner mistake.

Is Raw Food Good for Dogs?

Owners who feed raw commonly report firmer stools, better coat condition, cleaner teeth and steadier energy, and plenty of dogs clearly do well on it, just as plenty do well on a good dry food. What is fair to say is that the enthusiasm runs ahead of the evidence: the research base is thinner than either side of this argument usually admits, and most of what circulates online is published by companies selling raw food. We feed raw and we would still tell you that.

You will also see the argument that dogs are wolves and should eat like them. Dogs and wolves are closely related, but domestic dogs carry genetic adaptations for digesting starch that wolves do not, so ancestry alone is not evidence that a raw diet is nutritionally correct. Feed raw because it suits your dog and your household, not because of an argument about wolves.

The risks worth knowing before you start

Raw meat carries bacteria including Salmonella, Listeria and E. coli, and this affects your household as much as your dog. Dogs can shed these organisms in their saliva and feces without ever looking unwell, which spreads contamination to bowls, floors, bedding and hands. The FDA's guidance on raw pet food is worth reading in full before you commit.

One correction that matters more than any other on this page, because it is repeated constantly in raw feeding circles: freezing does not make raw meat safe. Freezing inactivates some parasites, which is useful. It does not kill Salmonella or Listeria. If you have been freezing meat as your safety step, that step is not doing what you think it is doing.

What actually reduces risk is handling. Thaw in the refrigerator rather than on the counter. Keep raw pet food separate from human food, and use separate boards and utensils. Wash hands, bowls and surfaces thoroughly after every meal. Wash your face if your dog licks it, particularly straight after eating. Pick up feces promptly in the yard.

Who should think twice about feeding raw

Some households carry more risk than others, and this is the part that gets left out most often. If anyone in your home is pregnant, very young, elderly, or immunocompromised through illness or treatment, the case against raw feeding is considerably stronger, because they are the people most likely to become seriously ill from the same bacteria your dog shrugs off. Babies and toddlers crawl on the floors the dog walks on and pull themselves up on the bowl.

Dogs with compromised immune systems, pancreatitis, kidney disease or a history of gut problems also need veterinary input before any diet change. If that describes your dog or your household, talk to your vet first rather than working it out as you go.

What to Feed on a Raw Dog Food Diet

Variety is the thing to aim for. A dog fed nothing but chicken breast for a year will be short of a great deal, and rotating proteins covers more gaps than any single ingredient can.

Best raw meat for dogs

There is no single best raw meat for dogs, but there is a sensible order to introduce them in. Leaner, milder proteins are easier on a gut that has never seen raw food, and richer ones are better held back until things have settled.

Organ meat is where a large share of the micronutrients live, and liver is the one that matters most. Kidney, spleen and pancreas round it out. Keep organs to roughly the proportion the diet models specify, because liver in particular is easy to overdo and carries a real risk of vitamin A excess when fed generously over months.

Raw bone, and how not to get it wrong

Raw edible bone supplies calcium and is a structural part of both diet models. It is also the part of raw feeding most likely to send you to an emergency vet.

Never feed cooked bones of any kind. Cooking makes bone brittle and prone to splintering. Raw bone should be appropriately sized for your dog, soft enough to be genuinely edible rather than a weight-bearing leg bone, and always supervised. Fractured teeth, choking and gut obstruction are the three things that go wrong. Dogs who gulp rather than chew are poor candidates for whole bones, and ground bone in a prepared mix is a safer route for them.

Vegetables, fruit and extras

Plant ingredients supply fiber, antioxidants and some vitamins. They are central to BARF and largely absent from prey model, which is one of the clearer differences between the two. Chopping or lightly steaming vegetables makes them easier to digest, since dogs cannot break down plant cell walls efficiently.

Carrots, celery, broccoli, Brussels sprouts, green beans, kale, peas and sweet potato all work well. Our list of superfoods for dogs covers the ones that earn their place, and carrots are the easiest place to begin.

Fruit is a smaller part of the bowl and should stay that way, but blueberries, apples, bananas, pears and watermelon are all good options once pits, seeds and rind are removed. Our guide to the best fruits for dogs has the full list. Eggs are a useful and inexpensive addition too.

Foods to avoid

Onions, garlic, chives and leeks, grapes and raisins, avocado, macadamia nuts, xylitol and anything containing alcohol or caffeine all stay out of the bowl. Raw potato and green or unripe tomato contain solanine and should be avoided, though cooked potato in small amounts is fine. Cherry pits, stone fruit pits and apple seeds all need removing.

Wild mushrooms are the genuine hazard rather than mushrooms as a category, since common store varieties are not toxic and wild species can be lethal. If you are unsure about an ingredient, check before it goes in the bowl rather than after.

Raw Dog Food Meals: What a Bowl Actually Looks Like

Percentages are hard to picture. Meals are not. These are illustrative daily examples rather than formulated recipes, split across two feeds, to show how the proportions translate into food you can actually buy.

A small dog, around 5kg. Roughly 100 to 150g a day. A morning bowl of chicken mince with a little ground bone, a teaspoon of grated carrot and a couple of blueberries. An evening bowl of turkey with a small piece of liver twice a week and a spoonful of finely chopped green beans.

A medium dog, around 15kg. Roughly 300 to 450g a day. Morning, beef mince with ground bone and a spoonful of pureed vegetables. Evening, chicken thigh with a small portion of kidney, plus half a sardine two or three times a week for omega-3.

A large dog, around 30kg. Roughly 600 to 900g a day. Morning, a raw meaty chicken frame with grated vegetables. Evening, beef or lamb with liver twice weekly, rotating in duck or rabbit across the week for variety.

Rotate proteins week to week rather than feeding one forever, keep liver to a small share of the total, and adjust the volume to the dog in front of you. A raw-fed dog at a healthy weight has ribs you can feel easily under a thin covering and a visible waist from above.

How Much Raw Food to Feed a Dog

Most adult dogs eat between 2 and 3 percent of their body weight per day, and the full working range runs from about 2 to 5 percent. Where your dog falls depends on age, metabolism, workload and whether they need to gain or lose.

Around 2 percent suits a dog who gains weight easily or lives a quiet life. Around 2.5 to 3 percent suits most healthy adults with normal daily walks. Above 3 percent belongs to hard-working dogs, dogs who need to gain, and growing puppies, who eat considerably more relative to their size.

Weigh food rather than eyeballing it for the first few weeks, and weigh your dog monthly. The number on the bag is a starting point; your dog's body condition is the answer. If weight drifts in either direction after a month, adjust by 10 percent and reassess.

How to Start Your Dog on a Raw Diet

Talk to your vet before you switch, particularly if your dog is a senior, has allergies, or has any ongoing health condition. That is not a formality. A diet change is one of the few things you control completely, and it is worth having the person who knows your dog's history in the loop.

The transition schedule

A gradual switch over one to two weeks is kinder to most guts than an overnight change, and it also makes it far easier to identify which protein caused a problem if one does. A workable pattern is a quarter raw for the first three days, half raw for days four to six, three quarters for days seven to nine, and fully raw from around day ten.

Some healthy young adults handle an overnight switch without difficulty. Seniors, dogs coming off a long-term processed diet, and dogs with sensitive stomachs should take the slower route. Start with one lean protein such as chicken or turkey and hold it for two weeks before introducing a second.

What to watch for, and when to stop

Softer stools for the first few days are common as the gut adjusts, and stools usually become smaller and firmer once the transition settles.

What is not normal, and what means you pause and call your vet: blood in the stool, vomiting that continues beyond a day, lethargy, refusing food for more than one meal, or any straining to pass stool, which can signal a bone-related obstruction. Do not push through those symptoms on the theory that your dog is detoxing. There is no such thing, and a dog who is unwell on a new diet is simply unwell.

Raw Feeding for Puppies, Seniors and Working Dogs

The blanket advice does not fit every dog, and the differences matter most at the two ends of life.

Puppies are the group where getting it wrong does lasting damage. Growing dogs need a tightly controlled calcium to phosphorus ratio, and large-breed puppies in particular can develop permanent skeletal problems if it is off. A puppy on raw typically eats around 5 to 10 percent of current body weight daily, dropping as growth slows, spread across three or four meals. If you feed raw to a puppy, use a commercially prepared food formulated for growth or work from a recipe a veterinary nutritionist has checked. This is not the place to improvise. Our guide to the first year with your puppy covers the rest of the routine.

Senior dogs often do well on raw, but they transition more slowly and are more likely to have a kidney, liver or dental condition that changes what is appropriate. Reduced activity usually means slightly less food, and dental disease can rule out bone entirely. Check with your vet first, then look at our senior dog essentials for the wider picture.

Working dogs sit at the top of the feeding range and sometimes above it during a working season, with richer proteins such as beef and lamb doing useful work. Feed to condition rather than to a fixed percentage, and expect the number to move between working and resting months.

If raw turns out not to suit your household, there is genuinely no shame in it. Plenty of very well cared for dogs never eat a raw meal. More nutrition and health guides live in our health and wellbeing section.