# Jake and Daisys Raw food, pretty good price!



## Michiyo-Fir (Jul 25, 2009)

It feels like I'm making all the food posts around here!

I went to the feed store today and they have 3 brands of raw food. Amore, Nature's Variety and a Canadian produced brand called Jake and Daisy's raw food.

NV here is $24.99 for 6 lbs chicken which works out to be $4.16/lb

Amore is $4 something per lb for chicken 

Jake and Daisy's is $2.99/lb! The only problem is that their chicken formula have no organs. Their other formulas are just a little over $3/lb to $4/lb depending on which kind of meat. For example turkey and buffalo are more expensive.

$2.99/lb I think is a great price. I think I would be spending about the same looking for my own meat sources and organs. 

One of our local Dog rescue and our police force now use this food as well. 

http://www.jakeanddaiseys.com/products-dogs.shtml

If anyone wants to take a look at their site, go right ahead! Unfortunately it's only for Canada I think.


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## dieterherzog (Sep 28, 2009)

Since we're starting to tread the raw world with our dogs I thought I'd share this with you - so I've been feeding my dog two raw Nature Variety's Medallions (Venison) for a week now. And he really goes nuts for his food. So today I decided to add a raw egg to his diet, and he ate all the meat except for the egg... stared at it for a while then started licking the yolk and slorping it up. 

After that, he licked his bowl for a good 3 minutes and looked under the raised stand to search for more food - it was hilarious. I hope you're having as fun of a time watching your pup eat raw food.


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## ioreks_mom (Oct 1, 2008)

2.99/lb is still very expensive. but, if you are getting pre-made then it is pretty good. 

if you were to look for your own sources you could find food for MUCH cheaper. i get chicken legs for about 1.30/lb and turkey necks for about 1.20/lb. i have been SUPER lucky lately and i got about 50 lbs of moose and fish for FREE!! wooo! if you live in an area where people hunt now is the time to ask around about getting last years moose (deer, whatever) since the hunters are getting more meat now. also, look in the grocery store for meats that are on sale saying "cook or freeze today" or something like that. meat like that is usually very cheap and the dog doesn't care if it is a little old. you can find good deals with a little looking


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## misty073 (Mar 31, 2009)

Ok weird I posted a post on this thread and now its not here??? Hope its not on some other thread LOL.

Anyways the Jack and Daisys here is 3.49 going all the way up to 5.99. I have been looking into premixes and I have no idea what to get. So far I have found 3 options Jake and daisy's, mountain dog and another one that was $4-5 a pound (out of my price range, I love my dog but her food cant cost more than ours )

I was thinking of doing it myself but I cant. She wont eat bone unless its a bone...like a wing or a chicken back and then if she has other stuff with it she wont eat the bone. If she doesnt eat bone she has runny poop  this was soo much easier before with the premix we got (although it had oatmeal in it)

The mountain dog has 70% meat and 30% veg...my understanding is that is too much. and no organ meat which I can add in but I am thinking of maybe just a meat/bone mixture and adding the rest myself?


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## Michiyo-Fir (Jul 25, 2009)

Wow Jake and Daisy's is expensive in your area! I bought 2 packs of it today (2 lbs) and a 6 lbs bag (12 patties) of NV raw chicken formula.

The thing is..I'm supposed to feed around 2% of body weight? And Nia is 6 lbs which means 0.12 lbs a day only. When I cut up the Jake and Daisys into 8 parts, it's 0.125 lbs each so I'm only supposed to feed one chunk a day. That is actually only about a 1x1x2 piece! It's extremely tiny! Won't Nia be starving all day long???



misty073 said:


> I was thinking of doing it myself but I cant. She wont eat bone unless its a bone...like a wing or a chicken back and then if she has other stuff with it she wont eat the bone. If she doesnt eat bone she has runny poop  this was soo much easier before with the premix we got (although it had oatmeal in it)


Have you tried chopping the bone into small chunks? Nia will eat the bones happily if they are bite sized pieces. If it's any bigger, she gives up and just ignores it. The last 2 days that I fed bone I chopped it up. Plus it's much cleaner because I don't want her dragging a big piece of bone around the house and rubbing her face/chest/paws in it.


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## dieterherzog (Sep 28, 2009)

Michiyo-Fir said:


> Wow Jake and Daisy's is expensive in your area! I bought 2 packs of it today (2 lbs) and a 6 lbs bag (12 patties) of NV raw chicken formula.
> 
> The thing is..I'm supposed to feed around 2% of body weight? And Nia is 6 lbs which means 0.12 lbs a day only. When I cut up the Jake and Daisys into 8 parts, it's 0.125 lbs each so I'm only supposed to feed one chunk a day. That is actually only about a 1x1x2 piece! It's extremely tiny! Won't Nia be starving all day long???


My dog is 12lbs and is supposed to get 4.5oz a day of NV, so I guess it makes sense for your dog to get about 2oz a day since she's half his weight.


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## Michiyo-Fir (Jul 25, 2009)

ioreks_mom said:


> 2.99/lb is still very expensive. but, if you are getting pre-made then it is pretty good.
> 
> if you were to look for your own sources you could find food for MUCH cheaper. i get chicken legs for about 1.30/lb and turkey necks for about 1.20/lb. i have been SUPER lucky lately and i got about 50 lbs of moose and fish for FREE!! wooo! if you live in an area where people hunt now is the time to ask around about getting last years moose (deer, whatever) since the hunters are getting more meat now. also, look in the grocery store for meats that are on sale saying "cook or freeze today" or something like that. meat like that is usually very cheap and the dog doesn't care if it is a little old. you can find good deals with a little looking


I looked around but most meat around here is $1.99/lb. Only when it's on sale it's about $0.99/lb. Organs are even more expensive from $2-5/lb. Plus I don't trust myself to balance everything properly from calciumhosphorus to vitamins.

No one hunts around here =( I only know my friend's dad hunts rabbits but they eat them afterwards and he travels 3 hours to hunt them so it's unlikely he'll give them to me...

Since Nia is so tiny and only eats 1/8 lb per day, it's not really that much more expensive to buy her premade since it saves a lot of time for me not to do the finding, cutting, portioning, balancing, adding vitamins/supplements, etc.

By the way, where did you store the 50 lbs of meat!?!? I just bought 8 lbs of raw today and there's hardly enough space in my freezer along with all our people food! 

We live in a pretty small place so there's no way of buying a freezer and putting it here...



dieterherzog said:


> My dog is 12lbs and is supposed to get 4.5oz a day of NV, so I guess it makes sense for your dog to get about 2oz a day since she's half his weight.


I'll probably end up feeding her more than 2 oz a day since she has trouble keeping on weight. But it seems so unbelievably little in portion size! 

I think yesterday I fed her about twice that amount of chicken with bones and she was hungry later at night and ate another 1/4 cup of kibble! 

For some reasons, raw makes Nia more hungry than usual. She ends up staring at us when we're eating all day after eating a raw meal. It's a bit strange that when she was eating kibble she's never hungry and now that she's eating raw she always looks starved even when she eats more than enough.


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## ioreks_mom (Oct 1, 2008)

Michiyo-Fir said:


> By the way, where did you store the 50 lbs of meat!?!? I just bought 8 lbs of raw today and there's hardly enough space in my freezer along with all our people food!
> 
> We live in a pretty small place so there's no way of buying a freezer and putting it here...


we have a small chest freezer. we got a call about more moose but we couldn't get it because we are out of room. i would love to get a really large freezer. one day, i suppose!  we are also planning to get 1/2 a pig, cut and wrapped, from a local butcher for $140 (great price!) but we need to find the room first!


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## DJsMom (Jun 6, 2008)

Michiyo-Fir said:


> The thing is..I'm supposed to feed around 2% of body weight? And Nia is 6 lbs which means 0.12 lbs a day only. When I cut up the Jake and Daisys into 8 parts, it's 0.125 lbs each so I'm only supposed to feed one chunk a day. That is actually only about a 1x1x2 piece! It's extremely tiny! Won't Nia be starving all day long???


Nature's Variety calculates amounts differently than using raw foods that aren't pre-packaged as dog food. I f you look on the bottom of the packge, it gives you the *number of nuggets, or the number of pattys* (or what percent of a patty) to feed for your dogs weight, rather than measuring the weight of the nuggets or pattys.
So Nia should get between 1/2 to 3/4 of a patty a day. Sorry, I don't have a package of nuggets in front of me to read from. 
The package also states that "these are only general guidelines. Feed up to twice the amt of puppys or kittens. Individual requirements vary based on ..."

I would start out using the recommended amt & go from there.


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## Michiyo-Fir (Jul 25, 2009)

DJsMom said:


> Nature's Variety calculates amounts differently than using raw foods that aren't pre-packaged as dog food. I f you look on the bottom of the packge, it gives you the *number of nuggets, or the number of pattys* (or what percent of a patty) to feed for your dogs weight, rather than measuring the weight of the nuggets or pattys.
> So Nia should get between 1/2 to 3/4 of a patty a day. Sorry, I don't have a package of nuggets in front of me to read from.
> The package also states that "these are only general guidelines. Feed up to twice the amt of puppys or kittens. Individual requirements vary based on ..."
> 
> I would start out using the recommended amt & go from there.


If you use their online calculator, they do give you the weight of it as well as how many nuggets/medallions/chubs, etc.

They tell me that Nia needs 3-4 oz. a day to maintain body weight but I think that's too much. Every other source I've consulted (about 4) says 2-3% of weight. 3-4 oz. is too much.

Even like dieterherzog said, her dog is 12 lbs and eats about 4.5 oz. Which doesn't really make sense for my 6 lbs dog to eat 4 oz as well...



ioreks_mom said:


> we have a small chest freezer. we got a call about more moose but we couldn't get it because we are out of room. i would love to get a really large freezer. one day, i suppose!  we are also planning to get 1/2 a pig, cut and wrapped, from a local butcher for $140 (great price!) but we need to find the room first!


My gosh! Half a pig that's gotta be huge! I guess you can always get another cheap chest freezer. I see people selling them here for between 25-50 dollars on Craigslist or something. I almost bought one a few days ago when I saw it for 20 but then realized I had no place to put it plus my mom would be really really mad. Plus I have a 6 lb dog, if I had 50 lbs of meat it could feed her for a whole year so I probably don't need that big of a freezer anyways.


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## DJsMom (Jun 6, 2008)

Michiyo-Fir said:


> If you use their online calculator, they do give you the weight of it as well as how many nuggets/medallions/chubs, etc.
> 
> They tell me that Nia needs 3-4 oz. a day to maintain body weight but I think that's too much. Every other source I've consulted (about 4) says 2-3% of weight. 3-4 oz. is too much.
> 
> Even like dieterherzog said, her dog is 12 lbs and eats about 4.5 oz. Which doesn't really make sense for my 6 lbs dog to eat 4 oz as well...


Oh, I'm sorry ... first off I was thinking Nia weighed 12 lbs, & 2nd, I didn't realize NV had an on line calculator.
DJ weighs _about_ 15 lbs, is active, & eats _about_ 8 oz of raw food a day, divided into 2 meals. I always tend to feed MORE than LESS when feeding him & have never had a problem with his weight or his health.


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## Michiyo-Fir (Jul 25, 2009)

DJsMom said:


> Oh, I'm sorry ... first off I was thinking Nia weighed 12 lbs, & 2nd, I didn't realize NV had an on line calculator.
> DJ weighs _about_ 15 lbs, is active, & eats _about_ 8 oz of raw food a day, divided into 2 meals. I always tend to feed MORE than LESS when feeding him & have never had a problem with his weight or his health.


I think Nia will probably get around 3 oz. instead of 2 as well since she's pretty active if she needs more I may even up it to 4 oz. She used to eat about 1/2 cup of dry food (Orijen or EVO) instead of the 1/4 cup that others seem to feed their dogs of the same size and weight.


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## briteday (Feb 10, 2007)

Michiyo-Fir said:


> If you use their online calculator, they do give you the weight of it as well as how many nuggets/medallions/chubs, etc.
> 
> They tell me that Nia needs 3-4 oz. a day to maintain body weight but I think that's too much. Every other source I've consulted (about 4) says 2-3% of weight. 3-4 oz. is too much.
> 
> ...


I think you need to take into consideration that the manufacturer guidelines are based on their knowledge of exactly how many calories are in their food and also how much is moisture content. Personally if one of my papillons had a difficult time keeping weight on (which is never the problem with MY little piggies!) then I would just feed a bit more or offer an extra midday meal (mine usually get two meals per day). On occasion my girls do lose a bit of weight in the winter (I suspect because the house is cooler during the day while we're all gone and they also go out every day for a 3-mile hike, no matter the weather)...when I do the monthly weigh-ins I often find that they are a bit lighter than normal, so I increase their rations.

Also, it seems like groceries are always a bit more in Canada than the US. But I do my raw diet for around $1 per pound. I can get whole chickens for 99 cents per pound anytime (at Costco) and they often go on sale for less. If your dog won't eat bones you might try finding a grinder (check hunting/camping stores as wild game is often made into sausage) and grinding whole chickens for her. I wish I had more friends that went hunting so I could offer more variety to my dogs. But I do check out anything in the mark down bin at the grocery. And I can buy lots of pork cuts for 99 cents per pound at weekly sales msot weeks. I end up using a lot of boneless cuts because they are such small dogs. But I supplement the calcium with 1/2 teaspoon of finely ground egg shells to one pound of meat. For my three dogs a meal adds up to about 4 ounces. So I split a 1/8 teaspoon of ground shells between the three of them. I've also heard that you can use Tums at a rate of 1 Tums to 1/2 pound of meat.


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## Michiyo-Fir (Jul 25, 2009)

Actually...Nia only eats 1 meal a day. She refuses the 2nd meal no matter what it is so I've just taken to feeding her a full day's worth in one meal and then leaving out kibble so if she wants it and she's hungry she can have something.

I think it's the winter too...she seems to be losing a bit of weight on the same food as before probably since it's so cold. 

I calculated her kibble calories right now she's eating like 220ish a day. So it would be almost 3.5 oz of raw (NV raw is 68 cal per oz. ) I'm going to try for 3 oz today since it's a new food and too much would probably cause her stomach upset.

Edit: Funny yesterday Nia seemed to like raw quite a bit and today when I fed her she ate maybe half of it and lost interest. I only fed 2 oz. by the way. If she doesn't have any kind of stomach upset tomorrow I will probably feed her again tomorrow morning and slowly switch her to 2 meals a day instead of one.


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## misty073 (Mar 31, 2009)

Wow I would like to know where everyone is getting their meat so cheap I have yet to find any cheap meat. The cheapest I have found is $4/kg for pork or chicken thighs and legs. Even ground beef with heart in it at the butchers (for dogs is $2.39 a lb) You wont find any sort of beef for that price and I cant even afford the lamb for us let alone the dog 

My husband will be going hunting soon so that will be a great source of meat. But I am having bone issues. I have cut the chicken backs to small chunks and she wont eat them she just picks the food around them. Plus for the last two days I have tried giving her half a back and she doesnt really seem that interested in it (I think it may be because she has to eat them outside and she hates going out now...too cold for her)

I just bought some jack and daisy's last night and she tried it today...she seemed to really like it. I have been looking for differnt kinds of foods online and came across one that said it had grapes in it????? seems odd...so I emailed them and I am waiting to hear back. My old dogfood I actually found apple seeds in it...I told my groomer and she was going to look into it but we moved so not sure what she found out. 

I think price wise for me might be to buy mountain dog chicken and bone mix and maybe just add my own stuff to it???? Oh why does this have to be so difficult LOL.


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## Michiyo-Fir (Jul 25, 2009)

I think your dog might just like ground meat better. 

I went to 2 stores yesterday adn took down the prices of meat/organs. Here organs are so expensive! They're $4-7/lb!! But I guess I only need tiny bits of it compared to the other parts.

Yesterday chicken drumsticks were on sale $1.19/lb! I think that's a great deal for leg meat. I would probably buy some chicken bones(with little meat on) for $0.79/lb and add that to the drumsticks for more bone if need be. Also pork shoulder/back thighs are 1.19/lb as well so that and the chicken bones for calcium should work great.

I really do prefer the premade stuff though just so I don't have to go out and balance everything.

I'm not sure where you live but see if there's a T&T or Yaohan somewhere. T&T has pretty cheap meat plus they have all sorts of organs. Yesterday I saw pork heart, liver, tongue, spleen, intestine, stomach. Also chicken/duck/turkey gizzards, chicken/duck liver. All sorts of good stuff and you really don't need a lot of it anyways.


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## misty073 (Mar 31, 2009)

no we dont have anything like that here  we did when I lived in the lower mainland but not here. 

I like the premade too I find it easier to give the stuff she needs. I find it hard to measure everything in such a small amount (for a 12lb dog) I think I will stick to the premade and then look into grinders and keep doing my research. I find so much contradicting stuff on the internet I dont want to make mistakes.


One question though...If I buy a frozen ground meat in large amounts can it be thawed to add organs and supliments and then freeze it again?


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## ioreks_mom (Oct 1, 2008)

yes, you can thaw and then re-freeze meat for dogs. 

i never thought about the trouble someone would have feeding a small dog raw. wow! it must be hard trying to get everything so little. i agree that grinding is probably the easiest route! my big doggies are much easier to feed, i think


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## Michiyo-Fir (Jul 25, 2009)

misty073 said:


> One question though...If I buy a frozen ground meat in large amounts can it be thawed to add organs and supliments and then freeze it again?


I heard it wasn't good to thaw and then refreeze the meat but I'm not 100% sure. Why don't you just make an organ/veggie(if you want to add veggie) and supplements ground like a paste or something and separate that into daily serving sizes? Then you just need to thaw the ground meat in daily portions and add a chunk of the organ paste?

Yeah the idea of a grinder is good. Perhaps look for a 2nd hand one? I'm looking for one as well even though I'm currently buying pre-made. But if I see one for a good deal I will grab it because I suspect eventually I'll probably do it myself. 

I live in BC so there's lots of T&Ts but I guess they're not everywhere in the country...
Well if you have any kind of asian butcher or market check it out there's tons of organs and such. Since it's for the dogs anyways I'm not extremely concerned with the freshness of the meat. Whatever is cheap will do!



ioreks_mom said:


> yes, you can thaw and then re-freeze meat for dogs.
> 
> i never thought about the trouble someone would have feeding a small dog raw. wow! it must be hard trying to get everything so little. i agree that grinding is probably the easiest route! my big doggies are much easier to feed, i think


You can?? I never knew that! I thought it wasn't good to thaw and refreeze?


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## DJsMom (Jun 6, 2008)

Oh yeah, I'd say it's definitely easier to feed Coco that DJ, altho I've pretyy much got it down pat now.


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## misty073 (Mar 31, 2009)

I am in BC as well but we just moved to the okanagan...and things are a bit more expensive here compared to the lowermainland.


I am going to keep my eye out for a grinder as well (not that I think I will have much luck our craigslist also sucks compared to the lowermainland LOL)


I am thinking the paste idea might be a good option for me as I can get ground chicken and bone mix from mountain dog for these prices. 
CHICKEN	
2 x 1 lb	$3.70 
2 x 1 lb - case of 6 $21.25 
3 lb	$4.80 
3 lb - case of 6	$27.50 
4 blocks - 19.2 lb case $22.00 

They dont make a beef alone just with veg and its 6.80 for 2 pounds. They have a complete meal for 3.40 a lb with veg and supliments but I am not sure about the veg % I think its too high


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## Michiyo-Fir (Jul 25, 2009)

Actually I've heard some butchers don't mind doing a ground for you every one to 2 weeks. You might want to ask around. You can bring in all your chicken and organs and whatever else and just let him/her do the grind.

Also are there farms in okanagan that will let you have some of their butchered animals? I don't think they need cow hearts and organs and stuff. 

I'll have to look into mountain dog. We don't have that here =)


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## misty073 (Mar 31, 2009)

You are probably right about the butcher doing it for me...I never thought about that, alot of people hunt here so they are always getting butchers to package their meat for them.

I googled refreezing meat and aparently its fine so long as you thaw in the fridge. Thats a cheaper option to because the bigger the package the cheaper it is.

Here is the link to mountain dog...I am still looking into it but wouldnt mind getting the chicken and bone mix. http://www.mountaindogfood.com/


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## Michiyo-Fir (Jul 25, 2009)

Update: Nia's been on raw for 3 days now and for some reasons she's losing weight. I fed her 4 oz today which is 4% of her body weight...

She definitely likes NV's raw better because today for dinner I had a mixture of both one on each side and she ate all the NV stuff first and left the Jake and Daisy's until last. After another 5 min or so she finally ate all the Jake and Daisy's too.


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## dieterherzog (Sep 28, 2009)

Michiyo-Fir said:


> Update: Nia's been on raw for 3 days now and for some reasons she's losing weight. I fed her 4 oz today which is 4% of her body weight...
> 
> She definitely likes NV's raw better because today for dinner I had a mixture of both one on each side and she ate all the NV stuff first and left the Jake and Daisy's until last. After another 5 min or so she finally ate all the Jake and Daisy's too.


I looked at the ingredients for the Jake and Daisy's one and compared it to NV one - most significant differences:

Calories are less for JD - about 50cals/oz (JD) vs 65/oz (NV)

Also, protein content is higher for NV compared to JD, did the JD offer a guide on feeding amounts?

Give it a week and see if your puppy's weight stabilizes. If not, then it's probably the difference in calorie content. 

My puppy has started to turn his nose up at kibble even though it's the Orijen Regional Red stuff that he used to love  I'm afraid that feeding him raw is going to start making him really picky.


BTW, if you haven't used the excel spreadsheet I attached, that gives a really good guesstimate on how much calorie your puppy needs - so you can just base it off the guaranteed analysis on the dog food packaging. It usually just the calories and not the weight of the food that matters


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## Michiyo-Fir (Jul 25, 2009)

Hey where did you get the caloric content info for JD? I looked for it but couldn't find it. No wonder Nia's losing weight. She needs like 200+ calories per day and I only fed about 100 (2 oz JD) for the last day or so.

I was using EVO before and just started on JD and NV (NV only today). Hmm...this is going to be more expensive than I thought. She's going to eat about 1 lb every 4 days instead of every 7ish like I intended.

I haven't used the spreadsheet because I don't have microsoft office on this laptop. I just got it =) I'll take a look at it with my other comp later.


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## dieterherzog (Sep 28, 2009)

http://www.jakeanddaiseys.com/nutrition-dogs.shtml

That's what I looked at and I just used the conversion for 100grams to oz. I also used the JD online calculator but it says a 6lb dog needs about 3.8oz/day for 4% body weight. Personally, I would just count the calorie content and adjust from there.

Which is why I also think that making your own raw stuff can help you control your pups weight more easily except that it's not more convenient!


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## Michiyo-Fir (Jul 25, 2009)

Thanks for all the help!

I actually think doing it myself is even harder because I don't know about the calorie content of meat. Like I fed Nia chicken breast and bones for a few days and she lost weight too! She ate quite a lot as well.


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## dieterherzog (Sep 28, 2009)

There are lots of calorie counters out there that can tell you the calorie content of chicken and what-nots. I do agree it's a big pain in the ass, and also I am always so afraid of messing up the nutrient content. 

But according to the spreadsheet, for a 6lb. dog (and if you feed 3% body weight), you need 275cals/day, 4.5oz muscle meat, 0.6z equally in bones and organ meat which I think is about right. A 4oz skinless boneless chicken breast offer about 110 cals, so the rest of your calories can come from bones, meat and vegetables!


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## Michiyo-Fir (Jul 25, 2009)

I just noticed Nia is pooping like 4 times a day on raw! Although it's VERY VERY tiny poops and they're hard. I guess perhaps she's not used to the 2 meals a day yet...

It seems that she spends quite a lot of time pooping out the little pellets. is that normal?

Also she's eating a LOT more leaves and grasses on raw. She likes the dried leaves on the floor and just crunches through them. Should I stop her from doing that?


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