Feeding Dripping to dogs

Inexile

Silly question possibly but have an idea that may need to be dislodged!

I was feeding the fosters some food that had been donated - Rocco - which I believe is a good tinned dog food. At the bottom of the tin is thick white fat, which reminded me of dripping.

Which got me thinking could dripping which you buy in a block be a good additive to dogs feed if you were feeding lower quality dog food.

I just did a quick google on it and the salt seems to be the problem but is it any worse than the regular supermarket tinned dog food.

just not sure if I have stumpled on a great idea or fallen into a mine field

maggiepip

The layer of fat that you get at the bottom of the rocco tin (I feed my dogs Rocco its great food!) is just the fat from the meat that manages to separate. But it would be the recommended amount of fat the dog should be getting per tin per day, so its balanced. To give dripping on its own, or add it to a dogs meal I think would be a bit too much fat to be feeding, and put the diet out of balance unless you knew exactly what you were doing. My grandmother used to keep the dripping and eat it on bread !

Inexile

Dripping on bread - oh god my mother did that too. Yuck.

I take your point Maggiepip on the balance but I was wondering if your feeding a cheap food ( cereals and meat derivates as first ingredient type food) would it be a cheap way to boost the nutrimental content.

maggiepip

I get what you're saying. Its still a fat though and its not going to contain protien etc. I googled the nutritional value of dripping (cant link on my phone) and its very high in salt (like you said). But the omega 6/omega 3 ratio is also very high. Thats not great either as dogs need higher omega 3s like the balance you get in Salmon Oil. Im not a nutritionist by any means, but to me dripping doesn't look like it would be a good fat to supplement with at all - a teaspoon of Salmon Oil would be much better methinks!

Pretzill

If it's dripping, it's a lot of fat - I wouldn't imagine it would be good for dogs no more than it's good for us to eat too much animal fat - though mine love the jelly type stuff, that separates to the top of fat after a roast - it's like stock - a rare but welcome treat. But I'm sure the salt content would be high depending on the meat - chicken makes a nice jelly.

If I have any dripping or oil leftovers I mix them with seeds and leave it out for the birds in the winter - the dogs always look disappointed when they see me heading for the bird table!

Inexile

ok that's that idea knocked on head. Will keep adding the pilchards instead.

Thanks all for comments