> And since two members have talked about feeding chicken parts, I'd like to
> ask about something I've seen only once on a website.  Is it true that
> cooking chicken parts is what makes the bones liable to hurt the dog
> internally?

   Cooking apparently makes the bones brittle and thus likely to shatter
into splinters and pierce the dog's gut, causing pain, bleeding and
sometimes death. But when a wolf eats its prey, it eats it bones, hair and
all.  You never see a wolf tending a caribou on the barby; they eat it raw.
Field biologists examine dead animals and I've never heard of anyone
publishing that a predator died of injuries from eating bones.  Raw ones.
Dogs do die from eating cooked ones.

 Alaskan wolves will eat a
> grouse if they can get it and THEY obviously don't get hurt, but my
husband
> remains unconvinced.

   I don't blame him.  But consider this:  the dog food companies pay for
most if not all the research done on dog digestion (who else could afford it
or want to?), and these companies donate to vetinary schools.  So your vet
and mine have been taught to feed commercial food, even though people have
been feeding dogs table scraps and carcasses for millennia and dog food
companies are...what? a century old at best?  Follow the money.  And no vet
wants to put his hard-earned profession on the line for something
controversial.
   I've been feeding raw bones for 15 years now, and one dog died of old age
with clean teeth and glossy coat.  The younger ones are alive and kicking.
Consider how many people feed BARF (bones and raw food) - if there were any
hint of a problem, pet lovers would be in an uproar.  Consider that even an
unfounded rumor causes panic.

Rini