# hamburger



## selzer (May 7, 2005)

So while I was picking up the chicken leg quarters, I found hamburger at a reasonable price. 

All my dogs are between too skinny and ideal, none are overweight. Jenna, Babs, Arwen, and Heidi are at their ideal weight. Rushie and Ninja are showing a little more rib than normal.
Milla and Tori can gain a few pounds. And then there is Whitney who could use five to ten pounds. I have been struggling with Tori, Milla, and Whit for a while now. 

I have upped their food and finally Tori is looking better. Milla is just a skinny young GSD. Whitney is starting to have nice solid poop more often than not, but she is still showing rib and pelvic bones. I am feeding her what I normally would feed Rushie who is normally 20 pounds heavier. 

Fast forward. They LOVE the hamburger. I am giving them about 1/4 pound and shaving off some kibble. 

So if I normally feed 1 1/2 cups kibble twice a day, and I want to add 1/4 pound of raw hamburger to one meal, how much kibble should I shave off? The first night I gave 3/4 cup kibble with it. Last night, I gave 1 cup with it. 

Anyone else passing out hamburger? And is it likely to cause my skinnies to gain a little? I would throw a burger patty on top of their normal kibble, but they will spew runny poo if I overfeed.


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## meisha98 (Aug 27, 2008)

My dogs get hamburger sometimes and I adjust also. Where the burger is fattier and denser meatwise than the kibble, I do a third meat to 2/3 kibble ratio. Your 1/4 to 3/4 sounds good to me. Too much straight meat will also gives my dogs the runs but I know it's good for them. I also alternate in raw ground chicken or turkey in small amounts with the kibble to give them variety. I know alot of people do the raw or BARF diets but my dogs are doing well on natural kibble or freeze dried food with frozen raw patties or straight raw ground meat in it. Your dogs will gain weight, especially if they overeat. Beau has gotten a little heavier than I like because if I'm not looking, he'll eat Lainey's food too. She's a slower eater. I have become a food guard LOL!


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## elisabeth_00117 (May 17, 2009)

Sorry, can't help as I only feed raw. 

Maybe someone else who feeds both can answer better...


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## Woodreb (Oct 27, 2008)

I would figure out how many calories are in the 3 cups per day that you are feeding and adjust the amount of kibble based on that. There's roughly 300 calories in 4 oz of ground beef.
If it were me, I would probably up the overall calorie intake a little if my dog needed to gain weight, say 10% more than what they are getting now. I wouldn't do more than that at first so I could see how their bodies react to the increase.


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## selzer (May 7, 2005)

I have done this, an extra quarter cup per feeding. I am not sure how to compare kcal/cup to the 300 calories in 4 ounces. 

There are 468kcal/cup of the kibble. But I am sure there is not 468000 calories in that cup as it suggests. So something is freaky in how they provide calorie data for kibble. I have asked dog food reps and they look at me like I come from Mars.


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## Woodreb (Oct 27, 2008)

The best that I can tell is that we have a habit of talking about calories when we should be talking about kcal. 

For example - at this site: http://www.lose-weight-with-us.com/calories-in-ground-beef.html they talk about kcal content of a typical serving of ground beef and the number is pretty much the same as the "calories" that you see on other nutritional labels. So use 300 kcal for the beef and 468 kcal/cup x number of cups to do the calculation and go from there. The exact kcal content for the beef will vary somewhat depending on the fat content, with more kcal in the higher fat content ground beef.


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## GSDSunshine (Sep 7, 2009)

> Originally Posted By: selzer There are 468kcal/cup of the kibble. But I am sure there is not 468000 calories in that cup as it suggests. So something is freaky in how they provide calorie data for kibble. I have asked dog food reps and they look at me like I come from Mars.


There is a difference between a calorie, and a Calorie. The first is a scientific measurement for energy. 

Whenever you see a Calorie in food, it is infact 1000 calories. So teh kcal/cup =Cal/cup. IF that makes any sense...


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## selzer (May 7, 2005)

Ok, so at some point they are trying to confuse the laymen. 

I know about calories as a scientific measurement, and when the say kcal, I know that that is 1000 calories. The problem is that we are supposed to be eating 2000 Calories per day to lose weight and one little cup of this would be way over that. 

Your explanation makes sense. But I wish everyone would be on the same page. Calorie and calorie should be equal and probably just listed as kcal. 

I think I got it. Thanks. I think the scientific part of me chokes at this lack of proper designations.


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## Woodreb (Oct 27, 2008)

Actually I think the laymen are the ones causing the confusion and people in general tend to think and talk about "calories" when they should be talking about kilo calories instead. 

I know how you feel about proper designations. Sometimes it drives me nuts when people talk about the bad "chemicals" and the good "organics" like they are not basically chemicals as well - simply because chemical is now the shorthand for "synthetically produced chemicals" as opposed to "natural product chemicals".


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