At The Natural Canine, our BARF and PREY meals offer a balanced diet for your pet, with the right mix of protein, offals, bone, and vegetables. It's important to note that no single protein source can provide all the necessary micronutrients your pet needs.

While BARF is an excellent starting point, we highly recommend rotating meat sources. Variety is the key to ensuring your pet's long-term nutritional balance.

White Meats and Red Meats 

We want to ensure we include both white meats (Chicken, Turkey, Duck) and red meats (Kangaroo, Beef, Lamb) in our pets diets. At the very least in rotation you are wanting to include one of each. 

 Different proteins have different nutritional profiles, so supplying a variety to your pet will enable them to access a wider range of nutritional benefits.

For example: chicken liver and beef liver, although both the same organ, have vastly different nutritional profiles. Beef liver is nutritionally dense in B12 and copper, yet chicken is a great source of folate, iron and selenium (Source 1). This is only one example of how proteins can differ nutritionally. 

Check out this article by the Feed Real institute for a further in-depth scientific  explanation: https://feedreal.com/articles/variety-is-crucial

Grass Fed vs Grain Feed

Getting down to it, "You are what you eat". Interestingly, Grass-fed beef may contain less total fat than grain-fed beef, but a lot more omega-3 fatty acids and CLA, which are both linked to health benefits (Source 2). So where possible, we do recommend introducing a grass fed or free range protein.  

How often should I rotate?

There's not set rule on how often to change it up. Generally we recommend at least one each of white and red meat weekly, although our favourite orders to pack are the 'one of everything' of our range.

We do understand that not everyone may be in the financial position to purchase our more costly proteins, but we suggest trying our seasonal mixes for an additional variety. 

Overtime, we recommend including as many different options as you can come across. This doesn’t necessarily have to be every week or month.

Potential negative affects of not rotating 

Over time, sticking to the same flavours/proteins can lead to negative outcomes like increased fussiness, potential development of allergies/intolerances to the main protein, and nutritional gaps in the diet. It's crucial to introduce variety, especially for puppies, to prevent fussiness.

Source 1 (Chicken vs Beef liver nutritional profile)

Source 2 (Grass fed vs Grain fed)