Barfen on vacation: tips and alternatives
If you travel with your dog, you don’t necessarily have to do without barfing. What options you have on vacation to feed your dog with fresh meat, and what alternatives there are, we tell you here.
Are you one of those dog owners who prefer to prepare the food for your four-legged friend yourself and don’t like to leave your dog alone at home when you go on vacation? Barfing on vacation is unfortunately not quite as easy as you would like it to be as a convinced barfer. But: if you start with the preparations in time, feeding fresh meat on vacation is no problem.
What changes in the dog’s diet during the vacations?
The vacation season usually goes hand in hand with more exercise for the dog. Whether running, swimming or other activities, the dog organism then usually runs at full speed. It is not uncommon for four-legged friends to lose a pound or two during their time off. All the more important is the right feeding. If you barf your dog at home, you must consider these special features on vacation.
Where can you buy meat for barfing on vacation?
Of course, it depends on where you spend your vacation, but often you can barf your dog on vacation just as you would at home – and just need to adjust the portion sizes a bit. The prerequisite: a supermarket with a fresh meat counter or possibly even a butcher where you can ask for offal.
Tip: Find out about the conditions at your destination online before you start your trip. This way, you can locate butchers in advance who will sell you fresh meat. Vegetables, with which you supplement the food according to the Barf principle, you can usually get in any supermarket. Remember to pack a blender to be able to chop carrots and co.
Can the fresh meat be stored on vacation?
All this assumes, however, that there is also a sufficiently large freezer option at the vacation destination. So even if you can get meat to barf for your dog, adequate storage of the meat can be a problem. Accommodation such as hotels or camping cabins do not always have a refrigerator. In that case, it is necessary to rely on alternatives.
What are alternatives to barfing on vacation?
For those who are not able to get fresh meat for the dog or to store it appropriately, there are still Barf substitutes. For example, you can resort to dried meat, which you can simply soak in water on site and then serve to your four-legged friend.
Another substitute option, where your animal friend does not have to do without his valuable fresh meat: Pure meat cans. The food is particularly suitable for bridging the time in which you may not yet be able to shop at the vacation destination, because you arrive on a Sunday, for example.
The canned meat can contain, among other things, offal, rumen, bone and cartilage and muscle meat, and can easily be enriched with vegetables and oil. It is therefore a good basis for a meat-heavy diet for your dog, as is required by barfing.
As a dog owner, you have even less effort when barfing on vacation if you switch to wet food at short notice. A complete food not only has a high meat content, but also contains a mix of vitamins, fiber and minerals.
Tip: If you are going on vacation on an alternative to Barf, then you should change the diet of your dog best already a week before travel. In this way, the digestive tract of your four-legged friend gets used to the substitute food very slowly. After the vacation it is then exactly the opposite. Then it is a matter of gently converting your four-legged friend back to barf.
