You may hear this term used more and more as you evolve into a raw feeder---it will become the foundation of your whole raw prey diet. The Frankenprey model describes the process of creating a whole raw prey animal by using bones, meat, and organs from other animals---like Frankenstein. In the wild, cats eat small birds, rodents, snakes, rabbits, etc. This creates a perfect meal where organs, bones, and muscle meats are in complete proportion. For those of us unwilling to hunt birds and mice for our carnivores (yet still desire to be raw feeders), we turn to Frankenprey. As a side note, there are companies that humanely euthanize prey animals like chickens, rodents, quails, and rabbits; we'll discuss that in another article.
The Frankenprey model follows a strict 80/10/5/5 guideline and most raw feeders will follow that over a week's worth of meals instead of a day's worth of meals. You'll see this average weekly intake is more convenient and carries a smaller risk of contamination and vitamin/mineral overload; raw parts are thawed in bulk and fed as soon as possible. There must exist a balance; maybe not a perfect daily balance, but a balance nonetheless. 80% of weekly meals should contain muscle meat, 10% of weekly meals should be made of bones, 5% of weekly meals should be made of liver, and 5% of weekly meals should contain secreting organs like kidneys. This sums up to 100%.
So, in other words, Frankenprey is just taking raw parts and pieces of animals to create the nutritional balance and wholeness a carnivore would get from hunting and eating own prey. For various reasons, raw feeders can't or won't feed a whole prey animal, so we must create the properly balanced meal using raw food available to us. Kidneys may come from lamb, calves, beef, etc. Chicken, turkey, and beef livers are easy to come by. Bones are a bit tricky as you don't want to start with thick bones right away and will need to transition from meaty bone strips to larger pieces as the animal's jaw strengthens. Muscle meat creates the largest portion of the Frankenprey diet and is the easiest to come by---beef, chicken, turkey, lamb, bison, duck, etc. The entire process is much simpler than one may think and the top 5 questions beginners ask are:
'What are the benefits of raw versus canned or dry food?'
'How much raw do I feed our cat and in what proportions?' (LINK: TBA)
'Where do I purchase raw meat, organs, and bones?'
'I want to be a raw feeder, where do I start?'
'Isn't feeding raw expensive?' (LINK: TBA)
To answer these, click on the corresponding question and it will take you to the appropriate article.
