Dental caries

The dog and the massive bone in comparison

A few weeks back i brought the dog to the vet for her routine vaccinations and an annual check-up. I like the demeanor of this new vet; he did not just have good doggie-skills, but he has good people skills too. Anyway, the dog has dental caries affecting the molars? (are they called molars in dogs too?) and i wondered whether i should be brushing her teeth. I am not the sort of owner who will pamper my dog, or at least i think so. I prefer my dogs rugged, after all they are animals. The vet recommended that i give the dog bones to gnaw on. He said dogs are scavengers and something about chewing stuff would stimulate something which would in turn reduce teeth decay. Clearly i wasn’t very attentive. I understood where he was coming from, the mechanism sounded familiar, so i simply agreed. Maybe he’s right, maybe there is another school of thought, because i recalled a dog trainer once advised me to feed my dogs only with dry kibble, because it is these sort of junk food that causes tooth decay. He also added that raw bones attract wasps which could potentially harm my dog. The latter point was what concerns me and made me decide to not feed the dog any bones. Plus last time i fed the dog lamb bones; she developed diarrhea and i got told off by the vet surgeon. Clearly there are many schools of thought, so you know what, what the hell. I will feed her raw bones and see how it goes.

Wondering whether i should leave the bone out for a few days for the dog to savour, or to throw it out before night. I don't want the bone decomposing in my yard.