BoneZone® Press & Media Centre

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

BUNDABERG-REGION INVENTOR TAKES THE “FORGOTTEN HALF OF FEEDING” TO KICKSTARTER WITH BONEZONE®

BUNDABERG, QUEENSLAND - A Queensland-developed dog-feeding system preparing to launch on Kickstarter on 31 August 2026 is asking a question its inventor believes deserves far more attention:

We spend enormous amounts of time deciding what our dogs should eat. But what does the dog physically get to do while eating it?

BoneZone® began as a practical response to a familiar problem. Substantial foods, bones and long-duration chews are usually given to dogs loose, leaving the dog to hold, brace and work them against its paws, theground, floors, furniture or whatever else provides resistance.

Petelli Ventures spent years developing a physical alternative.

BoneZone® is a modular Structural Feeding™ and chewing apparatus for dogs. It secures appropriate bones, substantial foods and long-duration chews to a stable physical structure, creating controlled resistanceagainst which the dog can grip, pull, tear, scrape, lick, gnaw and work.

The apparatus came first. The language came later.

After years of observing dogs using successive BoneZone prototypes, Petelli recognised that the problem it had been engineering around was larger than simply stopping a bone from being dragged around the yard.

The food itself may have structure, but in a domestic environment the physical resistance needed to work against it is often left entirely to chance.

Petelli now calls its defined approach to this physical side of feeding Structural Feeding™.

“For years I thought I was solving a loose-bone problem,” Petelli founder Pete said. “Eventually I realised the clamp wasn't really the point. If the dog pulls, something has to push back. We had spent years engineering that counterforce without having a proper name for the broader feeding approach behind it.”

Structural Feeding™ is not a diet, a recommendation that every dog should eat bones, or a replacement for veterinary or nutritional advice. It concerns the physical presentation and management of appropriate substantial foods and long-duration chews.

Petelli has also developed a public Five-Stage Structural Feeding™ Framework:

ASSESS → SELECT → SET → GRAPPLE → CHECK

The framework starts with the individual dog, moves through item selection and physical setup, observes how the dog actually works the item, and requires active reassessment as the dog, item, apparatus or environment changes during the session.

“BoneZone doesn't make an unsuitable bone or chew suitable,” Pete said. “The whole point of the framework is that you assess the dog, select the item, set the system properly, observe what actually happens and keep checking. Conditions change, so your decisions have to change with them.”

BoneZone® uses an adjustable aluminium Clamp-Post, independently positioned jaw assemblies with selectable jaw faces and multiple mounting configurations, allowing appropriate foods and chews to be presented at a controlled position and working height across different domestic
environments.

The system has evolved through years of CAD, prototyping and real-world use, much of it with Phoenix, Petelli's approximately 42 kg Belgian Malinois.

That development has also led Petelli to a broader question for veterinarians, animal-welfare researchers, behaviour specialists, pet-food companies and product designers:

If the physical mechanics of feeding matter, who has traditionally owned that problem?

Petelli is not suggesting that the pet industry deliberately ignored it. Instead, the company believes the subject may sit between established disciplines.

Nutrition considers what goes into the animal. Behaviour and welfare research examine what animals do and experience. Enrichment products create opportunities for activity. Product designers solve particular physical problems.

But when a dog grips and pulls against a substantial food item, something still has to provide the opposing force.

“Maybe nobody ignored the problem. Maybe nobody clearly owned it,” Pete said. “We didn't start with Structural Feeding as a theory and then invent a product to fit it. We built the apparatus first. The terminology came later, when we finally had to explain what the hardware had actually been enabling.”

BoneZone® will launch on Kickstarter on 31 August 2026.

Petelli intends to use the campaign not only to bring BoneZone® into production, but to open a wider discussion around the physical presentation of food and chews to domestic dogs and where that subject belongs alongside nutrition, behaviour, welfare and enrichment.

The company also intends to seek feedback from professional and working-dog handlers, including relevant Queensland Police contacts, without suggesting agency endorsement, testing or adoption.

And despite the broader argument that has emerged from the project, Pete says the original problem has not disappeared:

“There is serious engineering and a much bigger feeding discussion behind it now. But the original Australian explanation still works pretty well: got a loose bone? Clamp it.”

BoneZone® - a modular Structural Feeding™ and chewing apparatus for dogs.

Structural Feeding™ - developed by Petelli Ventures Proprietary Limited.

Media can access high-resolution images, clean B-roll, demonstrations, founder information and campaign links at:
https://petelli.com/pages/media

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Pete - Petelli Ventures

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