Food recomendations?

nlkeple · 09-25-2007, 08:24 PM

I just adopted a 5 year old Female pomeranian that is over weight she is about 20 pounds, and she should be 10. Right now she is eating Beneful because that is what she was eating at her old house and she just got here so I have to transition her. I really need a dry prepared food, I would love to do homemade but I just can't. I have seen the lists with the food scores. But I wonder if I need to look for something specific since she is overweight, and a toy breed? Any information or recommendations would really be appreciated.

SparkleGold · 09-25-2007, 08:40 PM

You should try one of the Freshpet's dog food rolls. I have been using their brand since early this summer. My dog has been doing amazing on it. Here is a link to the website, they have a video too and it gives you an easy summary about their product. weight gain, from what i understand is mostly assoicated with high carbonhydrate. Homestyle Select has very low carbonhydrates so it might help.

http://www.homestyleselect.com/difference/index.htm

cascabel · 09-25-2007, 08:44 PM

IMO the best way to take weight off a dog is to feed it a high quality food that will give it all the nutrients it needs, but just to feed less of it. If you can afford it, my personal favorite is Timberwolf organic foods. There are a lot of other great foods out there though and it sounds like you are familiar with the dog food analysis website. Anything with 5 or 6 stars would be great.

It may be hard switching from a food like Beneful that is full of fillers since the dog will be used to eating a large volume of food. However you can always start off by adding some filler to the high quality food (like non-sodium green beans or pumpkin) and slowly diminish the amount of filler you are adding so that the dog hardly notices the change.

Also, just to check....has the dog been tested for hypothyroidism? I mean double the normal weight is pretty significant so you definitely want to rule that out as a contributor otherwise any attempts at weight loss may fail if she does have a thyroid condition. Good luck and thanks for adopting an adult dog!

nlkeple · 09-25-2007, 08:52 PM

We just got her 1 week ago, and she has a vet appointment next week to get a full checkup and I already told the vet how overweight she is and that I wanted to have her rechecked. I say re checked because the person who I got Lady from says that she was tested for problems related to her weight and that after the tests her vet said that she just needed to not be feed table scraps. Of course this is second hand information given to me by someone who didn't want her anymore, which is why I am having her rechecked at her appointment.

cascabel · 09-25-2007, 09:00 PM

That's great that you have a vet appointment scheduled. She sounds like a lucky pup to have found an owner who cares so much!

nlkeple · 09-25-2007, 09:33 PM

I would love to take credit for being organized enough to get her to the vet right away, but I can't. The reason I have to be so prompt for the vet appointment is so that I can get her heartworm prevention before she comes due for her next dose, and while I am sure heartworms are a problem everywhere, I live in Florida so I can't slack on that issue. And while I am there anyways, I might as well have her completely checked since she is new to our family. Plus she was not fixed when we got her and she went into a heat cycle, so I have questions for the vet like...why couldn't she have waited a week or two because then she would have been fixed and we wouldn't have to be going through a heat cycle?

squirt1968 · 09-25-2007, 10:57 PM

When I switched from beneful to natural balance I mixed it for only a few days and then junked the bene had no problems no loose stool or anything. Tnhe dog is a shih tzu

briteday · 09-25-2007, 10:57 PM

I would let the vet check her out. But having two small toy dogs myself (one is a pom, the other is an overweight papillon...thyroid normal, no change in diet) I am constantly watching their weights and adjusting their ration as necessary.

My pom's maintenance allotment (to maintain 10-12 pounds, yes she's a large pom) of premium kibble was 1/4 cup twice/day. If she is getting LOTS of exercise, more than two 30-minute walks twice/day then she can have 1/3 cup twice/day. (we now feed raw but her ration remains the same, per volume)

Our papillon should weigh about 10 pounds and was up as high as 13 pounds. She gett a scant 1/4 cup twice/day. At that amount she was losing the right amount of weight every 4 weeks and is down to 10.5 pounds now.

If the vet check is normal for thyroid and anything else that might affect weight I would switch to a premium food at 1/3 cup twice/day. Wait 6 weeks and re-weigh the dog. If you have a Petsmart nearby with the vet in the back of the store they have a scale that is at the desk back there, available to you even if the vet part is closed. Just remember to weigh her on the same scale every time. If your vet is closer and doesn't mind a quick weigh in then do it there. But try to use the same scale every 4-6 weeks.

If she isn't losing on 1/3 cup x2, then I would reduce it to 1/4 x2/day.

Also try to increase her exercise. Our pom is only two but she is a constant ball of fire, always playing, jumping, chewing, chasing...

Our pom wasn't spayed either when we adopted her and she was just finishing a heat cycle. Remember to be careful for an entire 4 weeks from the time she started bleeding. Even after they have stopped bleeding they are still fertile and a male will do almost anything to get to her. Do not leave her in the yard unsupervised for even a minute.

collies4ver · 09-25-2007, 11:28 PM

My rat terrier got pretty portly and I had to cut her all the way back to 15 kibble twice a day to get her to lose weight. Yes, 15 and I counted them. I don't use weight loss formulas, full of fillers and carbs which don't help the problem. Just a very high quality food and feed less. I use no grain low carb foods and raw.

nlkeple · 09-27-2007, 10:04 AM

Our local feed store sells chicken soup dog food, and recommends it. I really trust his judgment. We are such a rural area and the feed store is such a fixture in our community he would never recommend something he didn't believe in. Our vet wants her to have 150-200 calories per day, her appointment is next week, and after he tests her for problems because of her weight he said we could discuss it more and make any adjustments based on her test results. 1/2 cup of the chicken soup food is 168 calories which works out perfectly. I am not really sure how to space her meals out though. I have heard that toy dogs should have food more often because it is harder for them to regulate their blood sugar. Is that true? She prefers to eat in the night time. I think she waits all day hoping that she won't have to eat dog food. I think she believes that I will eventually cave and feed her people food. I really think it is because at her last home they told me she got ALL of the table scraps (4 adults and 2 kids would scrape their Breakfast, lunch and dinner dishes right into her bowl) and she also got food treats throughout the day. I just got her the new food yesterday and will be mixing for a few days, but my plan is to put down 1/4 cup and leave it there she will pick at her food throughout the day but I really think she is trying to wait for the people food. By dinner she will have usually eaten her 1/4 a cup, and I can give her her second 1/4 cup. she usually ignores that until after the kids go to sleep (I am not sure why since her food is in a quiet area not near where the kids play). But after they go to bed she usually eats the second 1/4 cup as a meal. No matter what she eats or doesn't eat all food gets picked up before I go to bed (that is just my personal preference, I just don't like the idea of having food out while I'm asleep and if it stays out overnight it will be old and stale).

I guess my big questions are is the blood sugar thing true about toy breeds? (I will ask the vet next week when I go to double check but in the mean time I would like to know)

Is it ok for her 1st half of her food to be out in her bowl all day, and for her to get her second half at dinner time? In my past experience with my parents dogs, they have always only gotten their food served at dinner and that was that but Lady is a picker and I don't know about the blood sugar thing, so I am not really sure if I am being lenient or if it is better for her because of the blood sugar thing.

Do any of you use chicken soup dog food? Is that a good choice?

Sorry for all the questions. It's just that Lady has had a tough life up until now and I really want to do the right thing for her (really all dogs deserve to have the right thing done for them), but I do not know enough about a lot of these issues to do the right thing all by myself.

I almost forgot. On Saturday she will have been here almost two weeks. From the first day she got here, I have been careful about what I will or will not feed her. She was eating Beneful before so I continued that until yesterday when I talked to the man at the feed store, now I am mixing for a few days before I change her completely. I also have not given her cookies, for a snack I will give her a piece of apple (no stem, no seeds), and if she is acting hungry I put green beans into her dinner serving to help her feel full. She got some egg in her food the other day, and will continue to on an every so often basis, but with just her food and beans, with a few apple pieces, she seems to be already losing a little bit of weight. I also walk 1.5 miles every morning and every night and I know that she was not exercised at her old house but she seems to handle the walk fine and the half way point is a neighborhood park area with access for her to water. Unfortunately she went into heat the other day so now I am afraid to take her on the walks in the neighborhood until she is no longer fertile, I don't want to give the neighborhood dogs a road map to my house, but as soon as she is not fertile she will get back to "walking her butt off."

GreatDaneMom · 09-27-2007, 01:20 PM

alright, well i know really nothing about toy breeds, ive never had one. im a big dog kind of person. but i did just switch my dane over to Chicken Soup. its only been a few days and shes already showing a lot of improvement. shes got more energy, less doo doo, shes putting on her much needed weight, and her coat is starting to get a little better (but im sure thats because she got a bath last night with her new shampoo!). my pup really loves the chicken soup too, i was trying to switch her over, and i usually mix for a few days while decreasing the old food, but she wasnt going to have that. she just pain would NOT TOUCH her old food. i personally really like the food.

starry15 · 09-27-2007, 05:51 PM

I reccomend nutro natural choice

GreatDaneMom · 09-27-2007, 06:10 PM

nutro isnt that good... the first three ingredients on one bag are "Lamb Meal, Ground Rice, Rice Flour, Rice Bran," sure lamb meal is good, but the next are rice, rice, and rice... all fillers, ground rice is the only of those 3 to hold any nutritional value. heres another "Chicken Meal, Rice Flour, Ground Rice, Rice Bran" chicken meal good, then yuck, alright, yuck. plus you dont want a food that has your grain that far up on the list of ingredients, or listed THAT many times. thats three quarters all filler in the first 4 ingredients.