Q & A: Weight loss
1 October 2001
Expert advice from Bailey’s nutritionist Katie Lugsden on keeping your pet in peak condition
Q. My Springer Spaniel is very active and spends all her time on the yard with me. She comes out hacking on the moors virtually every day and loves chasing rabbits and anything else that runs away from her! Although she eats quite a lot of food she is still losing weight. What do you suggest?
Janet Cox, Exmoor
A:This sounds like dog heaven to me! I’m assuming that your dog has been regularly wormed and generally appears to be healthy. If not then there could be an underlying problem such as a significant worm burden that is stopping your dog from putting on weight.
As your dog is eating plenty of food, it may be that the food you are giving her just doesn’t contain sufficient nutrients. Using a more concentrated feed will provide more nutrients in the same or even a smaller volume of feed.
For example, A spaniel consuming 350g of Baileys Complete Dog Mix would receive 70g of protein and 35g of fats and oil. If this was replaced with Buckeye Prokennel Original the same amount of food would supply 91g of protein and 52.5g of fats and oil.
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It may also be worth making food available to your dog all day so that she can help herself while she’s on the yard. You should find that this will increase her total intake per day compared to meal feeding.
If the problem persists you may have to try and reduce her activity for a while so that she uses some of the energy and nutrients she is consuming for weight gain rather than exercise.
