underweight GSD-please help

[Rajat]

HI FRIENDS,

This is my first post on this forum. Well, to start with first thing first

> I live in Delhi, India so a reliable vet is not available, or none that I know of
> My puppy has a very sensitive stomach, as it appears, he is underweight as per the growth chart.

at 10 weeks he was 6.3 kilos(14 lbs)
now at 3 months he weighs 8.5 Kilos(18.5 lbs)

I feed him Hill's science plan puppy large, with brown rice, fish(boiled and boneless), carrots, spinach, sweet potato, potatoes, chicken, curd(yogurt)
because of his leaner looks my mom might have overfed him but his stomach got upset with loose stools, though now he is almost fine

Please advise me how can i overcome this with a proper feed, plus dog food is no good in India and my dog seems allergic to it.

NOTE: He has been de-wormed twice and it doesn't seems that he has any.

[Gretchen]

There are some good resources on this website about raw feeding.

We use a dehydrated raw food from the company, The Honest Kitchen. Once we switched our dog to a mostly raw diet and her GI problems stopped.

Can you research on-line some dehydrated type dog foods and see if they could be shipped to India? For the kind we use, we just add water, it is easy. The diet you posted looks good. Maybe you can post a photo of your pup.

[Pooky44]

Hill's dog foods are mostly of low quality. But Hill's is hooked into a LOT of
vet establishments. Try to find a higher quality, grain-free dog food.
They contain more calories that the dog will metabolize for proper
development.

[Rajat]

Thanks Gretchen I certainly will look into the raw feeding but shipping it from America or Europe doesn't seems to be an option to me.

@pooky44: Completely agree with you but apart from royal canin there is no better option available in India for dry dog food, a new brand Drools is available but is mite or less the same as RC.

Here are some pics of my puppy



Sent from Petguide.com Free App

[Anubis_Star]

He doesn't look underweight to me. A straight side shot, and then a picture from the top looking straight down onto his back and hips would help tell better though. GSDs are lanky, skinny puppies. They LOOK starved, but usually aren't. He may also just be a "smaller" pup.

Zeke was only 8lbs at 8 weeks of age. At 12 weeks of age I doubt he was much over 15-16 lbs. Now he's 90lbs and a perfectly healthy, LARGE boy.

BTW, your boy is VERY VERY cute

[jaymas100]

Hi, I use earthborn Holistic dog food. It is an excellent food, no grain or fillers. You feed hardly any to them. Try this Lily was underweight and we switched her food to this from royal canin and within 1 month she was up to weight, her coat looks amazing and she has endless energy.
regards
sam

[gagsd]

How often do you feed?
To gain weight, if you are not already, I would recommend 3-4 feedings per day.

[Rajat]

@jaymas100: I know nothing about holistic feeding. If you can help with some startup it would be great. secondly, I live in India not the america or Europe so kindly advise me about things i might get here itself, rather than planning an import.


@gagsd: I feed him four times a day at an Interval of four hrs in b/w

feeding goes as follows

8:00 AM >> 1/2 boiledEgg, 2 Roti(Oven baked Wheat bread), probiotics
12:00 Noon >> 2 potatoes/sweet potatoes, chicken boiled/fish,2 tsp. yoghurt
4:00 PM >> Brown rice, boiled pumpkin or 1/2 boiled egg, 2 tsp. Yoghurt
8:00 PM >> 1/2 boiledEgg, 2 Roti(Oven baked Wheat bread), probiotics

NOTE: I used to mix kibble or supplements with every feed but due to his stomach getting upset I have stopped that as of now.

[Anubis_Star]

Originally Posted by Rajat

8:00 AM >> 1/2 boiledEgg, 2 Roti(Oven baked Wheat bread), probiotics
12:00 Noon >> 2 potatoes/sweet potatoes, chicken boiled/fish,2 tsp. yoghurt
4:00 PM >> Brown rice, boiled pumpkin or 1/2 boiled egg, 2 tsp. Yoghurt
8:00 PM >> 1/2 boiledEgg, 2 Roti(Oven baked Wheat bread), probiotics

NOTE: I used to mix kibble or supplements with every feed but due to his stomach getting upset I have stopped that as of now.

Please discontinue the above feeding schedule, it is extremely lacking in nutrients and could cause major problems.

Any type of bread can't be digested by them, neither can potatoes or rice. Basically the only nutrients your pup is getting is egg and cooked chicken/fish. Also keep in mind you can overdue egg, my pup only gets 1 or so a week and Zeke only gets 2-3 a week.

If he seems to have a weak GI system, I would start feeding one food source and slowly mixing in others. An IDEAL diet, in my opinion, is one that represents a canine's natural diet. This would be a raw diet imitating the body of a prey animal. 80-90% meat and raw bone, and then 10-20% raw organ meat (kidney, liver, green tripe, etc). The key to a raw diet is VARIETY, changing things up. Adding in a couple raw eggs a week.

If you are unable to feed a well varied raw diet, then I would stick to just feeding the kibble for now, perhaps mixing in some yogurt (goat's yogurt is good for them, or even goat's milk). That way you at least know you are getting a decent amount of required nutrients, even if it is from a poor source. If it seems to upset him, try a different brand of dog food with a different meat protein source if you can (instead of chicken feed beef, for example). If he seems to do ok with the kibble you could slowly add in some cooked chicken/fish for added taste, but everything else is really just an unnecessary filler.

[Rajat]

Please discontinue the above feeding schedule, it is extremely lacking in nutrients and could cause major problems.

Any type of bread can't be digested by them, neither can potatoes or rice. Basically the only nutrients your pup is getting is egg and cooked chicken/fish. Also keep in mind you can overdue egg, my pup only gets 1 or so a week and Zeke only gets 2-3 a week.

If he seems to have a weak GI system, I would start feeding one food source and slowly mixing in others. An IDEAL diet, in my opinion, is one that represents a canine's natural diet. This would be a raw diet imitating the body of a prey animal. 80-90% meat and raw bone, and then 10-20% raw organ meat (kidney, liver, green tripe, etc). The key to a raw diet is VARIETY, changing things up. Adding in a couple raw eggs a week.

If you are unable to feed a well varied raw diet, then I would stick to just feeding the kibble for now, perhaps mixing in some yogurt (goat's yogurt is good for them, or even goat's milk). That way you at least know you are getting a decent amount of required nutrients, even if it is from a poor source. If it seems to upset him, try a different brand of dog food with a different meat protein source if you can (instead of chicken feed beef, for example). If he seems to do ok with the kibble you could slowly add in some cooked chicken/fish for added taste, but everything else is really just an unnecessary filler.

Well certainly you might be right about what you said but I really don't get this idea of keeping Dogs on 100% Meat diet. They are certainly carnivores but that's not all they have a very different system, their digestive system is also geared up for digesting starch.

A Simple theory is Dogs evolved from Wolves around 11,000 to 17,000 years ago to live among human settlements. Around the same time human were having a revolution of domesticating plants i.e. Agriculture which shows that preying on animals was not their only source and they thrived well on starch contents like rice and potatoes.

Secondly, In India, from where I belong, a lot of households keep their pets on a 100% vegetarian diet as most of their owners have religious beliefs against flesh eating and those dogs of theirs thrive well and live a long and happy life.