Posts Tagged ‘Adult Dog Food’
Maybe you are changing from puppy food to an adult dog food or maybe you are changing from a regular dog food to a special diet food. What ever the reason, you need to know how to change your dog’s diet is a way that will be best for your dog and better for you as well. Sudden change in dogs’ diet often results in such stomach upset that bad gas, vomiting, and diarrhea occur. This is obviously not good for your dog. Not only is he not getting vital nutrients that he needs, but he can easily become dehydrated. The possibility of dehydration is higher according to the dog’s size. Smaller dogs, like babies, dehydrate faster than larger dogs. This is scary, since dehydration can lead to your dog’s death.
Any change in your dog’s main diet must be done gradually, over a week’s time. In addition to the above mentioned changes, changes can be something as simple as changing from one brand of dog food to another or changing from a hard food to a soft food. Plan the change in advance. For simplicity, this change is described in terms of feeding a small dog (10lbs or so). Make sure you have at least ½ of a small bag of your dog’s current dog food on hand and purchase the new dog food.
· Day 1: Mix ¾ c of the current food with ¼c of the new food.
· Day 2: Same as Day 1.
· Day 3: Mix ½ c of the current food with ½c of the new food.
· Day 4: Same as Day 3.
· Day 5: Mix ¼ c of the current food with ¾ c of the new food.
· Day 6: Same as Day 5.
· Day 7: You can now give your dog only the new food.
If your dog shows signs of stomach upset at any time, go back to the previous step and repeat for a couple more days. For Example: On Day 3 your dog develops diarrhea not long after eating; you would go back to mixing ¼ c of current food with ¾ c of new food for the next couple of days, then proceed with the next step. For larger dogs, the ratios should remain the same, no matter how much they eat.
Slowing Their Eating Style
Your dog may have a number of reasons for eating his food too fast. Often, other household pets and/or children are the cause. If you have these factors, your dog may be eating so quickly as an act of resource guarding (or food protection). They think that they have to hurry and eat or someone else will get their food. It may be true; your other animals may come in and eat food before the others can. To remedy this (whether it’s due to other pets or due to children), you will need to teach all of your dogs about sharing. Once the dog learns to share, he will not be as worried about missing out on food because he will understand that there will always be enough food to meet his needs.
It may also be that your dog is just a fast eater. This is much the same in some children, but just as dangerous. Choking is always a hazard when food is taken into the body and gulped without proper chewing. In this case, you will need to teach your dog to slow down. Here are a few tips to try that can help you teach this lesson:
· Get a large ball that is fairly heavy, enough so that he cannot knock it out of his food bowl very easily. Put the ball in the center of his dish and put his dog food around it. This way he will have to eat around the bowl and cannot grab huge mouthfuls at once and will force him to eat more slowly.
· Get an old cookie sheet and spread his dog food all over it. By spreading it out, he can only get smaller bites, which forces him to eat slower.
· Use your hands. Feed him a handful of food at a time, making him eat it out of your hands. Of course you won’t want to do this with moist food (yuck!). Make him wait between handfuls and he will eventually learn to eat slower.
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As you may imagine part of dog care is the basics of dog food. Most dogs have different stages of growth like humans, so they need different foods at those different stages. Some does have trouble with their digestive tracts and need to have specialized dog food. To compare dog food you need to know what most are made of, the cost, and why they are considered best for your dog. Keep in mind that puppy food is going to be softer and have a higher nutritional value for the growing dog than some of the other foods. Larger dogs will need an increase in certain ingredients, which accounts for the adult dog food.
Most dog food is plant or animal material that has been ground up for the dog to eat. Depending on the type of dog and their system you may even find food from the grocery store or health food stores is better for them than the actual dog food you can purchase. Speaking with a vet about the dog food brands is a great way to learn what they consider to be the best for your dog breed.
You will also find a choice between dry and wet dog food. Each will have its own benefit and you may find combining them is the best way to feed your dog the appropriate nutrition. Purina, Pedigree, and Pet Pride are just three of the top dog foods you will find in the stores. The contents of these three dog foods involve meat by products, meat and bone meals, grain, and horse meat. The less expensive brands are going to have fake substitutes for the dog food with a lot of grain fillers. This means your dog is not going to have the proper amount of nutrition in their meals.
Before you purchase any dog food you need to read the ingredients of the package to find out what they have used and how much nutrition is actually to be found in the dog food. Purina and Pedigree have several different options when you consider dog food. You will find healthy dog food, their regular brands, and different levels of dog food. These two are the best brands on the market for considering nutrition.
Dog food ingredients you will find in Purina or Pedigree include chicken, wheat, corn, lamb, beef, whitefish, venison, duck, rice, barley, potato, quinoa, buffalo, fruits such as apples and berries, salmon, carrots, green beans, and sweet potatoes. Depending on your dogs need you will find that some of these ingredients are found only in the allergenic specialty foods. Specialty foods for weight management, arthritis, breeding, dental conditions, diabetes, nursing females, and senior needs are also available.
All dog food is inspected by the food and drug administration to help make sure the meat and other ingredients are good. They also make sure that drugs are not involved in the process and that the food stays healthy and clean. If you are going to raw feed your dog you need to make sure you are buying healthy food that is stamped by the Paw Naturaw symbol as they inspect the meat to make sure it is not contaminated. It is not always a large deal, but sometimes brands have been recalled due to bad batches. You will find that recently there was a recall due to wheat gluten from a Chinese company.
Dog care is extremely important and feeding your dog properly is going to determine whether they live a healthy full life or become sick. Monitoring what your pet eats and making sure to keep human food off the menu is important. There are certain products dogs can eat and others they should not touch. Dogs often suffer from cholesterol issues because of human food full of fat and grease.
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Gerry Ronson – Dog Supplies, Dog Leads and <www.dog-toy.co.uk/dogproducts/?page=14″>Luxury Dog Beds.