When
I take Diesel out of walks I often
get stopped by
people asking what breed he is, after they have finished saying what a
lovely
looking dog he is they often finish by saying something along the lines
of
"he's skinny, isn't he?" When people first started saying this, I
made up excuses to explain why he was under weight, even though I
believed he
wasn't. I started to get a bit worried that maybe he was skinny, so I
increased
his food but found that he left the extra amount and tried to bury it
for later
and got stressed when he couldn't, so I reduced it again and I began to
worry
that there was something wrong with him. When I took him to the vet and
told
him I thought he maybe underweight because so
many people were telling
me so,
he told me not to listen to them, and that Diesel is a lean, fit and
healthy
dog which is
exactly how he should be. I went home feeling very happy
and
confident that I was doing right by Diesel.
However
it didn't take long for my
confidence to be knock
down again, within a couple of weeks and several more people saying
that Diesel
is skinny and a lot of them saying I should find a better vet (after
telling
them that my vet said he is fine) I began to worry again, so I sent an
email to
Burns pet nutrition (with some photos of Diesel) asking if he is under
weight
and telling them that people were saying that he is skinny. A lady
replied
saying exactly the same thing as my vet, and that by keeping Diesel
lean
(especially while he is growing) I am reducing the risk of him
developing
arthritis, hip dysplasia, etc. later in life. She also forwarded my
email to
John Burns himself, who replied "do not allow people to knock your
confidence, there are so many overweight dogs about that people are so
used to
seeing fat dogs, that when they do see a dog at it's ideal weight they
think
its skinny." My confidence was restored again, but I do not let people
knock it down again and I carry copies of the following with me so that
when
people make comments like "Isn't he skinny!" I just hand it to them
and walk away without a word.
A
study was carried out with 48 Labrador
Retrievers from
8 weeks old until death. The puppies were paired within their litters
according
to sex and body weight, and randomly put into either the control or the
lean
fed groups.
The
control group were allowed to eat what
they wanted
for 15 minutes a day. The lean fed group were fed 25% less than their
litter
mate in the control group. The same diet was used for all the dogs;
just the
amount fed was different.
The
study showed that the lean fed group lived on average
1.8 years longer, and were consistently healthier than their littermates.
1.
Promotes a longer and healthier life
2.
Reduces potential for developing
chronic diseases such as
arthritis, diabetes and heart diseases (just to mention a few)
3.
Reduces risk during surgery (if needed)
4.
Helps maintain healthy blood sugar
levels
5. Helps maintain healthy blood pressure and heart rate
1. The
outline of the dogs ribs
can be felt or seen
2.
The dogs waist is visible when viewed
from above
3.
The abdomen is tucked when viewed from
the side
The
results of this study were originally
published in
JAVMA May 1st 2002 (vol 220, No 9).
There
is an estimated 40% of dog owners
that have over
weight dogs, and most of them don't even realise that their dog is
overweight.
For diagrams and body weight guide click here.
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