Hi all

I am new to champdogs and reading on here i have seen some good advice from all you fellow dog owners.

I wanted some adviced on which is the best food to feed an overweight irish setter, i have 2 setters 1 of which is a perfect weight which i show, the other is overweight she is more from working lines than showing lines so is slightly larger type anyway, i have been struggling to find something that is quality but also helps her to slim down.
She is excersied 3 times a day with 1hr in the am and pm and 1/2 midday, she is currently fed on JWB same as other dog but he gets tripe with his as it is hard to keep weight on him.  she loves the food and is always scavaging for more food from anywhere.  We do not give her anything other than the smallest amounts of food (well thats what it looks like), but every now and again i have caught he pinching things of my 2yr olds plate and in the bin grr little monkey.

Sorry to rant on a bit but any help will be much appreciated.

Hayley and her irish

Have you tried Burns? Alot of people have trouble keeping weight on their dogs with it.

Please dont feed a 'lite' food,theyre mostly fillers and way too many carbs and not enough meat :( . If you want to reduce the dry food,try substituting the taken out amount with veggies such as green beans,they make the dog feel full without adding the extra calories :)

Hi frodo

Thankyou for your reply no i have never tried Burns, i have tried the vegs before but she didnt seem to like them maybe i could try them but blend them up so then she will not think they are vegs, althought she seems to eat everything in sight see is darn fussy when it comes to dog food and veg.

Hayley

I would definately give the Burns a try then,it is naturally low in fat so you wont have to try so hard for your dog to lose weight,LOL ;) Have you tried Naturediet? It's a wet food in a vacuum sealed pack,,you could try mixing a little of that in for palatability,most dogs love it :D

The only thing i dont like about Burns is that it has rice as the first ingredient,it should be meat,we are afterall feeding dogs,not rabbits :rolleyes: but it's definately better than 99% of the commercial foods available!

You will be better off financially and nutritionally in my opinion if you feed less of a good quality food, and if as is likely the dog feels hungry add a filler like cooked cabbage/carrot/pumpkin/marrow/green beans to bulk it out.  If this is likely to be a long haul then possibly a multivitamin supplement to mek up for the reduced rations.

I find that for a loss of a few pounds I have had best results by cutting the food to half maintenance rations.  Bear in mind that if the dog is overweight you will have been feeding more than maintenence amounts, so I would say give half of that and cut even more if needed.

If the dog is severely overweight then after a month I would up the food to about 2/3rds of what is a proper maintenence amount for a dog in correct weight.

I have a bitch who I had spayed last year who was always slim and in her youth a poor eater, but last couple of years was just right.  After spaying her maintenance amount is only 2/3rds of her companions.

Are you feeding at your dogs current weight or his ideal weight? It should be the latter :)

Dont cut her food down so much that she is starving as this will only make her scavenge more and she also wont be a happy chappy,feeding time is one of our dogs greatest pleasures,still try and make it enjoyable for her.Try and find some way of getting her to lose the weight without cutting her food down dramatically.

Hi there

I have Irish setters too and I have the same trouble with my older girl, she puts weight on very easily. I fed her on Burns and she did lose weight on it, but I did find she was constantly scavenging as she seemed to always be hungry. I now feed her a small amount of pedigree with a handful of tripe thrown in plus exercise helps to keep her weight down. She doesn't scavenge now and seems much happier with what she is getting,and I find it easier to keep her at show weight. My youngest girl is perfect show weight at the mo, but I can see her going down the same road as her Mum lol as she is a greedy wee horror and will eat anything in sight.  hmmm what is it they say about dogs and their owners looking like each other :D :D I always have had trouble keeping my hand out the biscuit tin :D :D

My cocker put on weight during the F&M due to restricted exercise.  Reducing her intake did not work as it made her restless, begging reached rediculous proportion and I was frightened she might mug passing children :)  You could add veg etc as a filler but I found using a complete Lite diet, Beta as this was the brand she was on anyway, very effective as all unwelcome behaviour ceased and she appeared very satisifed.  Weight was lost slowly but steadily and she was soon back to her good figure. 

Absolutely! Those of us who've ever tried to lose weight know that it's doomed if we feel hungry! Simply cutting down the amounts just doesn't work for anything more than the odd pound or two.

Can highly recommend Pro Plan lite diet.  Has worked a treat for my overweight collie and he loved it.  We are now just swopping him back to the maintenance diet and so far so good.  We did feed this in conjunction with increasing his exercise.  He didnt scavenge on it and appeared to be satisfied.  I did also feed a small amount of naturediet lite as well.

As i've said before i would stay far away from 'lite' diets,the ingredients are more often than not worse than the regular food line,however it is up to you what you do and if the ingredients bother you or not :)

They don't bother me I trust the professional nutrionists to get the balance right :)  The only thing that bothers me is if the dog is enjoying it, is satisfied, it is giving it a healthy energy for its daily activities and returning it to a trimmer shape.  I have to admit the lowest of my considerations is whether it would bother you or not :)

:D

:-D

Actually Isabel i was replying to Hayley :rolleyes:

Please do not turn this thread into another BARF versus Complete slanging match. By all means offer advice on what you would feed to reduce a dogs weight. Please refrain from turning yet another thread into a 'feeding complete foods is abuse' row. Thank you :)

hiya hayley,

just a quick comment about Burns-they have a 'High Oats' variety which is 6% fibre-double that of the other varieties. Its supposed to make your dog feel fuller for longer so you can feed less. I had my lab on it for a few months. She did lose a few inches, but i'm not sure if it was all down to the food, or if it was just a contributing factor. The only downside of the High Oats is that isn't different flavours-its just made with chicken or chicken! She always seemed quite content eating it though.

nic