Hi everyone

I am just after a bit of advice, we have a 61/2 month old ess, he currently weighs 13.4kg he is very thin and boney.
He is fed on arden grange puppy junior large breed, he doe however have problems with his teeth, (I have just posted this in health) so not sure if this maybe why he is skinny???  even though he does eat.
Is there anyway to add extra weight onto him?? I am still feeding him three times a day as our dog trainer suggested this may help..
He has been wormed to date, The pet food supplier I use has recommended trying him with a mix of the AG puppy and the AG prestige, which has a high fat content.
Any advice most welcomed
Thanks
Lesley, Ben, Olli, Finn

Depends how much the exercise/work/walks burns off , does he have adequate rest times, after eating .We had a very small one training , turns out he had a pancreatic deficiency so his absorption of food was affected.

He gets 2 x 30 mins on lead walks per day (re-call not 100% yet) then rest of the time hes in the garden with the others
As soon as he has food, he will either just in his bed or up on the sofa for a cuddle.  We leave him roughly 40 mins to an hour then take him out for his last big walk (1 x 30 mins)
Then at around 10pm the three boys are taken into the garden before bed.
Apart from his teeth, he is perfectly healthy.
Vets recommended working dog food to get weight on, pet food supplier recommended the two types of AG

Ps, He didnt get off to a great start, when we first got him he was weighing in at under 2kg when he was 71/2 weeks old.
It then turned out the breeder had been feeding, beta adult dog food with adult bakers, that was topped off with cheap supermarket meat!!!!
We swapped him over onto the AG and he steadily put weight on.

Is he a working ESS?

In addition to his poor start it might just be the way he's bred to be.  My brother has one that he can't keep weight on very easily either.  I assume from your comments that even the vet has noticed?  If that's the case he must be very bony, poor lad, as most vets seem to prefer their clients light!

AG is a great food and he might benefit from a few different toppers to keep him keen - minced/chunked tripe is good as are tinned sardines.  Raw lamb breast is excellent but if he has teeth issues he might struggle with this (I haven't read your post on teeth yet).  Raw mince might be good though and is very easy for dogs to eat.

He's also at the age where his body is changing and most dogs go through a gawky stage - this might just be making him look worse.  Feeding 3 times a day is probably worth continuing for a while but you may also just have to wait this stage out.  :)

I have one who's just turned 4.  She's well-built and muscular now but as a pup, she was scrawny.  It's as if the food cannot sustain such a high energy breed?  We fed her on Royal canin complete with meat added(usually tripe) and we fed loads!  And often.  We kept her on 3 meals a day till she was over a year old and even now, if she misses brekkie a few days, you can tell quickly.  We got the frozen packs of meat from PAH and she went through one of those a day ontop of over the amount of recommended biscuit.  She also got all the left-overs from the family's meals too.

I can't comment on brands of complete foods as I personally feed Raw and wouldn't change. But, this may sound obvious but have you tried simply feeding more? If he will eat it and it doesn't upset his stomach I would just keep increasing it. If you are interested in topping with some raw I would go for anything with plenty of fat in it. ie breast of lamb if he's up to the chewing, failing that a really cheap fatty lamb or pork mince. (cheap mince usually contains more fat)
Can you get marrow bones? I think marrow is quite fatty and nutritious and it would give him something interesting to chew for his teeth too.

If you don't want to experiment with raw meat then maybe add an egg his dry? or tinned fish in oil/

I think it is easy to get hung up on what the packet says with quantities but I would always feed to condition and if they were underweight (not a huge problem in labs though, they are very easy to fatten up!) Feed as much good quality food as they can eat. (if your increasing quantities do it gradually though) and if they don't gain weight and seem to have a reasonable appetite  then I would be concerned about health issues.
Good luck, do let us know how you get on

I have made " satin balls" and given those to help weight gain and they have gone down a storm.

If you google you will find recipes, I can't manage links from my blackberry and my internet is down on my laptop.

Thank you all for your comments and ideas
Finn was meant to be from show lines, but when we got his pedigree through we discovered he is from both show and work lines!!! Dont really know if this makes a difference or not??
He is already as tall as my others which are from working lines.  when the others were pups they always looked stocky build, and a good weight on them.
Finn on the other hand is long legged, skinny, boney and a few inches of the others height already and he's only 61/2 months!!!
I must admit it never occured to me just to feed him more often :) we did have probelms with him when he was on four meals, where on the third he would be stick, which the vet advise to cut down to the three meals a day as she though his stomach just couldnt cope with the amount when he was on four!!
I have noticed the last few days he does look a bit better at his back end, thats since mixing the adult and puppy AG food :)

I have always fed the AG until 12 months, also when you cut meals you don't cut the amount of food (actually usually it goes up until about 9 months), so your just feeding more in one go, so what your vet said does not make sense, if the stomach is being overloaded at each meal they need more meals.

If a pup or dog is underweight it is often better to feed more meals so they don't eat as much in one go, in case this gives them the runs.

When I had a very picky (virtually anorexic bitch) I fed Arden Grange Prestige, and I have also reared puppies on this with excellent results.

Also yes I would expect Show bred springers to have more Bone, longer legs and probably be rangier pups, but if getting enough well covered as any other..

Lamb is a favourite for fat content , tripe builds body well , but if he cannot absorb fat well ...make sure the vet ok's this . AG etc and what you are doing gradually should help .Plenty of rest , supervised exercise.I however do not recommend raw egg white.Biotin is an organic compound, part of the vitamin B complex, essential for growth and well-being in animals .It functions in the formation and metabolism of fats and carbohydrates. It is widely distributed in nature and is especially abundant in egg yolk, beef liver, and yeast. A biotin deficiency can be induced by consuming large amounts of raw egg white,*** which contains a protein (avidin) that combines with biotin and makes it unavailable. Biotin is needed to synthesize fatty acids and convert amino acids to glucose in the body.
Biotin deficiency in animals is associated with dermatitis, loss of hair, muscle incoordination and paralysis, and reproductive disturbances.