dog putting on too much weight

[gardenmugwump]

 Hi, I need a bit of advice from all of you dog lovers out there.I have a Lhasa Apso/ Shih Szu cross bitch ( Daisy ) who is 18 months old she was been fed on Eden's dry untill I  changed my second tiny dog  (Lilly )of 2.5 Kg to raw food because she would'nt eat dry. and Daisy  became very reluctant to eat the dry, so for convienence sake I  fed Daisy on raw . She is big for her breed and vet said she needed to be 10Kg max and she was untill she went onto raw , which she loves , but in the 2 months she has been on raw she has had it  has gained 1,6Kg. Neither dogs have treats during the day have a dental chew at night , Daisy is fed  2% of her body weight  and she is always hungry and has started scavenging  . I  feel so sorry for her, I can her her tum rummbling  and she is now sits looking at me while I eat, something she has never done before , she has never been given scraps from the table . She has  average activity , has anybody come upon anything simlar or have any ideas please.

gardenmugwump

[Dottie]

Hello and welcome to the forum. Fat has the highest calories, followed by protein. Raw diets are high in both which is fine if you have a dog that is active and has a good metabolism. If the dog is not so active and has a slow metabolism then it is possible to run into problems with weight control.

From what you say, your dog is possibly not suited to a raw diet because she is already at the lower RDA, putting on weight and is hungry. It could be helpful to look for something that is lower in fat - perhaps 10% to 12% dry weight. It  will mean going back to dry food but if you find something that has a good fibre content it should help to fill her up. You can use the Dog Food Directory to source a suitable product and if you need help with this, please ask.

I do not feed raw myself so I hope that we will receive more replies from people who do.

[Tinyplanets]

Hello and welcome to the forum. You don't specify what raw your dogs have. Is it a raw complete or do you put their meals together yourself. I have had a mixed experience feeding raw completes. I fed Natures menu cubes and my dog lost weight. She was producing bigger stools so I assume that she wasn't using a lot of what went in. I know the cubes contained dried peas and it looked like these were going straight through her. Initially she was keeping her weight stable on nutriment complete but as she has slowed down, the weight crept on. She now mostly has the low purine variety and is keeping her weight stable on this. While getting her weight down a bit, I fed less nutriment and added some brown rice, oatmeal made with water . or  vegetables.  She also has the odd home cooked meal. Not so often now as I am not sure if she is getting all that she needs in terms of nutrients.