Very young puppies almost never need a weight loss diet, but chubby young adolescents may benefit from dietary tips for fat puppies.
Growing puppies should not have their nutrition restricted without guidance from a veterinarian, as it can lead to health problems. Fortunately, there are some simple and safe things you can do.
Helping a Fat Puppy Lose Weight
One of the simplest ways to help your puppy lose excess weight is to eliminate or reduce treats and increase play sessions. These changes can help moderately overweight puppies lose weight.
Avoid free feeding or ad-lib, which can lead to overconsumption of calories. Instead of keeping the bowl filled for grazing all day, offer measured amounts during designated meals. The feeding guidelines on dog food packaging are just that—guidelines. You need to customize the amounts for each pet, and your veterinarian can help.
Many overweight adult dogs perform better with low-calorie or “lite” foods.
Weight reduction diets often replace fat in food with indigestible fiber, dilute calories with water, or “bulk up” the product with air. These diets may not always be appropriate for young puppies, as they may not have the necessary nutrients for growth.
Always be sure to clarify any diet changes with your veterinarian. Be cautious with “lite” and “diet” foods for puppies—they’re not magic. It just means the food has fewer calories than the “regular” food from the same brand.
In fact, pets can gain weight on “lite” diets if fed inadequate amounts or if their begging and scavenging patterns increase.
A “lite” food brand may have more calories than the “regular” food from another brand. Additionally, some pets eat more of the diet food to make up for lost calories, so even if you feed a “lite” formula, measured amounts are still necessary.
Adjust your puppy’s feeding schedule. Divide the daily amount of food into four or even five small meals per day to help your pet not feel deprived.
Since metabolizing food consumes energy, giving several small meals throughout the day will use more energy than one large or two meals, thus burning calories more quickly. Once your puppy reaches the target weight, serving meals twice a day will maintain a healthy feeding schedule.
Therapeutic Diets
When young dogs are truly obese, they need medical supervision from a veterinarian and sometimes a special therapeutic weight loss diet.
Most major pet food manufacturers offer special weight reduction diets that are available directly through your veterinarian. Each offers innovative formulations that help pets lose weight safely.
Some therapeutic foods increase dietary protein to help the animal’s body burn fat. Others are designed to better regulate the body’s natural insulin levels so that calories are more easily burned rather than stored as fat.
Research shows that certain vitamins can affect how food is processed and stored in the pet’s body and affect weight loss.
For example, adding a vitamin-like substance called L-carnitine to the diet will increase the rate at which muscles burn fat for energy.
Other research has looked at the effect of vitamin A on the production of a natural hormone in the body called leptin. Researchers claim that leptin stimulates the production of fat cells, while an increase in vitamin A intake results in decreased leptin production and easier weight loss (at least in rats).
Exercise for Health
