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Helping Your Dog Lose Weight

January 30, 2011 by  
Filed under Health, Tips

2 Comments

As you know, we’re taking the Eukanuba 28-Day Challenge this coming month. Along with several other bloggers in the DogTime Blog Network, we’ll be trying out our choice of Eukanuba dog food and writing about it over the coming weeks.

The food we selected to try is the Eukanuba Weight Control Natural Lamb and Rice Formula, designed with 21 percent less fat than the comparable Eukanuba Adult Natural Lamb & Rice Formula. Changing to a weight control formula is one way we are working to reduce both Irie and Tiki’s weight by a few pounds this month. Lower activity levels during the winter months (and probably too much dedication to their jobs as our official treat testers) has added a few pounds to each of them. Like many do in the new year, we’ve resolved to tackle this weighty issue right away while it is still a matter of just a few pounds.

Along with the change in diet, we’re also going to be increasing their activity level with longer, more strenuous walks. We have a steep hill directly behind the house and plan to take one of our two walks every day up the hill for a better workout for them (and for us!)

What other ways can you help your dog lose weight?

  • Measure your dog’s food. Are you really feeding your dog the recommended amount or is it more? Grab a measuring cup and find out.
  • Substitute healthy treats. Look for healthy treats to give your dog. Did you know that many dogs love the chew on raw carrots?
  • Trim the treats. Set aside a certain number of treats for your dog every day and make sure that’s all that’s handed out by you and everyone else in the family.
  • Deduct training treats from the day’s food allowance. We use a lot of training treats (small bits of cooked chicken are a favorite) with our dogs so it’s important to deduct some food from the morning and/or evening meal to compensate for those extra calories.

Disclosure: We received one free bag of  Eukanuba Weight Control Natural Lamb & Rice Formula to review. We were not compensated for this review and all opinions are strictly our own.

About Paris Permenter and John Bigley

DogTipper publishers Paris Permenter and John Bigley are a husband-wife team of full-time writers. The couple has authored over two dozen books and 2,500+ magazine articles.

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  • Brandi

    “The food … designed with 21 percent less fat than the comparable Eukanuba Adult Natural Lamb & Rice Formula.” The food is also designed with corn meal as the first ingredient…

    There is no way I’d feed my dogs any Eukanuba brand, whether free or not. Their list of ingredients has a number of red flags including corn meal as the first ingredient, chicken by-product as the third, fish meal – typically also a by-product – as the fourth. Plus for Eukanuba’s quality, it is very overpriced.

    32 lb bag of this food = $60.49
    30 lb bag of Canidae ALS grain free (a much higher quality food) = $50.79.

    There are a number of cheaper, higher quality foods – Canidae, Taste of the Wild, Chicken Soup to name a few.

    Buy any one of them and follow the four steps above. Your dog will still lose weight and will be eating a much healthier diet.

  • http://www.dogtipper.com Paris and John

    Thanks for your comment, Brandi. We’re going to be interviewing a nutritionist at Eukanuba; I, too, am concerned about the corn meal. (We don’t have chicken by-product as the third ingredient on our bag but brewers rice.) It’s our job to check out various products so we’ll be checking on this one and reporting back!

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