Looking for best ways about how to get my dog to lose weight? Fat and chubby dogs may look adorable, but their consequences are not adorable at all!! Some breeds may suffer a lot due to weight gain and be at risk due to many health problems arising because of it. Therefore, it’s essential to maintain your dog’s obesity and plan the right track to overcome it. Here is complete guide on how to help my dog lose weight with simple food and exercise tips.
Why Should My Dog Lose Weight?
Gaining a few pounds to its ideal body weight can make your dog suffer from various health problems throughout its life. No doubt when a dog gets overweight it must be suffering or developing some diseases, risking its health all along. Here are some types of disorders developed in your pup due to obesity:
- High blood pressure
- Osteoarthritis
- Diabetes (type 2)
- Heart-related diseases
- Intra-abdominal cancers
- Frequent joint injuries
If your puppy is suffering from any of these diseases or showing symptoms, you immediately need to check over their body weight condition.
Dogs suffering from obesity have shorter lives than the normal weighed dogs. Overweight dogs are not physically playful, lie around all day doing nothing, look lazier, and interact less with family members. Never take their lethargy to their general laziness, as overlooking these simple yet dangerous signs can lead your dog to have imperilling health issues.
How To Help My Dog Lose Weight?
Dog losing weight is not simple as it sounds. Make sure to take assistance and approval from your veterinarian before starting this weight loss program for your pup. Also, always ask your veterinary healthcare team to run a physical examination on your puppy to ensure the smooth running of your program without any hindrance. Factors to be included while running a weight loss program for your dog:
- Do not be too liberal by giving your dog an unhealthy amount of treats, table scraps, and food, causing them to gain weight at some point of the day. Table scraps are harmful to your dog and can cause stomach distress.
- Switch your doggo’s regular treat with some low calories and healthy diet meals such as carrots, celery, green beans, helping them lose weight in this way.
- While training, your pup, remember to reward it with some treats of low calories containing some fresh fruits and vegetables.
- Giving too many high-carbohydrate-containing meals will make your dog gain weight. Their meat intake needs to be maintained by you and replaced with protein-rich dog food.
- Increasing their physical activities and exercising per day will help in weight loss. To engage your dog in such activities, you need to get involved in it too. Give your dog time and play with all-together. This process, in turn, can help both you and your dog lose weight and maintain health.
Weight Loss Through Exercise
When you thinks about how to help your dog lose weight? Exercise comes in to the first place. Canines do enjoy outdoor activities, and including them in your weight loss program is both fun and beneficial for your dog. Running, walking, swimming, playing fetch games can be some outdoor exercises that you can include in your schedule. Obese dogs may not show interest in such activities, but don’t lower down your enthusiasm as these creatures take energy vibes from their owners. You should always remain upbeat and try your best to engage your pup in physical activities. They, at some point, will show some movement and interest, which will be the first goal towards your success.
Always start slow and increase exercise over time once your pooch is habitual. Constantly expand your daily walking distance with your pup. Strive for a 30-minute brisk walk, and taking slight breaks in between is beneficial rather than taking frequent breaks.
Make The Exercise Fun
Dogs love to exercise and do outdoor activities. And this activity can be fun to make your canine buddy take an interest in it more than usual. Agility training in some dog training grounds with fun training equipment can play a huge role in maintaining the fun and liability of the exercise. In addition, it can help you communicate with your dog while doing some actions and build a strong bond between you two.
On a hot day, indoor activities sound perfect. However, dogs of all breeds can overheat. Therefore, doing indoor exercise would be better. Early morning and late-night walks are ideal for maintaining your pup’s physical movement.
How to Put a Dog on a Diet?
Always make changes in your dog’s diet slowly and steadily. Allow at least a week to make more transitions in their diet so that the schedule can run smoothly and without any restriction. Feed them a mixture of new and old diets for the beginning, gradually switching off to the new diet. Use measuring cups for proper meal intake of your pet. Provide weight management dog food, reducing the amount of meal constantly. Take help from your vet for the schedule and diet structure. There are so many best dog food for weight loss option available on Amazon, you can opt for one.
Weight-loss Maintenance
While making your dog losing weight, you should plan a strategy and take advice from a vet so that your dog may not lose too much weight during the process. Make use of dog calorie calculator, controlling your pets desire for high-calorie treats is not easy as it seems. You can make simple homemade dog food for weight loss with low fat and carbohydrates.
First, avoid giving your favorite food to your dogs, which may lead them to life-risking diseases and a shorter life. Instead, try to establish and stay within caloric boundaries as much as possible. Failing to maintain the schedule can make your dog suffer from breathing problems and cancer. So make sure to have a tight and determined schedule.
Conclusion
Ask your veterinarian first before opt for weight loss food for dogs. There can be some underlying medical conditions such as hypothyroidism and hyperadrenocorticism, which usually occurs in older dogs, so making their diet change to lose weight when suffering from these can be risky. Hope you find how to help my dog lose weight is healthy manner.