Dog losing weight

    • Gold Top Dog

    Dog losing weight

     We have a large lab mix dog, in our rescue program, who has lost 20 pounds since we original got her. We've done all of the necessary vet checks....vets are baffled as well. The last we had her on 8 or 9 cups a day and we have now upped that. We are going to give her a few days, on the added amount of food, and then take her back to the vets and get her weighed again and hope we have her at least stabilized. Our vets are putting the info out, on one of the sites for vets, and seeing if they can find out anything else. I just thought I'd put it out here and see if anyone has had this experience and it is just that this dog, for her energy level, needs this amount of food. When we first got her she looked good and was 80 pounds. She is quite active in the kennel. One of our members owns the Boarding Kennel and that is where we keep our fosters. I saw her today and she is one of those dogs who, when someone is near, jumps up and down in the kennel.....the kind that jumps on all 4's, as high as they possibly can.

    • Gold Top Dog

    Wow, I have three large dogs and they don't eat 8 cups a day total!

    The only thing that comes to mind is I once pulled a shelter dog that was underweight because of whip worms.

    • Gold Top Dog

    Maybe it's stress from being overstimulated in the kennel environment. 

    • Gold Top Dog

    Luna's been with me for 4 1/2 years and I fight to keep weight on her.  The conclusion we've come to and that she's really a 'big dog" that someone just forgot to let her have longer legs.  So she eats enough food for a 45 pound dog and it only keeps 30 pounds on her.

    You might try Prozyme -- sometimes that can help a dog process their food better but some dogs are just super active and need more food.

    Then again - if you don't know the dog's history there could be some wasting going on -- and you just plain can't know until time tells.

    • Gold Top Dog

    It immediately thought of EPI or SIBO, but without diarrhea or a decreased appetite, that wouldn't be very likely. 

    If he's in a boarding kennel situation, it may just be stress causing it.  Some dogs just don't do well in kennels.

    Before going to raw, Bevo ate between 8-10 cups of food per day.  His vet tested & tested & tested to try to figure out why he needed so much food, yet stayed so thin.  He never came up with anything other than he's insanely active & he just burns off that many calories in a day.  We joke that his legs are hollow, & the food just goes straight to try to fill them up.  Even now, he eats between 4.5-5 pounds of food daily. 

    • Gold Top Dog

     Thanks everyone. My take on it....at this point anyway, is that she is just way over active being in the kennel. We want to cover all basis though, before we adopt her out. We do have someone interested, so they are anxiously waiting. One of our personal dogs....last one we adopted......cattle dog/jack russel mix, or something along those lines, eats as much as our other dogs. They are all around 56 to 60 pounds and he is only 28 pounds. They all eat roughly 2 cups daily. When he stays at the kennel, we have to have him stay in one of the smaller rooms, cause of his activity level in the larger room. He is grand for agility though. And I thought our rescue border collie was fast. Here is a link to our foster on petfinder. This picture was taken earlier. Not sure what she is exactly. She is very tall and has a build somewhat like a sight hound.

    http://www.petfinder.com/petnote/displaypet.cgi?petid=14189729