Diet for Senior Lab

Is that ALL he recieves?? I'm seeing some serious nutrient deficiencies if thats his entire homemade diet...

Edited to add: I guess if he's 16 and a half, then maybe it doesn't matter too much if he's not getting any calcium. I would ask a nutritionist to suggest a vitamin/mineral supplement, and add some fiber to the diet in the form of canned, unsweetened pumpkin.

   What does the vet think of this diet; has he/she suggested any supplements? Pumpkin will bulk up the stools; use the plain canned pumpkin though; not the pie mix. Your friend may be interested in a consultation with Monica Segal;   [linkhttp://www.monicasegal.com/]http://www.monicasegal.com/[/link]. She's an animal nutritionist and could design a diet for the Lab; she also works with vets in designing diets for dogs with special needs. By the way, congratulations to your friend on having a Lab that age; she must have taken very good care of him. Another thought; has your friend discussed prescription diets with the vet; there's probably a diet the dog would do well on.

I realize age might have something to do with it but, is there anything
I can add to his diet to bulk him up?

 
More calories? Maybe I don't really understand the question.. If a dog is skinny, and they don't have worms or some other medical reason for being that skinny, they need more calories. That diet doesn't seem to provide very many, but I don't know the proportions. To add calories, I would leave some of the fat from the ground beef in the diet, i.e. don't boil it. Maybe brown it in a pan and add it and the drippings to the rest of the food? Unless he has trouble digesting fat, like a pancreas problem, which would explain the low-fat diet. I would also up the total amount of beef to add protein.
 
I agree with the others that the diet probably isn't very well balanced. Your friend could do a lot of research and balance it herself (I can send you the 2006 National Research Council nutritional recommendations, if she's interested in going that route), or checking out Monica Segal is a good suggestion too.

Vegetable oil is another way to add some fat and calories to his diet. 

My friend replies:

I could reply... I would say: Thanks to all who replied however, given his age and digestive system I had to take him off Vet food. My Vet told me his current diet was fine.

I'm sorry some of you feel he's not getting enough calories, fat, etc... That's why I'm here!

Any suggestions?

I put my guestimate of what portions should be into my diet calculator program, and this is what I got back. It may or may not be accurate, so take this with a grain of salt... it actually looks better than I would have expected.

Calculated calorie requirement: 1075.5 kcal/day*

IngredientStandard AmountStandard UnitGram AmountTotal kcal

[n.23565]Beef, ground, 90% lean meat / 10% fat, crumbles, cooked, pan-browned 2 portions ( yield from 1/2 lb raw meat )308 g 622 kcal

[n.20037]Rice, brown, long-grain, cooked 2 portions 1 cup390 g 378 kcal

[n.11125]Carrots, cooked, boiled, drained, without salt 1.5 cups 78 g 26 kcal

[n.11110]Cabbage, cooked, boiled, drained, without salt 1.5 cup, shredded 75 g 17 kcal

[n.1123]Egg, whole, raw, fresh, 1 large 50 g 66 kcal


Total calories fed: 1108.8 kcal/day OR 103% of the calculated requirement
Amount(s) above have been adjusted based on the selected feeding frequency.

Protein: 33.3%
Fat: 35.3%
Carbohydrate: 31.5%

Likely deficient nutrients: **
301  Calcium (Calcium, Ca)
303  Iron (Iron, Fe)
305  hosphorus (Phosphorus, P)
306  otassium (Potassium, K)
309  Zinc (Zinc, Zn)
312  Copper (Copper, Cu)
323  Vitamin E (Vitamin E (alpha-tocopherol))
618  Linoleic acid (18:2 undifferentiated)
-13  Iodine
-12  Chloride
324  Vitamin D
421  Total Choline

Likely excess nutrients:     NONE

**Edited to make it easier to read

you really need to add some calcium to that diet, and perhaps some vitamin E and fish oil. And how about some organ meat a couple times a week-- liver, heart, tripe? and fat. Fat is good for dogs, especially skinny dogs.

I'm still not sure about that calculator, lol. I put in several AAFCO tested foods and it STILL told me some of the basic micronutrients were "Probably" or "Possibly" deficient.

Anyway, clearly there's a lack in several things that would make me nervous in a senior dog. Vitamin E and selenium are vital antioxidants. The B vitamins are needed for mental, digestive, and nervous function. And calcium IS needed to keep the dog active and for many other functions including muscle contraction (both involuntary and voluntary) and nervous transmission.

It's super easy to add the eggshell from the eggs to the diet to bring the balance of calcium up to a proper amount. Thin-ness could be muscle atrophy in a senior dog, rather than weight loss. I struggled for years with MY saying Ben was too skinny, while the vet said he was fine, since his weight looked the same. He was losing muscle mass, something to do with the thyroid problem. Once we got on top of that, he filled out nicely, though he actually only gained a couple pounds.

Try increasing the meat somewhat (decrease the rice accordingly), while making sure you add calcium and antioxidants. If this is a diet for renal support, increase the egg (check with your vet and cook the whites). Also, consider adding a vitamin B complex supplement - either a simple formulation you can get at any drug store, or, my preference, a formulation balanced especially for senior dogs and cats - "Cholodin".

Finally, I'd definitely go for a fish-based OFA supplement, for a lab. Preferably cold water fish body oil. Border Collies hail from the same part of the planet (northern Atlantic) and also seem to have high requirements for fish-based OFAs. In their homeland they have a very fishy diet and so did many working hunting retrievers.

Good luck!!

ORIGINAL: brookcove

I'm still not sure about that calculator, lol. I put in several AAFCO tested foods and it STILL told me some of the basic micronutrients were "Probably" or "Possibly" deficient.

I'm not sure either... hence the disclaimer... but it is fairly accurate on protein/carbs/fat pecentages, as well as calories. I've also been playing with it using kibble diets to see what it does and doesn't do well...

As a supplement marketing company, it doesn't surprise me at all that their would err on the side of over-supplementation... but its also pretty obvious the diet above is lacking in minerals.

Oh, yes, it's definitely neat to be able to put in the ingredients and get those crucial ratios back. I've been playing with all my feeding scenarios since the Ben scare was over and it's been a lot of fun. Ben, as I suspected, is the only one with the freako metabolism here. The rest of my dogs do just fine on about a third what he does. Still high for normal dogs but manageable by combining highly energy concentrated kibbles with nutrient-dense whole foods with lots of energy (fish for protein, egg, animal fats instead of veggie fats, etc).

I'd love something similiar that just let you plug in whole/fresh foods and kibbles and computed/reported actual (approximate or estimated) nutrient amounts. I say approximate or estimated because of course levels of micornutrients can vary widely depending on the management or harvesting of the products used in the feed. And it makes a little difference if the animal you are feeding is mature or newborn.

We can do the same thing with forage and feedstuffs for livestock - surely such a tool would be useful for vets and nutrionists, not to say people who do home prepared diets for whatever reason.