Any advice on low calorie treats/chews?

Chuffy

Thyroid problems?   

Nope..we had her thyroid tested numerous time. Just had it tested again last week.

I think she just can't burn off the carbs...she is probably better off on grain free and low carb, so I am going to really give that a try and maybe quit the kibble too. I'll have to go pick a new food and figure out how much to give her to equal 500 calories.

My other dogs eats twice the amount she eats and he is very thin and muscular...but he is also a maniac and runs the length of our fence for hours. I can actually see a huge difference in Callie already as far as her desire to be active. Even though I cant let her run and play yet, she acts as if she WANTS to....she tries to trot while on leash and today when Buster was out playing, she started crying to go out to play too..which she has never done before. I really think once we get some of this weight off she is really going to feel amazing and she is going to be more active than she ever was.

Thanks Callie

I'll keep that in mind for when she goes back to Obedience. My daughter used to eat those when she was a baby. She loved them!

After spending the entire day researching foods and reading labels, I have decided to go with Wellness Core Reduced Fat Formula which is grain free and 350 calories per cup. I am going to feed her 1 cup dry along with a  6 oz.can of Wellness Chicken formula or Turkey formula per day. 1/2 cup dry in the morning and 1/2 cup mixed with the 6 oz can for dinner. That will give her 560 calories total of good, grain free food. I just hope she tolerates this food. I am going to switch slowly and if her stools get too soft I will be adding a little pumpkin to it. When her stools are too soft her anal glands have trouble.  Does this sound like a good plan to get her weight down? I want to get this right. I was going to go with just the canned food, but I think the kibble is better for her because it slows her down a bit. She tends to inhale canned food..it's usually gone before I let go of the bowl. lol I hope the kibble is B I G.

Thanks!

 Our Gus does best on low fat, high protein, and minimal carbs.  He came to us last year with about 10% too much weight from sitting around in a kennel.  I couldn't make any headway on it until I switched him to the Wellness Core RF.  That is a top notch product.  Even though I've gone to all homecooked, I still keep some around as emergency food for Ben (the Ocean, not the RF).

Dollars to donuts this will work nicely.  If you get soft stools, try cutting the food by about a third, first, and see whether that helps.  Adding pumpkin is okay but many times a switching issue is related to overfeeding, especially from something like Nutro Lite to Core.

Another good product, though it's somewhat heavy in the grains, is Canidae Platinum.  It's a very easy to digest formula, has decent protein levels, and has lots of good stuff for gi health included.  I'm less happy with the company at present - between the two I'd definitely give the thumbs up to Core, while Canidae makes me feel less confident.  They changed their ingredients lately and I don't think it was an improvement.

Anyway, good luck.  Your pupper is gorgeous - I'm inclined to say you've got a BC mix on your hands there - that's a common type of markings among working line BCs (the tri, lots of white, with tons of ticking). 

Thanks for the reply...I got lucky...they were giving away the medium sized bags of  the Wellness kibble at the pet store today. This warehouse frequently gives away food for people customers to try. I did have her on Canidae at one time but she just didnt handle it well.

Thanks for the compliment on Callie...I think she is mixed with BC...she has the personality of a BC and markings...but her body type is more ACD...short and barrel shaped with shorter legs. My other dog is a BC mix too.I was looking specifically for a BC when I went to the shelter, and they had her listed as a BC/Aussie mix. She is the sweetest honey of a dog....very friendly and really pretty quiet.And extremely smart. She has been my easiest dog to train.

Janet 

 I was going to suggest the CORE kibble. It looks really good, for weight loss.

I would split the can, and give her half a can, half a cup, stuffed into a Kong toy and frozen, twice a day. If it takes her an hour to eat her meal, that's an hour that she's occupied, and she'll be satisfied afterwards. 

I love that idea Jennie..I will have to try it!

Thanks!!!!

We've been through crate rest Poor Emma has actually had to be rested for over a week on several occasions, so I got all sorts of creative.

Another fun, low calorie thing is to soak a rope toy in broth, and freeze it. That's assuming your dog is a big chewer, and likes frozen stuff. I also did a good bit of clicker training, while Emma was being rested. I taught her parlor tricks like "speak", "tell me", "ready", and "Shhhh!" (all the same thing, but different commands!), then I taught her volumes (tell me soft, tell me LOUD!). I taught her to retrieve my cell phone, with the ring tone being the cue. That is a cute one. Anything that doesn't require too much movement. Things like "touch". You can teach the names of different toys, and ask her to "touch the ball", or "bring the bear", and feed bits of the meal for doing tricks. It keeps them amused, and moving slowly enough...  

Molly gains weigh by just looking at food. I feed both girls by calories. Molly has been eating Wellness core reduced fat with canned and has lost weigh. I am now switching her over to Taste of the wild Pacific Stream which has 360 calories in a cup and grain free also. I was told to switch to a higher fat content now and then so their hair doesn`t get dry.

For treats I do as callie does and get the freeze dried fruit in the childrens isle - 1/4 cup 25 calories, Kong Tots only one calorie each, Cheerios - 1/4 cup 25 calories, baby carrots, Newman`s Own -  cheese - 2.89 cal a treat, chicken - 3.65 cal, peanut butter - 3.8 cal, veggie - 3.87 cal a treat. These are for the small treats which I think are good size and I can break them in half if I want.

For chews I get the pork hide rolls as they are more easily digestible than raw hide. I let they chew on one of those or a Booda Bimple Bone for awhile each day. I don`t know the calorie content of either but as they only chew on them for awhile each day I don`t worry about any calories in them. Booda use to have some plastic in the bones but now they don`t anymore.

I dont know what a Booda Bimple bone is...lol..sounds interesting. I'll have to look into that. Thanks for the ideas! All of the advice here has been invaluable!

I gave Callie her breakfast in her kong today....1/2 kibble w/3 oz of canned..frozen...she loved it! Spent almost an hour with that kong and got every drop out! I have been mixing the new food with her old food..1/2 and 1/2..so far so good! Now she gets to go on 2 very short 5 minute walks...next week she gets 2 ~10 minute walks. She is recovering very well and I know she is going to feel great once the excess weight comes off. Going to bring her to the vet for a quick weight check each week. She goes to see the surgeon for a follow up in about 7 weeks and xrays will need to be taken to make sure she is healing properly. Once she is fully healed, it's back to doggy classes again....they have fun rallies at her training school that she loves. Her trainer has access to a farm with sheep and they do sheep herding excercises too. I definately want to get Callie signed up for that class. We dont have alot of "herding" opportunities where I live in NY.

American Natural Premium makes a good low calorie dog biscuit. They're called chicken bites and the only have five calories. Noel seems to like them a lot. Barley, Chicken and oatmeal are the first ingredients.

Nolan

Here is their web site if you want to read about Booda Bimple Bones. You can`t order from their site but you can find out where they are sold at. You can get them from some dog supplies sites on the internet including dog.com. I get mine at Runnings locally unless I make a order on line for other stuff that I can`t get locally as then I can get them a little cheaper.

http://www.aspenpet.com/