Help Your Dog Lose Weight, 3 Simple Steps Leave a comment

If you notice excessive tiredness, laziness, a bigger and round face, needing help while getting in and out of the car, and refusal to play games, you should check if your dog is facing obesity.

Because all these symptoms show, your dog is overweight and needs sudden actions to prevent further diseases. Consider our gathered weight loss tips for your dog and help the dog lose weight in the shortest possible time.

Recommended Read: 5 Indoor Activities for Dogs to Keep Your Dog Entertained Inside the Home

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How to Tell if Your Dog Is Overweight?

It might be difficult to know if your dog is overweight or not just by looking at them or considering their average weight as per the breed and age. You have to touch every body part to know better and consider these things while touching them:

1. Feel the ribs, and a fat layer above the ribs isn’t a problem unless you can feel the ribs behind that thin layer.
2. Make sure their chest is wider than their abdomen from chest to stomach.
3. If there’s no distinction between stomach and chest, and you can’t see the actual waist, your dog is overweight.

Health Problems Associated with Overweight Dogs

Being overweight might make your dog look chubby and cute but never healthy because many health problems are associated with it. Obesity causes health issues to the entire body, including joints, internal body organs, including the heart. Some of the common problems with dog obesity are mentioned following:

1. More than 25% of overweight dogs suffer serious joint issues.
2. Heart diseases, diabetes mellitus, hypertension, and many types of cancer can originate due to obesity.
3. Since the overweight dogs are less heat tolerant, they might face anaesthetic complications.
4. Urinary bladder stones due to overeating.

Possible causes of Obesity in Dogs

Obesity doesn’t respect a dog’s age and breed while causing severe health problems, including urinary bladder stones and cancer. The primary cause is always overeating and lack of exercise, but some other factors that may also lead to obesity are mentioned following:

• Age

As the dogs grow old, their physical activity decreases due to weaker joints. So, they’re not burning calories, and it leads to being overweight.

• Breed or Genetics

Apart from age, dogs with some specific breeds are at higher risk of obesity. For example, according to new veterinary research, Golden Retrievers, Beagles, and Pubs are at higher risk of obesity as compared to the rest of dog breeds. In addition, female dogs are high in number with obesity than males.

• Neutering or Spaying

When it comes to if neutering and spaying cause obesity in dogs, yes, it does cause overweight as the sex hormones, including estrogens and androgens, cause a decrease in metabolic rate. As a result, energy needs are lowered, and it leads to unhealthy weight gain or obesity.

• Overfeeding

Obesity and overweight are always directly linked with overfeeding as it causes more fat layers while badly affecting the digestion system. Excessive calories consumed are never healthy for either the human body or animals.

• Lack of Exercise

When overfeeding, more exercise is required because they’ve to burn more calories than before. So, lack of exercise doesn’t burn calories to keep the body healthy. As a result, overweight and obesity are caused by the dog’s body.

How Can I Help My Dog Lose Weight?

When your dog is suffering from obesity, you don’t have to worry but instead focus on the steps you can take to help your dog lose weight. We have gathered some useful weight loss tips for your dog, including starting a proper diet, engaging in indoor physical activities, and taking necessary precautions.

Step #1: Proper Diet

• Diet Food

Diet food for dogs that provides necessary nutrients and helps reduce fat as well as the best diet for dogs. You can mix some cooked meat like fish, rice, and vegetables with a kibble diet.

• Raw Food

If you can’t afford diet food, you can consider raw food that removes a lot of unnecessary carbohydrates to help your dog lose weight. Or you can mix raw food with a kibble diet as it works efficiently in reducing weight.

• Smart Supplements

It’s a myth that supplements work only when gaining weight but smart supplements for dogs that are explicitly formulated for dogs only help lose weight. These are more useful when you’re taking your dog for regular exercise.

• Treats

You can substitute safe vegetables and fruits into your dog’s diet, including green brands that are very low in calories. Most dogs love carrots, and these are the most useful when it comes to reducing weight.

Step #2: Ramp Up the Play and Exercise

• Interactive Food Ball

When it comes to the most helpful indoor activities, playing with an interactive food ball is on the top. All you need to do is throw the ball and ask your dog to bring it back to you. What’s different in a food ball from a regular ball is it can be chewed and makes a squeaking sound to make the play engaging.

• Interactive Treat Ball

Another efficient way to help your dog make physical activity inside or outside the home is playing with an interactive treat ball. What’s great about these balls is that they throw treats to keep the dog engaged.

• Walks

Regular walks are necessary after feeding or any specified time as per your vet’s recommendations. It helps in burning calories and reduces fat which results in avoiding obesity or being overweight.

• Runs

If your dog is older, then walks are enough; otherwise, young dogs should run as well, which helps them to improve their stamina besides burning more calories than walking. We recommend taking suggestions from your vet as per your dog’s age and physical conditions for running.

Step #3: Measure and Track

• Measure Food Portions Carefully

When following the diet to lose weight, measuring the food quantity is necessary as it will help to keep track of food being regularly consumed. Otherwise, your dog may over eat, so we recommend getting the Etekcity food kitchen bowl scale to measure the food portions carefully.

• Weigh Your Dogs for Progress

When taking all the necessary precautions while helping your dog lose weight and following all the weight loss tips for your dog, you have to weigh your dog for progress. It will help you keep track of your dogs progress, so you know if it’s working or not.

Recommended Read: Treating Your Dog’s Bad Breath. 5 Surprising Tips

Conclusion

These three simple steps are the easiest ones and very comfortable to follow by the dog of any obesity level. We tried to come up with the vets and animal nutritionist’s recommended ways to help your dog lose weight in the safest possible ways. You don’t have to hurry as this is a time taking process, yet these weight loss tips for your dog take relatively less time.