losing weight and getting in shape cannot only add years to your pet’s life, but they also make those extra years
more enjoyable.
Helping your cuddly canine shed a few pounds may be easier than you think. It simply requires understanding the importance of weight loss and fitness, paying attention to detail, and seeking assistance from your veterinary team.
Why a healthy weight is important for your pet
If a dog is just five pounds over its ideal weight and if a cat is two pounds above its ideal weight, they are at risk for developing some serious medical conditions. When a pet is overweight or obese, it’s not a question of if it will develop a related illness, but rather how many and how soon. Some of the common disorders associated with excess weight include:
- Type 2 diabetes
- Heart disease
- Osteoarthritis
- Chronic inflammation
- High blood pressure
- Respirator
- Kidney disease
- Many forms of cancer
It is expected that overweight and obese dogs will have shorter lives than their fitter counterparts. Heavy dogs and cats tend to be less energetic and playful. It’s common to think pets that lie around are just lazy, making it easy to overlook the lethargy that results from being overweight or obese.
Weight Loss For Dogs
Start with a Medical Exam
One of our veterinarians will examine your pet to make sure your pet does not have a medical condition, such as hypothyroidism or hyperadrenocorticism, amongst others that may be causing your dog’s excess weight. An exam with some blood work and a good medical history will rule out these diseases before putting your dog on a weight loss plan. Too many dogs start a diet and fail simply because overeating and lack of activity weren’t the problem—a disease was.
Calories
A weight-loss formula seems simple: fewer calories, in plus more calories out equals weight loss. Unfortunately, it’s not that simple. Once we recommend a diet, the next step is calculating the calories your dog needs. First, we will calculate your dog’s ideal weight. If your dog has a lot of weight to lose, we may strive for an initial goal weight that is higher than your dog’s ideal weight. We will use your dog’s initial goal or ideal weight to figure out how many calories your dog should eat each day.
A safe guideline for dogs is losing 3-5% percent body weight per month under a doctor’s supervision.
If you feed too much, your dog won’t lose weight. If you feed too little, your dog could get sick. To figure out how many calories are in your pet’s food we will need to check the label.
The art of changing foods
You’ll most likely need to offer your dog a diet food if it’s overweight. When you’re introducing a new food, allow several days for the transition.
Exercise the Right Way
Based on our studies of observations of people walking with their dogs, the average pace is 20 to 25 minutes per mile. That is a slow stroll with frequent pauses (on average every 1 to 2 minutes!) to allow their dog to smell an interesting object or mark territory. We’re here to shed pounds, people! Walking for weight loss is very different than walking for pleasure. Make it your objective to walk briskly and focus on the “out” leg of your walk and then you can smell the roses on the “back” leg. We recommend starting the activity with the brisk or “hard” effort first. Too often if we try to start slowly with the dog, allowing them to sniff and smell everything, we may have a challenging time getting them up to speed when we’re ready. People often ask, “Shouldn’t we do a warm up before you walk them?” The simple reply, “Have you ever seen a fox take a few warm-up laps before an all-out sprint to capture its prey?” Our dogs are built to go from 0-100 miles per hour with very little risk of injury. And besides, we’re going nowhere near an all-out sprint when we’re walking for fitness.
It is important that your dog understands you have places to go and that this is different than your usual casual walk. If they sit or refuse to walk, you may have to return home, crate them or put them in a quiet space without your attention and try again another time. We have yet to encounter a dog that didn’t take readily to brisk walking.
Draw your leash close – generally within two to four feet of your body – pull them close to you and away from the street side and set off at a pace you feel comfortable sustaining. This should be about a 12-15 minute per mile pace. It should feel like a brisk walk and you should break into a light sweat. The key is to keep it up! Don’t stop. Don’t look down at your dog when they inevitably want to stop and smell something or mark a hydrant. Continue staring straight ahead, tighten the leash (don’t jerk) and give a command such as “No stop.” “Come.” or “Here.”
Additional tips for getting your dog to move more:
- Move the food bowl upstairs/downstairs and rotate it so that the dog always has to walk to get to its food bowl. Dogs are smart, and if the food bowl moves upstairs, they’ll start relocating upstairs, too.
- Move the food bowl as far away from your dog’s favorite haunts as possible. Again, many dogs will sleep and lay near the food bowl so they don’t have to go far when the eatin’ urge hits!
- Use toys, balls, laser pointers, squeaky toys, anything that your dog finds interesting to chase. Try to engage your dog for at least ten to fifteen minutes twice a day. There are numerous toys that move and squeak that may also be interesting to your dog. Experiment and understand that what is exciting today may be boring tomorrow.
- What about the dog that wakes you at four in the morning to be fed or the dog that stares at you during dinner or television time until you give in and feed them? Our dogs have trained us well and know exactly which buttons to press when it comes to getting their way. Here are some tips for handling the pleading pup:
- Do not use a self-feeder. Auto-feeders are unlimited candy machines to a dog.
- Pet or play with your dog when it begs for food. Dogs substitute food for affection so flip the equation and you may find that playtime displaces chowtime.
- Walk your dog when it begs. The distraction may be just enough to make it forget its desire for food.
- Feed small meals frequently – especially for those dogs that like to wake you up in the wee hours begging for more goodies – divide the total volume or calories into 4-6 smaller meals – whatever you do, don’t feed extra food.
- When the bowl is empty and your dog is pleading, add a few kibbles to the bowl. By a few, try ten or fifteen – not a handful.
- Give vegetables such as baby carrots, broccoli, zucchini, celery and asparagus. Dogs love crunchy treats so make it a healthy – and low-calorie – choice.
Weight Loss for Cats
Start with a Medical Exam
One of our veterinarians will examine your pet to make sure your pet does not have a medical condition that may be causing the excess weight. An exam with some blood work and a good medical history will rule out these diseases before putting your cat on a weight loss plan.
In addition, cats that are overweight or obese must eat. Their physiology is different than humans or dogs and if they do not eat for as little as two consecutive days, they can develop a life-threatening form of liver disease known as hepatic lipidosis. Obese humans starting a diet program are also vulnerable to this serious condition. It is for this reason that you should never put your cat on a diet without the assistance of your veterinary healthcare team.
Calories
A weight-loss formula seems simple: fewer calories in plus more calories out equals weight loss. Unfortunately, it’s not that simple. Once we recommend a diet, the next step is calculating the calories your cat needs.
First, we will calculate your cat’s ideal weight. If your cat has a lot of weight to lose, we may strive for an initial goal weight that is higher than your cats ideal weight. We will use your cat’s initial goal or ideal weight to figure out how many calories your cat should eat each day.
The art of changing foods
You’ll most likely need to offer your cat a diet food if it’s overweight. When you’re introducing a new food, allow several days for the transition.
Exercise the Right Way
In an ideal world, we’d take a jog with our cats or enjoy a mile swim in the morning to stay fit. We certainly don’t live in that world! Getting our cats to engage in aerobic activity isn’t just difficult – it goes against their very nature. Cats weren’t designed to function as scavengers and persistence hunters the way humans and dogs evolved. Instead, cats evolved as stalkers who expended very little energy in seeking their prey and seldom strayed far from their territory. When they came across prey, they burst into an intensely aerobic and short-duration hunt. Most wild cats would pursue their prey at top speed for less than a minute. Once this activity was complete, they required hours to recover for the next hunt. If they missed several prey opportunities in a row, they could be in serious danger of lacking the energy necessary to hunt successfully.
Our domestic cats are simply smaller versions of these wild felines. While we may take our dogs out for a brisk walk or jog, our cats aren’t designed to perform that sort of activity well. Our cats prefer the hundred-yard dash to the marathon. Even more complicating is the fact that our cats evolved on a diet based on protein as opposed to humans and dogs that can eat vegetables, proteins, fats, you name it. Since cats are obligate carnivores, the same dietary rules don’t apply. Many cats will do better on a high protein, low carbohydrate diet for weight loss for this reason.
Just because cats aren’t good endurance athletes doesn’t mean we shouldn’t encourage them to move. Some simple tips for getting your cat to move more are:
- Play “Find the Food” move the food bowl upstairs or downstairs and rotate it so that the cat always has to walk to get to its food bowl. Cats are smart, and if the food bowl moves upstairs, they’ll start relocating upstairs, too.
- Move the food bowl as far away from your cat’s favorite haunts as possible. Again, many cats will sleep and lay near the food bowl so they don’t have to go far when the eatin’ urge hits!
- Use feather toys, flashlights, paper bags or balls, anything that your cat finds interesting to chase. Try to engage your cat for ten minutes twice a day. You can do this while you eat, watch television or even read. There are numerous toys that move and squeak that may also be interesting to your cat. Experiment and understand that what is exciting today may be boring tomorrow.
Additional tips for succes:
What about the cat that wakes you at four in the morning to be fed or the cat that meows incessantly or head bumps you until you feed them? Our cats have often trained us well and know exactly which buttons to press when it comes to getting their way. Here are some tips for handling a pesky kitty:
- Do not use a self-feeder. These are unlimited candy machines.
- Pet or play with your cat when it begs for food. Many cats substitute food for affection so flip the equation and you may find that playtime displaces chowtime.
- Feed small meals frequently – especially give a last feeding for those cats that like to wake you up in the wee hours begging for more goodies – divide the total volume or calories into four to six smaller meals – whatever you do, don’t feed extra food
- When the bowl is empty and your cat is pleading, add a few kibbles to the bowl. By a few, try ten or fifteen – not a handful.
- Offer fresh water instead of food. Many cats love fresh water so when they are eyeing the empty food bowl, fill up the water bowl instead.
Multi-Cat Households
What do you do if one cat is normal weight and the other is diagnosed with obesity? While there are countless creative solutions to this problem, here are a few we’ve found successful
- Feed separately – this is the ideal solution for multi-cat households. Feed the cat diagnosed with obesity its diet in one room while feeding the other cat its food elsewhere. After a prescribed time, generally 15 to 30 minutes, pick the food up until the next feeding.
- Feed the normal weight cat on an elevated surface where the obese cat can’t go.
- Do not leave food out while you’re away. In this scenario, you can’t be sure who ate what and the smart money is on the cat with obesity.
