Week 10 Day 1

Life’s a party, right? Well, it is for most dogs!

Living the moment and having fun at the drop of a hat! There’s a lot to learn from our 4 pawed friends, with there being no such thing as too much play and adventure!

Did you get the chance to change up this week’s walks a little? Perhaps with a short jog, some obstacles or by discovering a new route? We’d love to hear all about it in the coaching group 🙂

Upload your dog’s weekly activity stats now and check out your week 10 activity plan!

Children and Visitors versus Dieting Dogs

Dogs are central to the lives of many children. Providing companionship, protection and helping improve confidence and social skills. The pairing seems perfect. But when it comes to maintaining our dog’s healthy weight, the opposite can be said!

And as we all know, children are not the only hazard. Adult visitors are often the worst feeding culprits- posing significant risk to your doggy diet efforts.

So, if your dog spends a lot of time around children or visitors, this week’s video is for you!

(Jump to 00:17 to skip intro. Tap cc for captions.)

Target Weight and Beyond

As the puppy pounds melt away, it is likely you are starting to question what happens once your dog achieves their target weight. Read on for a quick overview on how to maintain your dog’s optimal weight.

3 Steps to Maintain your Dog’s Healthy Weight.

Once you achieve the holy grail of your dog’s ideal weight, there are three steps to ensure your dog maintains their healthy weight. All steps are essential if you are to prevent your dog falling into the trap of rebound weight gain. The 3 steps are:

1. Feed your dog a suitable maintenance calorie intake.

2. Feed your dog a suitable maintenance food.

3. Keep a healthy-weight mindset.

Step 1. Discover your dog’s maintenance calorie intake.

Your dog is currently on a restricted calorie intake which will need to be adjusted once your dog reaches their healthy target weight. On reaching your dog’s target weight, gradual increases to calorie and food intake will be made to halt weight loss and to maintain your dog at their new healthy weight.

Increases in calorie allowance will vary between dogs. For adult neutered dogs a 10 – 40% gradual increase in daily calorie consumption is usual, when switching from a weight loss to maintenance diet.

On reaching your dog’s target weight your WAGSTA Wellness program will provide automated calorie increments until your dog’s maintenance calorie intake is achieved (the point where your dog’s healthy weight is maintained).

After reaching your dog’s target weight, it’s likely you will switch your dog to a maintenance food. During this transition period regular weight monitoring and correct portioning remains critical. It typically takes one to two months for weight to stabilize and for dogs to settle into their maintenance portion plan.

Step 2. Choose the correct food to maintain your dog on. 

Once you have established your dog’s maintenance calorie intake you have two options.

a.) feed an increased quantity of your dog’s current diet food or

b.) switch your dog to a higher calorie food.

For dogs with big appetites e.g. Labradors and Beagles it is advisable to keep your dog on a high protein diet to help satisfy hunger levels. A sudden change to a low protein, higher carbohydrate food, can result in hunger issues despite increased calorie consumption.

Step 3. Keep a Healthy Weight – Healthy Dog mindset! 

Hitting your dog’s healthy target weight is a huge achievement and cause for celebration. However, this is not a time to relax and revert to our old ways.

Please do not let all your hard work and the inroads into your dog’s health be wasted. A few extra treats here and there, and additional table scraps will soon have your dog on the slippery slope to weight gain.

Your hard-fought habit change and lifestyle tweaks are here to stay! So, remain treat-wise, measure everything you feed your dog, and continue enjoying an active lifestyle together.

Game of the Week: Bubbles

When it comes to bubbles, many dogs are big kids! They love bubbles! What better way to get everybody out and active in the backyard?  No instructions needed here but a few tips to apply are:

• Buy a non-toxic pet friendly bubble mix.
• Keep the bubble mix out of reach- when dogs catch and consume bubbles the amount ingested is harmless however lapping up spilled liquid could cause tummy upset.

Go re-live your childhood and go buy yourself some bubble mix. Check out the flavored bubbles made especially for dogs!

Woofs and wags,

Your WAGSTA team.