Oliver's road to recovery

[Sarah Bakker]

Well for about a month and half now Oliver's tummy is getting better . We had him on acana for quite some time however my hubby and I were realizing more and more that this poor boy can't have kibble ..:/ very high sensitive digestive system and just have had long roads with his health.. he's lost weight due to this and now we are biting the bullet and he's now on a raw diet lifestyle. He is two years old and his ideL weight for him in guessing is 40lbs. Right now he's 35lbs. Any guesses of how long it takes for a dog to get his weight bAck? We are currently feeding him a raw food called big dog natural

[Karen, Jasper and Jackdoodle]

To maintain Oliver's weight at 35 lbs, you would need to feed him at least 700 calories per day. (More if he is very active, possibly as much as 875 kcal/day) Obviously, if you want him to gain weight, he needs more than that. I don't know how many calories there are in the food you're using, but you might try following the feeding guidelines for a 40 lb dog. 

JD lost about 15% of his body weight during a 3 week period several years ago when he first developed Inflammatory Bowel Disease, and he gained most of it back very quickly...so much so that when he saw his IMS a month after his diagnosis, she cautioned me not to let him gain too much too fast. Being a bit underweight won't hurt him, so I wouldn't push the weight gain. :)

[Sarah Bakker]

Hi Karen :) thank you for the advice . Based of this company's calculator I have been feeding Oliver a cup a day however I have been giving a additional 1/4 more in the day. Seems to be fine so far doing this. Would you mind looking at this site and see what you think ? This feeding calculator is a bit confusing ..:/ this is their site :
https://www.bigdognatural.com/products-info/how-much-to-feed

[Karen, Jasper and Jackdoodle]

I don't really understand this. What do the percentages represent? This is not a standard feeding calculator. Raw food or not, body weight, and gain or loss, depends on the amount of energy (calories) coming in versus the amount being burned, which depends on the individual's metabolic rate and activity level. . 

Without knowing the number of calories per cup in Oliver's food, I can't tell you how much he should be getting. Surely that info must be available somewhere, maybe on the package if not on the website? 

[Karen, Jasper and Jackdoodle]

I finally figured out the company's feeding calculator and their calorie recommendations are WAY too low. Any dog would starve on those amounts.

[Sarah Bakker]

I don't see anything on the package since I bought it in bulk .. they give me many bags of it. I used on the calculator based off his current weight and also chose on the scale that he needs significant weight gain at 4.0.. so with that says the kcal is 630....

[Sarah Bakker]

I recently started giving Oliver cow kefir milk from answers since has a lot of calories in it and I'm wondering maybe if I shouldnt give it to him anymore :/bc his stools have been soft and at points doesn't have much coming out of him .. like he's constipated a tad. Can cow kefir milk bother pups ???? Goats milk I know doesn't bother him.

[Karen, Jasper and Jackdoodle]

I don't know much about kefir milk, but milk in general doesn't agree with a lot of dogs. I'd just give him plain unflavored yogurt if you want to supplement his diet.