Puppy Underweight Problem HELP

[Denise & Hunter!!!]

Hi, my little girl Hunter is 9 weeks old, she has been with us for a week. When I first brought her home I took her to the vet for a check up and the vet said that she was underweight. She said that typically Goldendoodles are not food motivated and suggested that I soak her food in warm water. She is on Holistic Eagle Pack Puppy, which is what the breeder had her on and I continued. I have been soaking her food and she still does not have much of an appetite, she eats but it seems to be more of a "chore" to her. She seems to like her food, I am assuming anyways since she does eat it..... I just don't know. The vet said that you can feel her ribs to much and down her spine. She still "feels" the same to me in those areas. Does anyone have any suggestions? I would REALLY appreciate it!! Thank you! Denise & Hunter

[Nancy, Ned, Clancy, and Charlie]

Hunter is sure a cutie. My doodle is a light eater but he loves to steal food. Maybe if Hunter thinks it is off-limits food she will scarf it down.

[Karen, Jasper and Jackdoodle]

Denise, I'm hoping Dianne Carter will come in and advise you on this. She is our "go to" expert on feeding puppies, and a lot more. In the meantime, if it were me, I would probably try adding a spoonful of really good quality canned puppy food to her bowl.
It sounds to me like Hunter was underweight when you got her maybe. I'm guessing that maybe puppies don't eat so well for a few days after they leave their moms & littermates out of homesickness, much the same way adult dogs who lose their homes don't eat...Jack lost 4 lbs during the week after his original owners left him in the shelter. But it's just a guess.
I sent Dianne a message to come & weigh in on this.

[Denise & Hunter!!!]

She did as you can see! WOW you definately were right she had a ton of information for me! I am sure I will have tons more questions now! THANK YOU!!!!!!!!!!!

[Dianne Carter ~ Trinity Doodles]

Hi Denise! Crashing this party a bit late and hope I can add some additional solutions for you. The first thing I would say is that having just come to you in the last week I would say at her age it is not unusual for her to be on the thin side. I think often litters are fed communally sharing food dishes and well sometimes there are some little piggies who eat more than their fair share. I try to watch for timid eaters, and if I were to have one I would isolate them to eat to be certain they are getting their fair share. Of course I must add with the grand * buffet * here we have not had any timid eaters. Additionally though the following may not be popular, I see no benefit from feeding Eagle Pack unless you are using the holistic line which is my preference if you are set on this food. I am not saying it is a bad food, perhaps just not your BEST option. Lets take a look:

Chicken Meal, Ground Yellow Corn, Chicken Fat (Preserved With Natural Mixed Tocopherols), Pork Meal, Oatmeal, Dried Beet Pulp, Ground Brown Rice, Ground White Rice, Anchovy & Sardine Meals, Brewers Dried Yeast, Flaxseed, Wheat Germ Meal, Menhaden Fish Oil, Dried Egg Product, Salt, Potassium Chloride, Carrots, Peas, Inulin, Yucca Schidigera Extract, DL-Methionine, Vitamin A Acetate, Vitamin D3 Supplement, Vitamin E Supplement, Riboflavin Supplement, Vitamin B12 Supplement, d-Pantothenic Acid, Niacin Supplement, Choline Chloride, Pyridoxine Hydrochloride, Thiamine Mononitrate, Folic Acid, Ascorbic Acid, Biotin, Lecithin, Rosemary Extract, Inositol, Kelp, Polysaccharide Complexes Of Zinc, Iron, Manganese, Copper and Cobalt, Potassium Iodate, Sodium Selenite, Lactobacillus acidophilus, Lactobacillus casei, Enterococcus faecium, B. subtilus, Bacillus licheniformis, Bacillus coagulins, Aspergillus oryzae, and Aspergillus niger.

You do not need to visit much past the first two lines, 2nd ingredient corn, pork meal would not be a choice of mine and white rice is in my opinion is not as good as an option as you have available to you.

Is weight gain and nutrition needs your only goal? Does your doodle have any apparent skin or ear issues? Any stomach or other intestinal issues? These questions will help you to first determine if it may be required to make a grain vs grain free food selection. If none of these influence your decision do you have a preference? What is most important to you and work best with your lifestyle and budget? We prefer grain free, we are not opposed to grain but I would rather add them as I see fit in a controlled environment ~ I generally keep a selection of dry baby food on hand as well as mashed potato and sweet potato flakes on hand for times that I choose to use them. Here in Florida we have abundant environmental conditions that add negative influence to sensitivities to yeast, mold, pollen (oh my). During peak times often we need to change formulas until it passes ~ many food ingredients add fuel to the fire for us including corn, wheat, soy, barley, white potato ~ they turn to sugar quickly and feed yeast.

I have done a search for you and came up with this location: http://www.thepetloft.com/tpl/default.aspx. I am not sure where you are in Akron but it does appear they offer a broad selection ~ some okay, and some much better. We feed our puppies Orijen puppy as well as ACANA (made by the same company) and really think highly of it ~ our puppies are all porkers! We do add canned once daily, but do so differently than many may do. Upon opening we immediately mix it with one can of water to make a gravy, this we pour over the dry in the evening, you can soak it up or not. The gravy allows it to be absorbed by the dry food rather than sitting on top of and easily picked out. It also makes a more pleasant experience getting leftovers out of the fridge rather than that congealed canned food. There are several canned foods we like and offer our variety easily through shifting of cans, if you wish for specifics just let me know.

If your vet has ruled out any health or parasite issues and you find your little girl continues to lack what you and your vet feel to be an adequate appetite you may consider supplementing a good quality B complex right now. B vitamins specifically are beneficial during times of stress, a new home despite how wonderful it is would represent stress because it is change. B12 also helps to stimulate appetite. We load our pups up with quality nutrition as well as supplementation of probiotics & enzymes, supplementation, added powdered colostrum and alternatives (like diatomaceous earth) as we deem beneficial, especially during times of vaccines, worming meds and surgeries.

So, the danger of popping in late is fading fast which I am doing ( I took a bad fall over the weekend and keep fighting the requirement of rest ~ so much to do). I will pop in tomorrow to see how you are doing, you can post here, email me or even call me ~ if I can help you in any way see your way through this it would be a privilege.

P.S. A million years ago, or so it seems, I moved to Orlando, FL from Akron Ohio.

[Denise & Hunter!!!]

Oh my Dianne thank you so much for the information! I was really led to believe by the breeder that the Eagle was a "superior" food to use and being a total novice I believed her. So is it that the "meal" in the ingrediants is used more as just a filler? What is the benefit of the holistc part of Eagle? Ignorance to the differences made me think that the Eagle was more of an all protein/meat food than a grain food. From what I had read I was wanting to do more of the protein diet, although I do not think I could bring myself to raw feed and that just sounds a little to scary with all of the meat and hormone issues to try. The vet commented that you could feel her ribs to much and that in her spine you could feel to many of the indentations in it. She was the runt of the liter - I am not sure that should mean she should be underweight though. She has not grain more than 4 oz since I had her at the vet and to me she still feels as "boney". She did not have any other health issues though.

I am definately going to try the brand that you suggested and see where that store is, I am not familiar with it. Do you prefer one over the other? And if so for what reason? Glad I bought a million pounds of the Eagle! LOL I should have considered that she might not like it but assumed she would and it was good from what the breeder said. What types of canned food do you use? Are there different "flavors" that I should consider rotating? I was always led to believe that most canned food is bad - but that is from the "Mighty Dog" days and I know things have come a LONG way since then. How much dry should I be hoping that she eats per day?

I actually like in Portage Lakes, what part of Akron were you in?

I really appreciate all of your information!!!! I know I am going to have a MILLION more questions, I want to make sure that she is healthy most importantly and whatever food it takes that is what I will do. I hate thinking my little baby is hungry and wasting away!!!!!!

[Karen, Jasper and Jackdoodle]

I can answer the question about "meal"; "Meal" is a concentrated form of whatever the particular food is, with the water removed. If it is meat meal, such as salmon or chicken meal, it is actually nutritionally superior to just having chicken or salmon listed , because it has more protein & nutrients by weight when you remove the water.
Dianne's issue in mentioning the pork meal is with the "pork" part of the third ingredient in this food, I believe. It is the fact that since the ingredients are listed in order of amounts, from the highest to the lowest, out of your first three ingredients, which are making up the majority of the nutrients in this food, you have corn, which should not be used in dog food at all, and pork, which is not a preferred protein & is used mostly because it's cheap. Only the chicken meal is something we would want to see in the food at all, let alone in the top few ingredients.

[Denise & Hunter!!!]

Ahhh ok I got that now. What is the pork issue just out of curiosity...... Not that I like pork to begin with because I don't :-)

[Karen, Jasper and Jackdoodle]

You know, I just researched it a little, and although there is a wide spread belief that pork isn't good for dogs, or shouldn't be included in dog food, there is no evidence that I could find that lean pork is bad for dogs. So that's another good question. It's true that you don't see it much in the premium dog foods, but I don't know why.

[fergie11]

WoW - I just want to say Thank You for this Food Group. Thank you Karen, Lynne and Diana. We all learn from other's experiences.

Denise & Hunter - These people do know what they are talking about.
I, myself, am reading and learning.

[Denise & Hunter!!!]

This information is AMAZING! And so incredibly nice and thoughtful. It means so much to me because I am truly a novice doodle mommy!!!!