Is my 5-month-old poodle's weight healthy? How much exercise is safe?

He actually doesn't appear to be underweight based on the pictures shown. I'd have to examine him to be sure, but the biggest indication that he is not underweight is the fact that he appears to have well-developed muscles. Dogs of this breed tend to be naturally lean and put more weight on their muscles rather than their ribs, or belly. If I was concerned that he was underweight, then I would first want to rule-out a disease, or parasite causing him to lose or not gain weight. It's best to have a veterinarian evaluate him, so you can ensure he's healthy and ensure that you are not going to feed him unnecessarily. Dog obesity is a big problem in the U.S., which means that the average person thinks a fat dog is at ideal weight; and a dog with an ideal body condition, or a lean body condition is thought to be starving. The truth is that the lean dogs are statistically healthier and live longer than overweight dogs. Some dogs (much like people) are able to naturally maintain a lean body condition. Leo is one of those dogs, but would urge you to have a veterinarian examine him to make that call. Below is a link to a body condition scoring guide. This is what veterinarians use when assessing whether a dog is overweight or underweight. We prefer them to be at a BCS of 4 or 5, but some are naturally at a 3. https://www.wsava.org/sites/default/files/Body%20condition%20score%20chart%20dogs.pdf At this time, I recommend feeding him normally and would not recommend a diet change until he can be evaluated by a veterinarian. I hope that helps and all is well with Leo.

Hi there and thank you for using Petco Pet Education Center, formerly Petcoach to address your concern. This distance should be fine as long as you are periodically taking breaks during these walks / runs to prevent over-exertion. In the summer months, take care to provide plenty of water for Leo and if it is too hot, I would recommend shortening the walks / runs. I hope this helps! Please let me know if you have any other questions or concerns and I would be more than happy to help you further.

I'm not sure what you mean by a diet chart, however for his young age I recommend following the recommendations on the back oft he food bag. When he's an adult, you want feed about 75% of what the bag suggests for his weight. Diets vary greatly in the number of calories they have per cup, so it's hard to make an across the board recommendation. I recommend checking out Purina, Hills, and Royal Canin to get you started for diets. He should be on a puppy diet until about 9 months of age. He should NOT be on a grain free diet (this is a fad born out of the human gluten-free fad and recent research is showing it may be harmful for dogs, in addition to be unnecessary). As far as exercise, start anything you do slowly. He shouldn't be going for jogs until he's about 9 months old, but can run on his own as much as he wants and you can slowly work up to longer walks with him as he's interested. I'd recommend paying special attention to mental exercise with food toys, things like "snuffle boards" and kongs -- there are thousands of DIY Ideas online for this. Enjoy your little cutie!

It looks like his weight and body condition are good, though its difficult to evaluate that without being able to put my hands on him. (the hair can be deceiving) . When you run your hands over his chest you should be able to feel his ribs easily but they should not be prominent. When you run your hands along the sides of the abdomen back to the hips, you should be able to appreciate a "waist," but the bones of his hips should not be prominent. His spine (backbones) over his lower back should not be easy to feel. Without a walk-on scale like your vet has in his office, the best way to weigh him is by picking him up and weighing yourself on a bathroom scale. Then subtract your weight. (please be careful!! I don't want you to injure your back picking him up!) I hope that information is helpful for you. If you are continuing to feed a home cooked diet, consider checking out the site www.balanceit.com. This website will help you ensure that you have a balanced home cooked diet for Bear. Thanks for asking PetCoach!

Rather than a particular weight, we want to go for an ideal body condition score. Now with young puppies (just like kids) they are growing and the body condition scoring doesn't matter as much, but we still don't want her to be very overweight. Here is a helpful guide to checking body condition at home : https://www.aaha.org/public_documents/professional/guidelines/weightmgmt_bodyconditionscoring.pdf and your vet can also weigh in on this.

Puppies will gain a lot of weight in the first couple months of life, and it's never recommended to worry about their weight at a young age. In addition, he should not be talking long walks, at most he will need 10 minutes of exercise twice a day. A puppy should get 5 minutes of exercise twice a day for every month of age, i.e. at 3 months 15 minutes, 4 months 20 minutes, etc. I would not talk him on walks just yet given that he is fully vaccinated. You can play with him in your yard, but do not worry about his weight and do not over exercise him. Too much exercise will be detrimental to his growth.

I think thats an appropriate amount of exercise for a 15 week old labradoodle. Giving him a healthy outlet to use up that puppy energy will help keep him out of trouble and will maximize his focus and attention when you are working with him on training. The only other suggestion would be to ensure that you ARE taking some time to train him to walk on a leash. Leash walks will be a valuable skill that will serve both of you well for his entire life. https://www.hillspet.com/dog-care/training/leash-training-puppy Thank you for asking PetCoach!