How to know if my puppy is too thin or fat and how much to feed?

Thank you for submitting your question regarding Smokey. The average American dog is quite overweight. So if you have one at a healthy weight, it will usually look too thin. You want a thin covering over the ribs when you run your hands along his sides. He should have a waist the curves in from the top and size views. There is a one through nine scale of body condition scores. A healthy weight is a four or five. Every dog food contains a different amount of calories per cup. At six months of age, he should still eat puppy food. Look at the side of the food bag for feeding recommendations. Keep in mind, these are typically too high for most dogs. His weight looks great in your picture, but it obviously hard to tell for sure. Your current feeding amount is likely adequate. I hope this information helps! https://www.justrightpetfood.com/blog/dog-body-condition-score

It's difficult to judge body condition at two months, so I wouldn't be too concerned; but it's advised not to let them get too fat as a puppy, because he will eventually be a fat adult. You can avoid him getting too fat and growing too quickly (another concern for problems later on) by ensuring he's fed the correct amount of large breed puppy food. A quality dog food brand will be formulated for puppies and have specific feeding instructions to ensure they get adequate nutrients and not too much. Below is a link to more information about how to look for a good food. https://mobile.petcoach.co/amp/article/what-to-look-for-when-choosing-your-pet-s-food I hope that helps and all is well with Invictus.

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.

Although its a little hard to tell from the photo both of your pups look to be lean with good muscle mass. To assess body condition what you want to look for are a waist behind the ribs when viewed from above, and that you can feel but not see the spine and ribs. Young active dogs are certainly apt to be a bit leaner. You could certainly consider a diet for active large breed dogs, especially for the Dane mix. To figure out how much to feed you need to know two things. First, you need to find out how many calories are in a cup of your current food. This is sometimes written on the bag or you can go online to the foods website and typically find it. It would be written kcal/cup for dry or kcal/can for canned. Second, you need to figure out what the energy requirements for your dogs are. This will be different for different weights of dogs and for dogs with different lifestyles. A good website to go to to help you with this is the Ohio State University Pet calorie calculator. If you Google OSU dog calorie calculator it should pop up. This will show you how to calculate the energy requirement for your dogs based on their weights, and let you know what factor to multiply by for their lifestyle. Then basically when you know how many calories they should be taking in per day you can figure out how much to feed. Keep in mind if you do this and change the amount you are feeding, if you are seeing weight loss or excessive weight gain you will have to adjust the plan as it's not a perfect system. I hope this helps and thank you for using Petco Pet Education Center, formerly Petcoach!

Most puppies should be proper weight if they are getting fed puppy food, and in his case large breed puppy food. If you are concerned about his weight, then I would recommend getting him checked to ensure he isn't losing nutrition due to intestinal parasites, which is the #`1 cause for weight loss in puppies. Otherwise, he may just be naturally lean. I can see his ribs there but he is laying down, if he stands and his ribs are still readily pronounced, then he may be a tad bit underweight. Also if he has any loose stool, this can indicate other internal organ issues that should be checked by your vet. If he has an underlying issue that is not treated, then no matter what you feed him, he will continue to be undersized. I hope that things work out well for your pet Thunder and that his weight normalizes soon! Best wishes and take care.

If you can't see his ribs then he is eating enough. It is best not to overfeed them. They look to you for food as a bond. They are not necessarily hungry. Puppies go through growth spurts where they look thinner and heavier until they are adults. As long as you are feeding according to the instructions on the bag of food, you are probably feeding him just fine.

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!