You do make me laugh, Lisa! I can just imagine you in a US policewoman's uniform, gun in hand while bellowing "STEP AWAY FROM THE SCALES - AND KEEP YOUR HANDS WHERE I CAN SEE THEM (and check you're not surreptitiously weighing things)".
I was surprised by the amounts too, and did a "rough-cut" like Sarah, against what I actually give Paddy. What I realised is that I've probably been under-feeding him, but he's been looking and feeling like a perfect weight because OH gives him masses of treats - he's been getting through a third of a small bag of Mini-Jacks by James Wellbeloved a day without me realising it. I'm upping the food at meals and told OH to back off the treats: easily done this week, since we've run out and I'm not replacing till I see what the increased meal sizes and re-jigged combinations do to Paddy's waistline.
But he shouldn't be taking in such a large volume of calories in less nutritious formats - treats are "occasionals", not meal replacements which is what OH has built them up to. I've also been giving too little offal - if heart counts as "meat" - I hadn't realised that for dog purposes, "offal" = "glandular organs".
I'll let you know if I see any changes from the meal format changing.
I've also found that Paddy can't cope with a meaty bone meal - i.e. where he just gets 150/170g lump of breast of lamb - he gets really constipated - which makes a change from colitis
. So I've been giving him smaller pieces, more often - with minced lamb & veggies as the main part of the meal.
Penel - Paddy's a whiz. Had a minor relapse - used the acute medication and that sorted it swiftly - and Mark changed his daily medication. He's still so much livelier than before he started the homeopathy, but calmer (less hyper) than he was on the first set of medication. His coat is sooooo lovely - soft and glossy - maybe Mark could do something with the wool on my head (then again, if I ate as good a diet as Pads, I'd probably be all glowing and glossy too!). Tummy/bowel is settled and ordinary - what a relief - for the time being! Still a few of the oddities I PM'd you about, but I put that down to Paddy, not his colitis: sometimes he's just an odd little dog. Breath getting miles better since the new meds too. My mother hadn't seen him for about six weeks and said at the weekend that he looked even more beautiful - lovely proportions, amazing coat, moving nicely - so there's a thumbs up!
Oddly though: I weighed him at the end of November, just before going to see Mark. He was 11.9kg and a bit "thick" around the middle. Weighed him at the weekend - beautiful waist visible now, looks leaner - he's put on a full kilo and is now 12.9kg - but it's solid muscle and mass, not flab. So I'm putting that down to the combined benefits of a revised BARF diet, in line with Mark's views, and his medication helping him to optimise his absorption of the nutrients.
I just love him....it was a year ago on Saturday that we collected him....can't believe he's now 14 months old.
Denise
