Dog Lifespan Records And Diet

[harrkim120]

My first dog was 21 when he passed and I will be honest my parents probably fed him the cheapest dog food there was. Not saying feed your dog crap but I think that is a pretty long life. And he enjoyed every minute of it

What kind of dog was he?

[dogtrainer1507]

He was a sheltie beagel mix. I loved that dog he had the cutesy little bowed legs and loved to hunt. He was a horrible puppy but when he passed even my dad was crying and he didn't even cry when I got married. I thought he would happy to be getting rid of me guesshe liked the dog better. Hehe

[Grizcat68]

My yellow lab is currently a couple months away from 15 and still going strong! Healthy diet of Iams, pizza crusts, and bread once in a while

[RawFedDogs]

Your dog is living a long life in spite of everything you can do to prevent it. Good for him.

[ruckusluvr]

wow! i bet he would be 20 if he ate a balanced healthy diet!

[jiml]

as some have said. A lot has to do with genetics and the individual. As with people some can eat unhealthy and never have any diet related problems others die at 45 of heart failure. your odds are better on the healthier diet.

[northdog]

My last dog died at 8 - kidney disease. My puppy (8 months now) wants to live longer. I don't understand what kind of kibble is best. Origen is high protein 70%, I think. I put her on it (recommended by one vet). Then she got sick, diarrhea, and the next vet said it was bad for her. Vet didn't say why. Puppy is better now, though. Most other kibble products are significantly lower in protein - Nutro Natural Choice is 26%. How can 2 dog food products be so extremely different??

[dobesgalore]

Your dog is living a long life in spite of everything you can do to prevent it. Good for him.

LOL!!!

[buddy97]

Origen is high protein 70%- Nutro Natural Choice is 26%. How can 2 dog food products be so extremely different??

among other things, one is full of alot of meat product, the other one is not.

orijen is 40% protein.....they claim 70% meat content on the kibble, not the same as saying 70% protein.

[VolvoRottie]

I believe that in the old days dog food sold in the grocery stores probably wasn't as bad as it is now by any means. The bottom line has taken it's toll on the quality of everything out there, production costs, inflation etc. So, I can see where dogs back in the day could live longer than they do now. Absolutely everything in this country is not made the way it was back in the day.

Very true, when I was a kid in the 1960s, my first dog Daisy ate Alpo nearly exclusively along with my mom's then terrific home cooking. We would look into the ALPO can and it looked just like Dinty Moore Beef Stew sold today for human consumption; our dog got real beef and yes it had veggies in there along with the fat and gravy of cooking it, it smelled pretty good and that dog loved it to pieces. Today ALPO Is crappy dog food and isn't at all what it was back then. Daisy lived until she was 15 but she was a small Wire-haired Fox Terrier and a maniac her whole life.

My next door neighbor had a hunting dog reject, a Pointer named Ben who was fed the cheapest crap from WalMart his whole life; he was 19 yrs old when he died.

I think our dogs lived a long time back then due to not only better food but genetics and maybe less horrendous chemicals in the environment.

I feed my 11 yr old Rottie kibble now, but when she arrived here as a shelter save/rescue, she was 2 yrs old and a living skeleton. Her fur was dull and flaky, and she had a lot of goo in her eyes. She not only was fed good food immediately , she was fed human food for a year as I was really worried about her health. Turns out she was young and bounced back, and has great hips if not shoulders. Then in yr 2, I transitioned her to Candae kibble [before they changed the recipe and lost many customers due to reactions like diarrhea, and I mixed in home-cooking like baked chicken/veggies and brown rice and my own good broth. I made that once a week in my oven and soon, Zev looked like a million bucks and frankly had the energy of 5 dogs. She's been eating either Candae or Chicken Soup for Dogs mixed with my home cooked food for 9 yrs now and the dog is never sick; she is lame unfortunately due to old age and bi-lateral Shoulder OCD from too much jumping off our 5 ft. tall deck into the grass in our yard [bypassed the stairs for yrs.] chasing squirrels. She was a 99 lb dog and top loaded like many Rotties and of course, her weight is in the front, so her shoulders took a pounding for yrs. If you follow my links in my profile you can see her picks. She looked great until she was 10 yr old. Now she looks and acts old sadly. I'm heartbroken thinking about it.

I also used to take her hiking in local forests here for hours at at time multiple times a week; and she was off leash running in a local park when we didn't hit the woods/state parks daily as I was SAHM. Exercise kept her lean well until 9 yrs old and she only gained weight in the last 2 yrs as her shoulder OCD got worse; I feed her 10 caps of 1200 mg. Fish oil a day for that arthritis and pain per my vet. I don't like to use Rimadyl or similar drugs if I can help it.

I hope the exercise and good diet prolong her life but I'm realistic if dreading the idea that cancer still statistically kills most of her breed and many others as well. Diet mainly can't stave off cancer caused by environmental factors despite our efforts.

She's my oldest dog so far; most of the others died of cancer around 9 yrs old.