# Gaining Weight



## Ivy (Mar 16, 2011)

Hank is on Orijen food and he's always been on the skinny side. I'm looking for a way to have him gain a little bit more weight, i've upped his food but he gets soft stools when I do that. He's got a very sensitive stomach.


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## whiteleo (Sep 7, 2008)

You can add canned or try Natures Variety raw boost kibble it added much needed weight to my foster, good luck!


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## Losech (Jul 10, 2012)

How many times a day do you feed Hank? Feeding smaller meals that equal a larger portion might help out, if you do not do that already.


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## monster'sdad (Jul 29, 2012)

Change the food. If you have a dog that loses weight on a high protein food like that you must lower the overall contribution of calories from protein. If you look at performance diets they generally will have a 10% or less difference between protein and fat. Orijen's is 21%. The greater the proportion of fat and carbs in the diet the greater the ability to gain weight or maintain weight when being worked. Fiber also plays a role. Beet pulp is used in all of then because it optimizes the absorption of nutrients. 

Protein is a very inefficient source of calories because around 30% are wasted in conversion to energy. Fat loses the least and carbs in the middle.

Cap protein at 30% unless the fat differential is around 10 percentage points.

It is no accident that performance foods are 30/20 - 35/25 formulas.


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## Savage Destiny (Mar 16, 2011)

It would be helpful to see pictures of him to see how skinny he really is!


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## Kassandra (Jun 6, 2012)

When Charlie was extremely underweight, we would feed her half puppy food and half adult food. Puppy food generally has a higher fat content and I couldn't find an adult food at the time with as high fat content as I was looking for. It worked wonders for her, and though she is still a little underweight (I think she is just a skinny lanky dog who will never reach there ideal weight.. I like to compare her to my brother in dog form) she looks so much better and is healthy as ever. Even when she was so underweight she was still healthy according to the vet and blood work, but you can definitely see an obvious improvement. Her metabolism is so high it doesn't matter what we feed she will find a way to burn all the calories and stay slim


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## DDBsR4Me (Jan 23, 2012)

My boy is on the Orijen 6 Fish and it has really helped him to fill out to where he needed to be. He was always just a touch thin IMO and he's really looking good on the Orijen. He's 135lbs and gets approx. 4 cups a day - some days it's more, some days it's less. 

Which formula is your dog on and how long has he been on Orijen? 

To help gain weight I'd add some canned food or you could even make satin balls. I guess it just depends on how thin your dog is.


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## Ivy (Mar 16, 2011)

Hank's on large breed puppy food. It's almost exactly the same as the adult formula. Hank is about 43lbs and is getting 3.5 cups a day 3 times a day, any more than that and he gets diarrhea. I tried giving a tiny amount of canned food (the size of my pinky nail) and he got diarrhea pretty bad, so that's a no go.

He's not exremely underweight. I don't like seeing his ribs jut out when he's laying down and I don't like seeing ribs through the skin. I want to feel ribs but don't want to see them. A couple of extra pounds would be nice.


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## monster'sdad (Jul 29, 2012)

Ivy said:


> Hank's on large breed puppy food. It's almost exactly the same as the adult formula. Hank is about 43lbs and is getting 3.5 cups a day 3 times a day, any more than that and he gets diarrhea. I tried giving a tiny amount of canned food (the size of my pinky nail) and he got diarrhea pretty bad, so that's a no go.
> 
> He's not exremely underweight. I don't like seeing his ribs jut out when he's laying down and I don't like seeing ribs through the skin. I want to feel ribs but don't want to see them. A couple of extra pounds would be nice.


I prefer the hip bone test to be honest. I never look at ribs, rather I don't want overexposed hip bones.


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## Caty M (Aug 13, 2010)

There's no one real way to determine if a dog is underweight. I have one IG that no matter what weight she is at (healthy, skinny or chubby) always has real prominent hip bones. Our other IG is thinner, taller and just overall lanky looking, but hers don't show at all! A pic would be nice- I prefer a bit of rib on a dog.


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## Ivy (Mar 16, 2011)

Hank is not the type of dog that would easily show hips bones anyways.
I need to find a way to add a couple of pounds that won't upset his stomach.


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## lauren43 (Feb 6, 2011)

Ivy said:


> Hank's on large breed puppy food. It's almost exactly the same as the adult formula. Hank is about 43lbs and is getting 3.5 cups a day 3 times a day, any more than that and he gets diarrhea. I tried giving a tiny amount of canned food (the size of my pinky nail) and he got diarrhea pretty bad, so that's a no go.
> 
> He's not exremely underweight. I don't like seeing his ribs jut out when he's laying down and I don't like seeing ribs through the skin. I want to feel ribs but don't want to see them. A couple of extra pounds would be nice.


Holy moly that is a lot of food. How old is Hank? What breed?


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## Ivy (Mar 16, 2011)

Hank is a Basset Hound and will be 7 this April. Ever since I got him, he's needed more food to keep weight on.


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## monster'sdad (Jul 29, 2012)

Ivy said:


> Hank is not the type of dog that would easily show hips bones anyways.
> I need to find a way to add a couple of pounds that won't upset his stomach.


Use a traditional performance food like a 30/20, 26/20, 24/20 and your dog will gain weight and you will save money.

Nutram Active I am told is very good, as is Eukanuba Premium Performance and Pro Plan Performance.

A dog that size should be eating 2 - 2.5 cups total per day. You are feeding 3.5 cups times 3 or 3.5 cups divided by 3? It is not clear. The former sounds odd.

This dog is fine healthwise?


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## Herzo (Feb 5, 2011)

Hard to imagine a basset 7 years old not being able to keep weight on. And I agree I don't understand either 3.5 total or is it more. Have you ever tried a probiotic on him, just wondering if that would help his tummy troubles?


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## Kassandra (Jun 6, 2012)

We had a basset x beagle mix in the rescue I volunteer with once and we could not for the life of us keep weight on him. He was soooo skinny when he first came in and though we were feeding him soo much multiple times a day he would not gain any. If he did, it would be back to normal a few days later. Of course we got him into the vet, and turns out he had liver tumors or something like that and needed to go on meds and special food for it (low protein but high fat i think?) he put some weight on but it was hard to keep it.


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## monster'sdad (Jul 29, 2012)

Herzo said:


> Hard to imagine a basset 7 years old not being able to keep weight on. And I agree I don't understand either 3.5 total or is it more. Have you ever tried a probiotic on him, just wondering if that would help his tummy troubles?


A 7 year old basset weighing 45lbs doesn't need to be eating over 120 grams of protein everyday. 50 - 75 grams is probably the right number. The excess is just being peed out and the OP's wallet drained.

If the dog is indeed underweight it is probably due to this.


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## 1605 (May 27, 2009)

monster'sdad said:


> A 7 year old basset weighing 45lbs doesn't need to be eating over 120 grams of protein everyday. 50 - 75 grams is probably the right number. The excess is just being peed out and the OP's wallet drained.
> 
> If the dog is indeed underweight it is probably due to this.


Agreed. What the dog is eating is definitely not giving him what he needs. I am especially puzzled as why he is on "Large Breed Puppy" food when he is neither.


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## murbanski (Sep 25, 2012)

I agree with everyone on here. That sounds like a lot of food. I would definitely take him to the vet ASAP and see if they can find anything wrong. Could be worms etc etc etc the list goes on.


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## Ivy (Mar 16, 2011)

Herzo said:


> Hard to imagine a basset 7 years old not being able to keep weight on. And I agree I don't understand either 3.5 total or is it more. Have you ever tried a probiotic on him, just wondering if that would help his tummy troubles?


He gets a total of 3.5 cups a day and he's been on probiotics for a long time now.



SubMariner said:


> Agreed. What the dog is eating is definitely not giving him what he needs. I am especially puzzled as why he is on "Large Breed Puppy" food when he is neither.


If you read through my responses throughout this thread you'll see that the large breed puppy formula is the same as the adult formula. 



murbanski said:


> I agree with everyone on here. That sounds like a lot of food. I would definitely take him to the vet ASAP and see if they can find anything wrong. Could be worms etc etc etc the list goes on.


I made an appointment for him. Hopefully we can figure out what's going on.


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## Shamrockmommy (Sep 10, 2009)

Glad to hear he's getting checked out. Otherwise maybe try him on some California natural. It has pretty high calories per cup and the carbs from the rice might help put on some weight for him.


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## Herzo (Feb 5, 2011)

Bassets are considered large breed dogs, even though they have short legs.

Good luck in finding out what is wrong with him. I have had problems keeping weight on young bassets but never when they get older. They are all different however.


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