# Am I feeding the right amount?



## Dechi (Aug 22, 2015)

The best way is feeling the ribs. You need to feel them when you lightly press, but not too much.

Start with what is said on the bag, then increase if you feel you need to. When you see she's getting a little chubby, cut back by a very small amount. If she's reasonable, you can also free feed and not worry about it. Let her eat as much as she wants in 10 minutes and take away the bowl. Some dogs just stop eating when they're full. But beware, some will eat until they throw up...

Don't worry too much, this is not an exact science, trust your instincts.

As for adult food, some brands you can feed a puppy already, some you need to switch around 1 year old. If your puppy is active, she will burn the calories fine. If she's laid back, maybe you'll switch to adult a little sooner.


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## fjm (Jun 4, 2010)

Puppies are notorious for being ravenous when they are in a growth spurt, and then having a few days of being not very interested in food, so their needs can vary from day to day. Looking at the Acana feeding chart, I wonder if you are underestimating his adult weight, though. I would try 40 - 50g, fed in three meals a day, and see how that goes. I would plan on transitioning to adult food around 9 - 12 months (although as Dechi says, you can use an all stages food sooner), and expect him to have finished growing at around 8 - 10 months. At that point he will probably need less food.


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## Tiny Poodles (Jun 20, 2013)

Dechi said:


> The best way is feeling the ribs. You need to feel them when you lightly press, but not too much.
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Yes, I would just go by feel when Timi was growing - every time she felt skinny, I upped her food a little. The way that she would fly, I knew immediately that it would be bad for her to carry any extra fat when she was landing. She grew into a "lean, mean, muscle machine"!


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## sirvaan (Feb 28, 2016)

Thanks everybody. I tried to let him eat as much as he can for 5 minutes. A day after he is sleeping too much and do not intressted in playing ir doing tricks and got diarrhoea. I think it was too much for him. i will try to feed him around 50g and see what will happen.

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## lisasgirl (May 27, 2010)

My vet taught me this general rule for gauging skinniness (since I too have a puppy whose interest in food seems to vary day to day):

Make a fist with one hand, then run the fingers of your other hand over it. An underfed dog's ribs will feel like your knuckles - the bones under the skin protrude really obviously and you notice them with the slightest touch. A dog at a healthy weight feels like the bones on the back of your hand - you notice them, but they don't stick out. And an overweight dog's ribs will feel like the bones on the inside of your wrist - you can probably still feel them, but you have to be looking for them a bit.

It's also relatively common for puppies to be on the skinny side, since they're often growing so quickly that they don't have leftover calories for packing on fat. Offer more food if your puppy is on the thin side, but don't be alarmed if s/he doesn't eat all of it unless you're seeing other symptoms of something wrong, like severe skinniness or lethargy.


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## kayla_baxter (Jul 17, 2015)

lisasgirl said:


> My vet taught me this general rule for gauging skinniness (since I too have a puppy whose interest in food seems to vary day to day):
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That's exactly what I use to judge weight. Here's a handy photos. 










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## sirvaan (Feb 28, 2016)

The pics were very helpful. Thank u so much. I think finally I got a idea about how should i feed toby.

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## kontiki (Apr 6, 2013)

Now of course if we have plump hands ourselves this is not going to work right!


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