Feeding an Older dog - Advice please!

3Beasties

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My patterdale is now 15 1/2, bright and active and generally doing well but he seems to have become very picky about food.

For the past number of years he has been fed dry dog food which we always dampen. He's never been much of an eater but recently he hardly seems to be eating any of his meal. Some nights (if it's mixed with yummy left overs) he will gobble the lot up but other times he won't even touch it.

He tends to get fed more treats because of this as he is hungry and looking for food, he just won't eat his tea so this obviously isn't ideal.

I would say he is a fairly good weight so there's no worries on that score but I would just feel better if he ate a proper meal.

Ideally we'd just leave the food down for him to eat as and when he pleases (which is what we used to do) but having a lab in the house now means that is impossible.

So, I was thinking of either changing him over to wet/tinned food (which I think he'd gobble up) and/or giving him breakfast as well as tea.

Is changing his diet at this age a bad idea?

Any suggestions on some decent tinned food? Am open to other ideas/suggestions!

Here's a piccy (or two) of the little dude on his 15th Birthday :D

toby.jpg


toby1.jpg
 
I would be either using Naturediet or sticking with the complete and adding a sachet of catfood to each meal.
 
I'd be giving Chappie but only the chicken & rice with fish oils. easily digestable and soft to eat. My girl won't touch dried food. and as she's got older she used to not do well on other foods. But with this she's never had a problem I give her two small feeds with one handful of small bite mixer a day.:)
 
We feed CSJ as it's natural and our dogs are doing very well on it, If you look on the CSJ website they have different food for different dogs and they do a couple for older dogs i think. Also would maybe add a few little supplements (also from CSJ) if you like. And some cheapish dog/cat food sachets :) Hope this help. (Very cute dog btw) :D

(http://www.csjk9.com/productcart/pc/viewPrd.asp?idproduct=92&idcategory=6 One of the CSJ dog foods for older dogs)
 
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Some of their products are ok but that one is a very poor formulation for a dog food and far from natural -


Composition

Wheat, Beef & Lamb Meal, Maize, Barley, Chicken Liver, Wheatfeed, Unmolassed Beet Pulp, Chicken Fat, Full Fat Linseed, Alfalfa, Peas, Yucca Schidigera

Analytical Constituents

Protein 18.0%
Fat Content 6.0%
Crude Fibre 3.75%
Crude Ash 7.0%
Additives

Natural antioxidants
Nutritional Additives:

Vitamin A/E672 14,000iu/kg
Vitamin D/E671 1,200iu/kg
Vitamin E/3a700 140mg/kg
Iron sulphate monohydrate 65mg/kg
Cupric sulphate pentahydrate 30mg/kg
Manganous oxide 50mg/kg
Zinc sulphate monohydrate 350mg/kg
Sodium selenite 0.45mg/kg
 
Composition

Wheat, Beef & Lamb Meal, Maize, Barley, Chicken Liver, Wheatfeed, Unmolassed Beet Pulp, Chicken Fat, Full Fat Linseed, Alfalfa, Peas, Yucca Schidigera

Analytical Constituents

Protein 18.0%
Fat Content 6.0%
Crude Fibre 3.75%
Crude Ash 7.0%
Additives

Natural antioxidants
Nutritional Additives:

Vitamin A/E672 14,000iu/kg
Vitamin D/E671 1,200iu/kg
Vitamin E/3a700 140mg/kg
Iron sulphate monohydrate 65mg/kg
Cupric sulphate pentahydrate 30mg/kg
Manganous oxide 50mg/kg
Zinc sulphate monohydrate 350mg/kg
Sodium selenite 0.45mg/kg

This means nothing to me :p
 
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