Overweight labrador cross

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I have a Springador bitch (half Labrador and Half Springer spaniel). She is a beautiful playful dog, age 4 years and I have owned her since she was a puppy. Came from a reputable breeder.

Her temperament/looks are more labrador than springer (and I've owned both types before) although she is more excitable than the average labrador. I am having a lot of trouble keeping her weight down. She has been spayed.

She has lots of walks as we live in the country and a garden to play in. She is fed three small meals a day (kibble and fresh meat usually) but asks for food all day even though I know she is actually overfed if anything. I asked the vet and he said to give her raw carrots for treats. I have done this but she is still overweight. I am thinking of putting her on kibble for overweight dogs. At the moment she is on Tails.com but I have now cancelled the subscription because although they said they had altered the recipe because of her weight issues, there has been no noticeable difference.

Can anyone recommend a kibble for overweight dogs that actually works or have any ideas about how to curb her incessant demands for food. Oxford University have discovered a gene in Labs which makes them crave food that she seems to have inherited!

I had to reduce my dog down to one meal after he’d been neutered, he does get training ‘treats’ on top though. I haven’t heard of many dogs having three meals, maybe you need to drop the lunchtime one?

Otherwise you could add water or veg to bulk it out. Or give her food frozen in a kong to make it last longer?

Mine also has those yak chews which stop him asking for extra food.

Drop lunch and add water to her meals and let the kibble element swell up so she feels fuller. I also have a springador and despite having the soul of a fat dog she's very fit and without an ounce of spare flab.

I have used James Wellbeloved Light Recipe for weight loss. I had to feed way less than the RDA though. And I swear the dog produced four times the weight in poo.
Will your dog eat green vegetables? They are good for healthy fillers with few calories.
(I know four lab x spaniels and they all look like mini labs to me.)

Thanks for all your replies. I will try all your recommendations as TBH I am at my wit's end. She won't like having her lunch stopped so that will be a problem as of course, she knows what the time is!

Also will try longer walks. She did have a dog walker but she now refuses to go out with him (which has left him heartbroken poor man) as she is very clingy. She also now refuses to get in the car but I suppose that's for another thread. 😅

The frozen diced veg is good for bulking out dog food so they feel full. We had one that happily ate apple, cucumber and any sort of veg, including frozen Brussels
Could never cut it down to one meal a day as every lab I’ve had has had food on the brain constantly.
Putting the biscuits in a biscuit ball or similar so it takes a long time to eat so it keeps them busy
We also had to use the light dog food at various times.

The frozen veg is a great idea as she will eat absolutely anything. Thanks!

Hi Op, i have a food obsessed dog. I bought a couple of lick mats and I freeze low fat yogurt/wet food/gravy/peanut butter etc. Keeps her occupied for a while.

If you can I'd throw in a short walk just before you'd usually give her lunch to throw her routine off a little so she's not immediately predicting lunch and missing it.

I have a food obsessed Lab too. She barely chews food she eats it that fast. She has 3 meals of kibble a day. Treat wise, she doesn’t have much, maybe the odd biscuit or a carrot. She is allllways after food though and drools if she spots any. I give her food in a toy so she has to work to get it out to keep her entertained. Or I sprinkle it round the garden so it takes longer and she has to sniff it out. Helps a bit

Dont bullk up food with veg. Much better to feed a good quality food but the correct quantity.

Just get a good quaity dog food and make sure you weigh the food for every meal.

If she is used to three meals a day carry on doing that but split the days allowance into three meals.

No need to add water to the kibbe - it swells up in the stomach anyway so will make no difference.

Good foods woud be Milies wolfheart and you can discuss with them the amount of food to give her to get to her ideal weight. Usually it means cutting food down by 10% (but that is dependent on what she is on now)

How much Tails is she having at the moment?

I have labs wcs and they will all eat all day if I let them. I dont!

I take a hard line on this. Just feed her less. She will get used to it. Being overweight is so unhealthy.

Feed her less. Exercise her more. No treats. Dogs don’t need treats and most of them are full of crap anyway - even the so called ‘healthy’ ones.

Guidance on what constitutes a ‘portion’ for a dog is very often very wrong so don’t adhere to it - this is where so many people go so wrong. Butternut Box, for example, recons that my dog (35Kg Golden - weight fluctuates a bit) should have 1.5 pouches a day. He’s gets 0.5 pouch and 100G dry biscuits. So nearly half what is recommended. He is a perfect weight. Lily’s kitchen would have him on 4 tins a day. Insane. Would he eat more? God yes. Does he need more? No.

You’d be so surprised by how many people say ‘but my dog gets enough exercise’ and they’re walking it only 3 miles a day. Your dog needs a good two hours a day given the breeds she’s from - so even if you think you’re exercising her well, chances are you probably aren’t.

I’m not saying this to sound harsh. But I’ve rarely met an owner, outside the show ring, whose dog was well exercised (with noticeable muscles on their legs, not fat - there’s a difference) and the right weight. People look at my dogs and say I starve them. I don’t. I just feed them what they need - it’s like humans, so many humans are chunky (of which I am definitely one of them - hello chocolate strawberries) but have convinced themselves they’re not. The difference is, dogs can’t help themselves when it comes to food - we can, so it’s our responsibility to not over feed them.

I’d also be making sure no one else in her life is giving her treats. People so often think they’re being kind (although some people are just arseholes) when they give a ‘hungry’ dog treats and they’re not.

But labs and Springers are both prone to serious joint issues, so you need to get a handle on this fast.

Being overweight takes something like 10% off a dog's life expectancy, aside from anything else. And it is possible to keep a dog's weight down.

We have the greediest dog on God's green earth. She will eat anything, and has been known to race up to picnickers and slam down to a sit in front of them looking hopeful (at least she has some manners...) She is lean and very fit - proper muscles.

We keep her thay way with plenty of off-lead exercise every day (minimum one hour, usually 90 mins, sometimes a lot more). We never feed her from the table at mealtimes, so she very rarely tries begging there (if she does, she gets sent to her bed). Her kibble is measured in an old mug, but both dogs get table scraps, so I adjust the kibble and tinned meat accordingly. If she starts to look a bit bulkier than I'd like, she gets fed about 20% less until she's slimmed back down. She burns a lot of calories running around the countryside so it doesn't take long.

She gets training treats and the odd pig's ear or similar.

You just have to be very determined and I sometimes feel a bit brutal, but I have a middle aged dog who has no health issues and lives a wonderful life.

It's hard with labs because they are so food motivated.
For non weight related reasons I had to cut out a mealtime for my old dog (no longer with us) and swapped it for a chew/puzzle based activity (frozen Kong or similar) and that worked well. Much less food consumed but a good enriching activity.

No help whatsoever, but good job, most people don’t realise their dogs are overweight
Good Luck 👍👍

Our beagle put on quite a bit of weight over lockdown - we just reduced his portions (the so-called recommended amount is typically way too much).

The weight dropped off and within six months he was back down to where he should be and stayed there ever since!

I've got a Cockerdor and they do want a fair amount of exercise. I don't track our distance, but we walk an average of 20,000 steps a day and he has defined muscles in his legs and a very visible waist, even when his weight is a bit higher than normal. I'm happy if I can see his ribs as he's moving when the light catches them, but I dislike it when they're visible all the time - he can be a diva with food (he didn't get the Lab gene) and so I tend to be more concerned to ensure he maintains a healthy weight.

Lily's kitchen recommendations are comical, I don't know where they magic them from - they'd have him on six tins a day. At 23(ish)kg he's on 240g of Millie's Wolfheart and one tin of LK across the whole day. I'm shifting him gradually to two meals a day as he's a year old now but it's taking a while as he wants to eat at lunchtime still.

ANYWAY. Came here to say that it might be easier just to keep her on a good quality kibble - Millie's Wolfheart are fab and will talk all the issues out with you - and have a look at whether she needs more time outside, preferably off lead or on a long line, as a springador can probably walk three times your distance on a walk if given the chance.

It does seem hard for a bitch to lose weight post-spay, I've a friend struggling with this at the moment. Hopefully others who've been through this can help.

If she's used to being fed at certain times, could you split the amount that she would normally have for her last meal over the two meals instead? Rather than giving her the full amount for both meals. This is what we do with ours (also a springador too!) as he seems to get too hungry and antsy waiting until 5pm

I had good results with Hills RD prescription diet. But as pps say, the recommended portions are too high for the average pet. Or switch to a specific low fat diet.

A Kong wobblercan help ‘spin out’ her meal . My lab loved his, and the activity of having to release his own meal kept him active.

It does sound like she eats too much, but if she is reluctant to exercise, perhaps get a vet check, including thyroid levels. My lab had hypothyroidism, but you would not have known to look at him, it was only revealed by checking T3 & T4 levels.

For dogs, like humans, something like 80 % of weight loss is due to food, and only around 20% to exercise.

It does seem hard for a bitch to lose weight post-spay, I've a friend struggling with this at the moment. Hopefully others who've been through this can help.
You just have to be determined, and not give in to the begging. You're the human, you're the one who understands the health and life expectancy implications, you control the food supply, so it's entirely your responsibility - and that of the rest of the family, who might like to slip the dog half a custard cream.

The more you resist the begging, the less - eventually - the dog will beg. Ours know that there are times when it's worth hanging around looking hopeful, and times when it never is, and behave accordingly.

Ours has never got fat, but she has got a bit chunky, and I've just cut down her food quite substantially for a short period of time, and that has done the trick

@Bupster 20k steps a day for me is about 10 miles 😁I remember reading somewhere the average woman walks 1 mile for every 2K steps….

No wonder he always looks so pleased with himself in photos you post - Bill’s living the best life!

Lily's kitchen recommendations are about right for my two based on calories. I mean, I don't know who'd exclusively feed a lab lily's kitchen tins, you'd be bankrupt, but they're not miles off for mine (and they're both spayed females which they don't distinguish between on their food estimator)

But just feed less. I don't think 2 or 3 meals matters, it should be the same amount across the day either way.

My dog gets AVA weight management kibble. I don’t know if people will consider that good quality but it has a decent protein content and gets quite a good score on the All about dog food site. It does seem helpful that he can have a higher volume of this food as when we just cut down the amount of his previous food it turned out to be a tiny amount.

He gets less than the recommended amount on the packet. We have just arrived at an amount that keeps his weight stable by trial and error. I go on how easily I can feel his ribs. We also always weigh his food every meal as when we were using a scoop the amount was actually very variable and usually too much.

He gets fed twice a day but also has some of his rations in a Kong Wobbler, in a frozen Kong with veg and water or scattered in the garden.

He isn’t a fan of most veg and would not work for it so we use tiny bits of chicken for training treats. We weigh out the ration for the day and count it in his calorie allowance. Higher fat stuff like cheese is a rare treat.

Hes a rescue mutt who is a large lab/ goldie size. He weighs 32kg and gets 2 hours exercise a day always with some off lead time.

When we had to cut our Lab’s meals from 3 to 2 he found it very hard ( typical food obsessed Lab). We now give him wet food in a Kong at lunchtime so he feels he has had something. It’s the equivalent of about 30g dry food so we take that much off his evening meal allowance.

To get her into the car… we had to lure ours in with food at first. Some liver paste on a licky mat did the trick. Maybe at lunchtime when they are feeling starved 😉

Thanks so much to everyone for taking the time to give me your advice, all of which I have taken on board. Ultimately, I know it's my fault if my dog is overweight and the guilt is mine, not hers. Time for a new regime!