jannel woodhull: Does Your Dog's Diet Need Supplements?

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It is as important for your dog to consume a healthy, balanced diet as it is for you. Good dog foods, normally the more expensive ones, are formulated to provide your dog with everything it needs in its food, but feeding the same food each day can lead to deficiencies of some vitamins and nutrients.

It is worth looking at the ingredients on the label of your dog food and comparing it to what your dog ought to be eating. This takes a little elementary maths but is not difficult. Look on the Internet to find out what a dog such as yours should be eating for its size, weight, age and level of activity and copy it down in a column.

Then, read off what is in the dog food, multiply that by the amount you give your dog and write that in a different column opposite the names of the vitamins you have already copied down. The ingredients will probably be per 100 grams, so if you give your dog 500 grams a day, you multiply the numbers by five.

How do the two columns compare? If you dog is getting all it requires and more, then all well and good, but otherwise you will need to supplement your dog?s diet with the deficit.

Let?s say that your dog?s existing diet is a little short of vitamins A and D. Look up these vitamins on the Internet by typing into Google: ?foodstuffs that contain vitamin A and D?.

You might have to enter the vitamins in one at a time, but you will find a list of foods that will provide vitamins A and D. In this case, an egg will be the easiest manner of providing the extra vitamins.

Serve it boiled or just stir it into his food. Dogs love eggs so that will not be a problem Then you have to find out how many eggs you have to give a week.

You will find that you are able to supply almost any vitamins and nutrients you need to give in the various fruits, vegetables, grains and nuts available in the market.

Dogs would obtain a wide variety of these from the stomach contents of its prey in the wild, so if you have to supply them, liquidize them in a blender and stir them into the dog?s standard food. Raw is best, but the grains might have to be steeped in water over night.

There are some very common foods that are poisonous to dogs, so you will need to cross-check this before attempting DIY food supplementation. Foods such as raisins, grapes and chocolate are examples of things that are poisonous to dogs, but there are a couple of others too. Print a list off the Net and pin it up on the inside of the door of the pet food cupboard.

If this sounds like too much work, you could just discuss the matter with your vet and he or she will be able to recommend an easier solution to your concerns.

Owen Jones, the author of this piece writes on many topics, but is at present involved with researching Poisonous Flowers For Dogs. If you would like to know more, please go to our website at What to do if your dog eats chocolate.