How much do you feed?

[melbell]

The amount of food definitely depends on the dog's height, weight and build.

Honey (23 lbs 15 1/2 inches) gets 1/3rd twice a day
Oshie (26lbs 16 inches) gets 3/4ths twice a day
Ruutu (~36lbs 18 inches) get a cup twice a day

Ironically Oshie and Ruutu could afford to gain more weight as well, but it's hard to keep it on them. Honey got fat on me for a year and we found 1/3rd twice a day is perfect for her.

Just watch her weight as you play with her food amounts. I won't touch on free feeding since others have already, but like they said, not the best idea.

 

[Hanne]

A cup is a measurement of volume, not weight. I'm sure your dog food companies give you recommended feeding guidelines based on the dog's weight, correct? Well we get the same thing, except instead of measuring it terms of weight, we use volume. We can also look at how many calories per cup of food. Different foods will have different amounts of kcal/cup. So if I know my dog only needs 100 kcal a day to maintain her weight, and the food has 200 kcal/cup, then I know I should only feed my dog 1/2 cup per day. That's just an example of course.

Yes, it is exactly the same here - where we use weight and you volume

Good I'm not forced to use cups - my brain can not at all, figure this out - and bake a cake it would then go badly wrong

 

[Liza0714]

I started peeking in the commercial forums because my youngest dog, 10 months old, eats so slowly and always has compared to his sisters but then I stumbled into this thread.

My girls are very similar size, both about 17" at the shoulder, the older one slightly more active but we have stopped agility as I had a severe injury so I wouldn't call them super active, and both way about 25-26lbs. But they eat sooooo much more food than anyone else here. They are on decent food, wellness and honest kitchen, but thr older one eats two cups of food a day (a cup per meal) and the younger one is on 1.5 a day. The older one ate significantly more when she was doing agility. If I cut them back from this they loose weight and th older one gets really aggressive about food.

The puppy is already 20" and weighs 28lbs. I am almost ashamed to admit it but he gets nearly 3 cups a day and is skinny guy. Oh and he gets a Kong a day with peanut butter.

Anyone else feed this much? It is sort of concerning me.

 

[Cara Sandler]

I started peeking in the commercial forums because my youngest dog, 10 months old, eats so slowly and always has compared to his sisters but then I stumbled into this thread.

My girls are very similar size, both about 17" at the shoulder, the older one slightly more active but we have stopped agility as I had a severe injury so I wouldn't call them super active, and both way about 25-26lbs. But they eat sooooo much more food than anyone else here. They are on decent food, wellness and honest kitchen, but thr older one eats two cups of food a day (a cup per meal) and the younger one is on 1.5 a day. The older one ate significantly more when she was doing agility. If I cut them back from this they loose weight and th older one gets really aggressive about food.

The puppy is already 20" and weighs 28lbs. I am almost ashamed to admit it but he gets nearly 3 cups a day and is skinny guy. Oh and he gets a Kong a day with peanut butter.

Anyone else feed this much? It is sort of concerning me.

As long as they are healthy (for example, have been checked for an overactive thyroid) I wouldn't worry about how much they eat. They need what they need. However, I would stop giving the kong filled with peanut butter. A high fat diet can lead to pancreatitis, which can be deadly, and shelties are already prone to this. I would try to find a lower fat alternative to increasing calories. The reduced fat peanut butter is not good for them either so I would find something else entirely.