My Dogs Waistline

Waiting for dinner.

As a veterinarian I give a whole lot of advice. It's my job after all, educating, treating, advocating, and assisting people to learn about their pets needs. These needs are multifaceted complex and evolving. It is one of the many reasons I love being a veterinarian.

Today's subject is assessing your pets waistline. We often use the description of your pets waistline to describe assessing your pets weight. A defined waist is one of the ways we determine optimal body condition score. When assessing whether a pet is overweight we use the top and side view of the body profile. We want to see a taper at the waist when viewed from above and from the side. Here is a very good chart from Hills to help identify your pets body condition score (BCS).



Even as I stand in the examination room discussing a pets examination findings I sometimes get caught in the ever sticky predicament of having to admit that the advice I am giving isn't always the advice I am adhering too.

As my grandmother used to say, "Do as I say, not as I do." (In the spirit of full disclosure this was always in reference to her chronic consistent chain smoking, something that neither I nor my pets do).

When I received a request from uber-blogger Jana Rade, whose amazing blog can be found at  http://dawgbusiness.blogspot.com/, or on Twitter @DawgBlogger,  I thought "OK, time to put my money where my mouth is." She asked me to complete the mini dawg blog survey to "Show Off My Dogs Waistline" campaign.

So here it goes:

Exhibit A, Savannah, my 16 year old beagle mix. She has lost much of the muscle mass in her rear legs over the last two years, and we struggle to keep her active, mobile, happy, continent, and ambulatory. She has difficulty keeping standing when eating or drinking, and can no longer get up stairs, or sometimes even onto her 5 inch high bed. She has moved from her 5 inch high bed basket to the bed on the floor. Even the bed on the floor gets 'missed' sometimes. I usually find her close to the bed, but either partially in, or almost on it.

As a true beagle she spent most of her life pushing the bulging waistline. She has always been, and remains, very highly food motivated. Keeping her at a healthy weight was a challenge until she approached 13 years old. Thankfully she still loves to eat a snack and we keep her on a very high quality dog food. She eats twice a day, gets a few good quality snacks in between, and is kept warm, visible, and safe if outside. Managing a geriatric pet is a challenge. Keeping her happy and healthy is a combination of good advice, persistence, and being flexible with your plan. I advise my clients with geriatric pets to keep a little bit of meat on the bones so  that if they get challenged by a disease or illness they have a bit of fat on reserves. Also, we want to maintain lean body mass, not fat, but muscle on these guys. Keeping them active and ambulatory is the only way to maintain muscle mass. It is the aging challenge for all of us. There are many little tricks to try, monitor eating every meal and every day, and any amount of unplanned weight loss in an older dog is reason to go see your vet immediately.

Side View of Savannah. 

Top view, note her back legs are splayed in front of her, and she is barely on her bed.

Exhibit B, Charleston. My three year old pit bull mix. He is built like a pit bull, thick, long, and muscular. He is inside with me most of the winter. Snuggled on his bed, hibernating with his brother until the spring erupts, when they both hit the fields in search of trouble. He, like me, is a bit softer and rounder in the winter then we, (oops, I mean he) is in the height of swim suit season. (I promise we both will be leaner, lighter, tighter, and trimmer in June. I'll post an updated picture of his waistline and use it as the reference for us both then).

Side view of Charlie.

Top view of Charlie.

Exhibit C, Jekyll, the three year old beagle. He is a powerhouse. He has to be. He is Charleston's best friend, wrestling buddy, and refuses to let his long legged pittie brother get the best of him. Where Charleston is fast and has an elegant antelope stride, Jekyll is the torpedo-like bullet. I call him the sand bag. If he wasn't so strong, round, and solid Charleston would have broken him years ago. He has the stop, drop, and roll while Charleston plows over him like a master stunt-dog on their daily rumble-run-and-play sessions. All of my veterinary and non-veterinary friends think that my little Jekyll is fat. And here I go sounding just like my guilty clients I persistently reply, "He is not! He is solid, strong, muscular, athletic, and he has short little legs." (Sigh of slight admonition....)

Jekyll side view.

Jekyll from the top.

In my defense, my puppies (Charlie and Jekyll) run four miles with me 3-4 times a week in the winter and 5-6 times in the summer. They are very active pups and on a high quality commercially available diet. I monitor their waistline, muscle mass, coat, teeth, nails, ears, joints, mobility, gait, mentation, eating, urinating, and defecation habits daily. I know that a slim waistline is very important. It is a critical part of overall health. My two beagles have some weight challenges, they are after all beagles, and beagles LIVE for food, but I have also provided them lots of exercise, a very good diet, minimal treats, and measured amounts of food. I would say that the pups are BCS 3/5, Jek pushes 4/5 but he is all muscle, and Savannah is 2-3/5, she is what we vets call sarcopenic which is a loss of lean body mass that occurs with aging.

If you are concerned that your pet has a large waistline, or if you ever have any questions about any aspect of your pets health sit down with your vet to discuss them. There are often important medical reasons that can cause or contribute to your pets appearance, and there are many ways to help identify what is contributing to their BCS. We have advice to help get and keep your pet in tip-top shape and keep them there.

"Oh mom, wake us up when it's summer!"

"See mom, I look good! I'm the most handsome pup ever,
and so adorable, and charming, and  irresistible!"

"Yes, Jekyll, you are all of those things, and more."

The Weigh-Ins Begin

Tuesday I saw 3 dogs on appointments who all came in and were all overweight.

I thought that I would begin to introduce them to you.

My first fat dog of the night was Dazzle the Dachshund. She is a middle aged, spayed female short haired walking foot stool. She is so fat that her already stubby legs look to be half the length of what they should. Her dolichocephalic (long nosed face), looks like a little mouse, small pointy nose and ears that go straight out to the side because her face and neck are so fat. (To describe it more graphically her short streamlined body looks squat and stout, and she waddles.)

Her mom had brought her in specifically to address the weight issue.

I think that in my seven years practicing that this is maybe only the second dog that has walked in to see me for this reason. In most cases the owners try to slip by the fact that their dog is overweight. They hope that I won't notice, or that I ''have given up on them trying to correct it for the fourth year in a row."

For those owners that I actually can convince that there is a weight problem, I am happy to sit down and go through the very long conversation about every aspect of their pets life that has contributed to where the scale is now.

This conversation needs to be a 30 minute office visit.

We all need to sit down and discuss the entire home life. I am going to start with the basic questions of ;

1. What do you feed?

2. Do you measure how much you are feeding?

3. How many treats do you give?

4. What kind of treats do you give?

5. How much exercise does your dog get. (OK, pet peeve here is that putting your dog outside in your fenced in yard is not exercise. I almost guarantee that a fat dog is not exercising. Certainly not exercising enough. I want the exercise period to be interactive. I want you and your dog to be outside playing. Either you throwing the ball, or going for walks, or runs, or swims, etc). I want you to be able to tell me how long you are playing and at what intensity.

6. Who else lives in the household? Or who else is responsible for any of the pets care? Here's the concern here. I have many clients who have fat dogs because their kids are spilling their food, and/or offering lots of their own food to the begging, glued to their kids side or high chair, dogs. How do you tell a four year old to stop feeding the dog their vegetables? The other doomed weight loss scenario is the elderly retired and now living at home with their adult children grandparents with Alzheimer's. These poor owners are measuring their dogs food, exercising them, and have told their parents that they cannot feed the dog anymore! How do you tell your elderly parents who are home all day with the begging dog not to feed them? Or worse yet, these parents don't even remember they were told not to feed, or forgot that they did feed. That one is a toughy.


For these owners with the difficult challenges at home monitoring and mandating the feeding I do the following; I recommend that they put the daily food allowance in a Tupperware container on the counter and then lock up the rest of the food. Once the container is empty that's all the dog gets.

For the families with small kids, you have to put the dog in a separate area at feeding times.

I love the use of a calendar to help manage the pets flea & tick, heart worm preventative and even feeding and exercise schedules. Have everyone participate in keeping a calendar of your duties. When you give your monthly dose it gets crossed off of the calendar. When you go for your morning walk it gets crossed off the calendar. At the end of the month see how you did, and see what your weight looks like. All of this information is really helpful in helping us adjust the diet for your pets weight loss plan.


After I went through all of this with Dazzle's mom I learned the following :
Dazzle has always been fat. She lives with another Dachshund who is skinny. The skinny dachshund never finishes her food, so Dazzle does this for her.
OK, Dazzle is eating too much, and Skinny sister is being offered too much. Lucky for Skinny sister that she can self regulate her feeding, (we should all be so lucky) but clearly Dazzle cannot. When Skinny sister leaves her bowl the rest is tossed. DON'T leave it out for Dazzle, because of course she is going to eat it.

Dazzle is a couch potato. Skinny sister is a very active dog. (Not too hard to figure that that's why Skinny is skinny and Dazzle is not). Dazzle needs to be more active.

Dachshunds are a breed that tends to have weight issues. And of all the breeds of dogs these are  one of the breeds of dogs that need to be kept thin, (that and brachycephalics (smooshy-nosed dogs). Dachshunds are also very susceptible to intervertebral disc disease and this is seen more commonly in the overweight Dachschunds than the physically fit Dachshunds.

Dazzles starting weight is 26 pounds . My target weight for her is 22 pounds.

I always try to give a target weight but I always also give a time frame for target weight and a request that we check it monthly together and adjust as we go. I don't want a dog to be going on a crash starvation diet because this is not safe, healthy, or effective long term. I want the dog and owners

The quick fixes in life rarely last. My goal is to restore long term health and happiness.

The hope is also that if there is any underlying medical condition we can discover it earlier vs later. Maybe at the first re-check. I have been shocked to find some very under active thyroids in many of these overweight dogs. Don't overlook the medical conditions!

The amount you feed will likely vary with the season and the activity level.

Keep an eye on the scale and start to also keep an eye on your pups waist line. Ask your vet care professional to start training your eye to recognize body condition score.

In reality I don't care what the number on the scale is. I care what your dog looks like. There should be a taper at the waist when looking from above and a tuck in the abdomen when looking from the side. I am also using my hands to feel the weight and muscle mass of dogs, especially those dogs with heavy dense furry coats. And to my own Beagles defense he may not have a tucked narrow waist (he is built kind of blocky). But that boy has some massive quadriceps, and he can, and does, run like the wind. He is solid muscle! and there isn't an ounce of fat, even though he is short and stocky, on him. (But he is still soo cute!)

OK, let me know what questions you have about weight loss, obesity, etc. It's springtime, time to get ready for our bikini's, and get out there and exercise!

Update: 2013 Dazzle's reflection in the scale teetered a few pounds up and down for about five months. Our best attempts to help her elderly dad exercise with her daily were foiled by his own health challenges. I believe that he saw her greatest happiness on the other end of a biscuit, and in the end that tail wag from the short term bliss of a snack meant a bigger "I love you" than a walk and a boring bland diet that neither one of them really wanted to participate in.

For many of us it is very difficult to convince you of the long term gains when you are living exclusively in the moment.