Treat Management
A common concern in dog training is that the use of treats and reward based training go hand in hand to facilitate overeating and overweight dogs. K9 Anytime Doggy Daycare has seen dogs and their parents come to us looking for help killing a few of those excess kilos as a result of "treat happy" parents. However, if you train correctly, your dog will not "get fat" from reward based dog training.
Ultimately, your dog's weight and their food intake is in your hands, and careful measure and balance of their daily diet is easily adapted to accommodate food used in dog training in any one day.
It's not even necessary to exceed their regular daily food intake on a training day. Instead of using treats, using a portion of their usual breakfast or dinner during training means they are still enjoying a tasty and reinforcing reward without over eating or consuming extra calories.
Similarly catering to your dog's activity levels is another simple way to monitor their healthy weight. Increasing and decreasing your dog's food portions in correlation to their activity and exercise ensures that their calorific intake stays proportional.
Together, the above two steps ensure that you aren't adding extra calories to your dog's diet, and they they are still able their enjoy the rewards, without straining or harming their bodies.
K9 Anytime Dog Training School
Shifnal
TF11 9ES
Shropshire | Wolverhampton | Shrewsbury | Bridgnorth | Telford
