Democratic Sentinel, Volume 10, Number 17, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 28 May 1886 — How a Dog Should Be Fed. [ARTICLE]

How a Dog Should Be Fed.

The puppy, when just weaned, should be fed four, five, or even six times a day, and from two months to four months of age, four times; after that three times, to the age of nine to twelve months, according to the breed —the smaller varieties reaching maturity soonest; after that twice a day is enough, a full meal being given each time, until maturity is reached. Regularity as to time is important in feeding, both because it assists health and is a considerable help in inculcating orderly and cleanly habits. Minute calculations have been made as to the amount of food required by a dog, with the result of conflicting statements of opinion, ranging from one-twentieth to one-twelfth of his own weight per day, and it is often stated in this form one ounce of food for every pound the dog weighs. Experience convinces me that in the matter of quantity of food the scales are better dispensed with, using instead the dog’s appetite as the correct measure; I therefore always advise that a dog should have as much at a meal as he will eat freely, and that when he stops to turn it over and pick out bits here and there, the dish should be removed. The composition and quality of food is the next point claiming consideration. In reference to the first point, I think it necessary to refer to theories propounded by Dr. Billings, veterinary surgeon, of Boston, Mass., in two lectures delivered in that city, and reproduced with apparent approval by that section of the American press which specially deals with canine matters. I have not the text before me, so cannot quote with verbal accuracy; but, briefly stated, Dr. Billings, founding his argument on the admitted fact that the dog is a carnivorous animal, declared he should be fed entirely on flesh, and even went so far as to say that farinaceous food was poison to the dog. The English practice for centuries—from the time of that excellent huntsman and discourser on dogs and their treatment, Edmund de Langley, of the early part of the fourteenth century, confirmed by such practical writers as Turberville and Ger vase Markham, of the sixteenth, Cox, Jacobs, and others, of the seventeenth, and all the masters of hounds, huntsmen, game-keepers, kennel men, and every other person who has kept a dog since—is dead against Dr. Billings’ theory, which, indeed, should rather be named a “crotchet.” For dogs there is no more wholesome food than the mixed scraps from the table, consisting of meat, bones, bread, and vegetables, and when there are more dogs kept than there are bones and scraps for, the broken victuals should be taken as the standard of the component parts of that which has to be further provided. In regard to pet dogs kept by ladies, the great mistake often made is to overfeed and feed too richly. It is a mistaken kindness to feed dogs on rich, fat-producing diet; and to give sugar and sweet cakes and puddings is to certainly destroy the powers of the digestive and assimilative organs; and anything that produces excessive fatness will bring on asthma, to which disease pugs and other short-faced pets are especially prone. Occasionally we meet with, in all breeds, a dog that is a dainty feeder. These have to be coaxed to eat, a little at a time being given, and a tonic of iron and quinine with gentian given daily for a week or two at a time.— Huge Dalziel, in Harper’s Magazine.