Nursing: Make Sure Your Dog Gets Sufficient Nutrition Feed a nutrient-dense diet such as puppy food. Without increasing the amount of food offered at a meal, increase the number of meals throughout the day. Free-choice feed her, offering unlimited access to dry food throughout the day.
What is the best food to feed a nursing dog?
In fact, nursing dogs have 4-8 times the energy requirements of healthy adult dogs. Increased fat in precisely balanced nutrition helps supply more energy. What should I feed my dog while she's pregnant and nursing? We recommend feeding Hill's® Science Diet® Puppy Foods as soon as possible.
What can I feed my nursing dog to produce more milk?
Milk thistle is one natural supplement known to help nursing mothers with their milk-making. Other dogs benefit from taking zinc while providing for their pups. In small doses, apricot can also increase milk production. Whatever you decide, it's always best to run it by your vet before you begin supplementing.
What do you feed a new mother dog?
Feeding a high-quality dog food may be sufficient but many veterinarians recommend feeding the new mother puppy food or a specially made nursing (lactation) diet. This can provide extra calories that the dog needs to produce more milk. Make sure to keep your dog's food bowl full at all times.
How often should a nursing mother dog eat?
For the first 1-3 weeks of nursing, increase mum's daily meals from two to three. By week four (when the milk production is at its peak), go up to four meals a day. The portion size of each of these meals should increase as follows during nursing.
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