underwieght blue tick/walker coonhound

Question
i have a 1 yr 7 mo old female walker/blue tick hound that wont gain weight. she is on heartgaurd and frontline and recently had a dose of wormer to get whipworms( i think, i cant remember). she is a happy healthy outside dog. she has always eaten science diet food since she has been with me( i got her around 7-8 weeks old). i poured vegetable oil on her food( about 1/4 cup once a day)to get weight on her and it worked. so i changed to active dog( the only problem with this is the higher protein value in it) to get the higher fat content to try to keep the weight on her but that didnt work, she dropped what she had gained. i know coon hounds like her are usually wirey dogs but she is a bag of bones. is there anyones food that has a real high fat content that i can feed her? am i destined to pour oil on her food everyday? how healthy is that for her? could it be a medical problem?

Answer
Hi Jeremey,
This is a frustrating problem. My first question to you is this dog spayed?
Non-spayed dogs are more likely to have this problem. But it could be a digestive order issue. Malnutrition can be underweight as well as overweight.

Oil on her food is good for short term but not long term. You are on the right track with the Science Diet food, as I recommend nothing else.
The active dog food has more fat but not more protein. As you can see here from the active list of nutrients it has a really high fat content but the average protein levels.

Fat= energy for any living thing. So active dogs need more fat to burn for energy compared to dogs that do nothing. Does this dog hunt?
That would have a lot to do with her weight too. You may just need to increase her daily amount also.

My first recommendation is if you haven't done so already, take her in for a complete exam including stool cultures and possibly a barium xray series to see what kind of shape her digestive system is in.

If that all checks out negative and she is spayed then I would up her food amount to that of a dog 15 lbs more than her and feed her that divided into two feedings. If you use any oil it should be olive or canola oil and only about 1/8 cup once or twice a week. Oil tends to block or carry out some nutrients not to mention loose stools (which further carries out nutrients) so you want to go easy with it.

Back in the day the old hunters fed their dogs bacon grease once or twice a week for energy but I think that is not a great idea.
So try upping her food, here is a feeding guide on the product page of the active food; http://www.hillspet.com/hillspet/products/productDetails.hjsp?PRODUCT%3C%3Eprd_i...

and add the smaller amount of oil a couple of times a week. If you can weigh her that would help also. If all else fails I found this online and it seems to be very popular for a short term fix. Use the lower recipe and make sure you monitor her weight carefully.
http://www.instructables.com/id/S982S8JFF48DZXW/

Please let me know if any of this helps in a few weeks.