Dogs Health

Question
I live with an 11 yr. old Golden Retriever weighing 80 lbs.  She lives on a diet of dry food (2 1/2 cups) once a day.  Is there something I can suggest to the owners to add to the food that would be good for her and make her diet not so boring?

Answer
The last thing you want to do is change this dogs diet. You may be bored with her food but she isn't. Dogs are not like us and while they might drool over a tidbit from the table, those and a variety of "surprises" (meaning different foods) are what cause gastric upset, pancreatitis and hemorrhagic-gastroenteritis, and all those except the first one can be fatal to a dog.

So think like a dog, not a human and leave well enough alone. She is already overweight since female retrievers should weight no more than 55-60 lbs.
If they want to add anything to her diet, then suggest that they start giving her carrots and stop giving her cookies or treats. She just may lose the 20 lbs or so that she needs to live a longer life.

It is nice that you are concerned and I am glad you wrote rather than just implementing something that might have really made her sick.

========================
Well, first of all, what does she really eat other than her 2 1/2 cups a day? Is she eating treats, bones, or table food? That all adds up to weight gain.
I just had another client ask the same question and this is what I told her.
Take a small bowl of her food and put it on the table if she is used to being fed from the table and give her a piece or two of her own food. When you give her the food, all she cares about is that she is getting what she thinks is people food. Then I told her to add canned, drained and rinsed salt-free green beans to her food if she is used to getting scraps in her food. She was delighted. She was so happy because it all worked so well that she came all the way across campus to tell me this. I also told her to start using carrots instead of treats from a box. My dog is 10 yrs old and I raised her on carrots and she weighs almost the same weight as she did at one yr old. She is maybe 3 lbs over.
So there are many things you can do. A diet change to a better food that will meet her energy needs but fill her up helps too. Science Diet Adult Light fills that need also.
Try the other things first for a few months and see how it goes.
Let me know how she does.
:-)