Health And Fitness For Your Dog

Giving your dog the proper health and nutrition they need can be a tough task considering a busy work week and especially during the busy holiday season. We have places to go, people to see and not enough time to get everything we need done. It may be tough to keep track of your dog, but you will find that paying attention to you dog's health will be beneficial for you as well. Exercise for you pet will be exercise for you as well. Here are some tips on health, fitness, and canine obedience you can use all year round.

1. Become acquainted with your breed of dog:

Your breed of dog is unique in some way and will require different health and fitness routine to meet their needs. All dog breeds are different and it is a good idea to learn the breed of your dog. Take some off time to do some research and become familiar with your breed of dog. You can learn all kinds of interesting facts about your pet especially related to health like their activity level needs. Becoming familiar with your dog will help you understand and provide the right environment for your pet.

2. Watch food intake

Holiday months usually see an increase in dog treats. Neighbors, family, and friends want to play with our small dog and give them all kinds of food to eat. If you find you dog getting more treats than usually make sure you cut back on the dogs food or spend more time training your dog to help burn the calories. Remind others to help you keep your dog healthy, by being careful to only give your pet healthy treats at the proper time.

3. Safety during the Holidays

During the holidays there might be more dangers than usually. Here are a few of the many harmful items you should keep you dog away from: chocolates, poinsettias, electrical cords, and other small kid's toys. Safety also relates to our pets and we should pay attention to keep our small pets out of harms way.

"The key to your dog's health is the appropriate amount of a nutritionally balanced diet. Dogs that are fed a high quality pet food do not need table food supplementation. If your dog spends most of his time outside, he will actually need more calories in the winter to stay warm, so you should increase his food intake by 10-15% in the colder months." -- Dr. Jonathan Shuman