Let’s face it. Your boy? He’s a little chunky. You successfully bought his love with snacks and loyalty with treats. You convinced him that you were extremely cool by sharing whatever you were eating and you kept him busy while you were gone by constructing elaborate peanut butter traps. But now, those little legs are straining to keep a pretty girthy sausage from dragging along the sidewalk. It’s time your boy lost some weight.
Don’t worry, buddy, it’s easy! Just following a few simple tips can make a huge difference!
Exercise
Just like with people, it really comes down to managing the ratio of calories in to calories out. If your goal is to lose some weight, then you want to burn off more than you take in.
Walking
An easy way to start burning more is by adding some distance to your daily walks. Since dogs already love going for walks and are always eager to do more, it’s basically a no-brainer!
That’s right, bud! We get to do even more walkies now! Come on!
Yeah! Let’s go!
…okay well uh maybe we can come up with some other exercise ideas.
Playing
If there’s one thing aside from snacks that dogs love, it’s playtime with some good toys. Stocking up on a few playtime friends can help encourage your dog to enjoy some vigorous fun play to get rid of some of those calories. A wide selection of toys all but guarantees that he’ll find something that inspires him to have some fun.
Don’t be discouraged if you don’t get a reaction right away, that’s why we have a selection!
It’s not an exact science, just a matter of finding the right thing to tickle his mood.
Okay.
Alright. So. Okay.
Let’s try to focus on eating healthier and come back to this later.
Eating Healthy
All the exercise in the world isn’t going to help if we don’t also improve that diet. Your pup needs to lay off the high-calorie treats and focus on nutrition in order to complement all the hard exercise work you two are doing.
Cutting Down Excess
Eliminating particularly unhealthy treats can be a good first step with a big impact. Things like peanut butter-filled Kongs and unnecessary snausages and pupperonis can be cut out entirely.
Don’t worry! Once we get down to a healthier weight, these can still be sometimes snacks for special occasions!
Wait is that a birthday cake how the fuck did you even–
Okay jesus fine whatever
Better Food
Improving the quality of your food and snacks can also have a surprisingly large effect, without having to restrict the total amount of food you give to your dog. You can compare the contents of different dog foods, and replace treats with healthier options. For example, baby carrots make a much better reward for being a good boy than biscuits!
You can… uh… you can opt for apple slices instead of…
…what…
You know what? Fuck this.