# Tiny little rescue - what to feed?



## Jarrod (Jun 12, 2013)

Hi all,

We adopted a tiny little Jack RussellxDaschund on Monday from a shelter who has had a rough time. She came in at about 7 weeks, She was vaccinated when she came in but both her brothers died of parvovirus and she likely had a mild case. She was then adopted by a family who fed her table scraps so she had bad diarrhoea and was taken back to the shelter. She is very small for her age and very thin. 

They have been feeding her boiled ox liver and sometimes chicken and rice. We bought Castor and Pollux puppy food for her. So far she is doing well, eating lots of liver 4 times a day, she has healthy gums and is very playful now. So here is the problem, she still has some diarrhoea (no bloody stools or vomiting) and even if I mix the dry food into her liver she avoids it. She is malnourished so I can't take a tough love approach either.

Any opinions on what we should feed her now, when to transition to the dry and how to do that? She is now 9 weeks old.


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## taquitos (Oct 18, 2012)

Why don't you get her on canned food for now? She will probably eat it without fuss and it would be balanced so she probably won't have diarrhea on it. You can then start adding a little bit of kibble at a time until you are feeding her only kibble (this is what we usually do for cats switching from dry to wet to raw lol).


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## Shell (Oct 19, 2009)

Can you feed a good quality wet (canned) food? One that is mostly meat based with minimal fillers. Once she's healthier, you can transition to a good dry food by slowly adding more dry and less canned food each meal. 

Lots of liver isn't good, it is healthy is small amounts but "lots 4 times per day" risks Vitamin A overdose which can cause bone deformity, refusal to eat, anemia, digestive upsets, muscle weakness or stiffness, diarrhea and weight loss. For a small dog, 2-3 servings of liver per WEEK would be plenty.


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## Aska (Jun 9, 2013)

A lot of liver is unhealthy, it can get a vitamin posioining of some sort.

Anyway, pour hot water on her dry food. Dog's have different bowels than we do and they don't get all the nutrition fron dry food because well, it's dry. Pour some water on it and her nutrition intake increases by 30%.


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## zhaor (Jul 2, 2009)

Yes liver is high in vitamin A and vitamin A is one of the vitamins that carries a risk of toxicity.

The adding water to help digestion is something new to me. I can sort of guess at how it can possibly help but something might have been lost in translation there. But adding water, especially warm water does help bring out the smells and make dry food seem more appetizing for them at least.

A good quality canned food is a good recommendation. If you want to feed dry right now, moistening the dry food is a good start (assuming the kibble isn't preserved with citric acid). Mixing canned with the dry could help too. Adding in things like canned tripe, fish oil, or coconut oil also be relatively low cost ways to make food more appealing.


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## voodookitten (Nov 25, 2012)

Im pretty certain everyone else has covered everything except I must add - it is the height of rudeness not to post photos! hehe :nono::biggrin1:


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## Jarrod (Jun 12, 2013)

Thanks for all the advice! Have cute back on her liver and she is eating chicken and rice mixed with kibble. Unfortunately here in south Africa it is very hard to get good wet food!

Will try to upload a pic from my mobile!


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## Shell (Oct 19, 2009)

She's adorable.

For a dog that small, a homecooked or raw diet could be a very affordable option. Another option is to blend (like with a food processor or blender) the dry food into a mush with a little water, you can even blend it with the cooked chicken into a mush which is basically like a good wet food.


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## Willowy (Dec 10, 2007)

I agree that a good balanced raw or homecooked diet would probably be best for her, and maybe if you mix a few kibbles in she won't notice . But it does need to be balanced---not too much liver, proper balance of calcium, all the right nutrients, etc. 

Here's one resource for a homecooked diet: http://www.dogcathomeprepareddiet.com/index.htm and if you look around I'm sure you can find more on the subject. And here's the DF raw feeding resource thread---lots of good links! : http://www.dogforums.com/dog-food-forum/15085-feeding-raw-where-start.html


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## Jarrod (Jun 12, 2013)

I have been so tempted to try her on a raw food diet, just seems to make sense to me? I will check out the forum though, since there is so much conflicting info out there!

An update on her progress, we have been mixing her pellets with a little chicken broth and hot water and supplementing in chicken. Actually getting some pellets down so we are making progress.

She is still fussy on drinking water, but she is getting some liquid this way as well


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## Jarrod (Jun 12, 2013)

Oh I must just say as we'll, she is already doing better since being with us gaining weight and misbehaving!!


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## Abbylynn (Jul 7, 2011)

Awwwwe .... She is adorable!


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