Another Busy Day

Dog With Teddies By Anonymous

This is a cute photo picture. I find it very special in black and white. It has a dog (thought it's not my favourite breeds) and bears (my favourite) surrounding it.


Today I again go to Helium.com. I check my earning, nil. I don't know how they pay -- is it in terms of per article or what. I read the FAQ but no answers to it. Anyway, it seems interesting to me to post a message and be ranked. Yesterday, my post on Coping with the loss of a dog was ranked 5 out of 8. Just now when I checked, it is now ranked 4 out of 8.

Today I post this article, Feeding your dog or cat, and I am being ranked 4 out of 7. This is a record of my post.

Feeding Your Dog Or Cat
You are what you eat. Our pets, be it dog or cat, is also the same. Nutrition is very important to the health of all animals. Taking care of our dog and cat is our responsiblity as their owner. The pets have only you, the owner as their closest kins. We should take good care of them. And I think the best care is to give good food for your pets.

The meaning of good food doesn't mean delicious food with so many flavours and seasoning! Dogs' anatomical body system especially the digestive system, is different from that of human beings. In olden times, I mean 30 or even more years back, when people are not so knowledgeable about dogs, they fed their dogs human food. And we know that dogs in the wild, stray dogs, look around the rubbish bins and they feed on bones, stale fish bones, and other left overs which they can find just anywhere around them. Many times, you would have noticed that these dogs mostly have patches of 'hairless' spots on their body. Their eyes may be one side blind, or their legs, especially at the elbows, are also bald, and they appear very dirty. This is all the results of poor nutrition.

As mention earlier, dogs were fed human food long ago. Nowadays with scientific research, we have better knowledge of what to feed the dog, what is good for the dog and what is no good for the dog. According to research, dogs have different digestive system from us and dogs cannot eat food like onions, chocolates, raisins and bones. These are just some of the items which are known to affect the internal proper functioning of the dog's systems, like causing kidney failure and so on, depending on what the pet feed on. Feeding your dog or cat with bones put your pet at a danger of pricking or hurting its stomach or getting a bone stuck in one of the internal muscles, causing internal bleeding.

Other than abstaining the dog from eating chocolates, raisins, onions and bones, now is time to consider whether it is better to feed your dog/cat with dry food or wet food. Wet food means feeding your dog/cat with meat. For dogs, some people like me, I used to boil pork/chicken, cut it into small pieces and feed the dog. For cat, I suppose they eat only cooked fish ( I have never kept any cats before).
While cooking the pets' food is time consuming and tedious(with all the cutting and tearing out of bone, if any), dry food is far more convenient. It is said that the dried food contains all the necessary nutrients for the dog. So in my opinion, I think, the best is a balance of both. This is because I find that feeding dry food is very dehydrating for the dog. My dog used to need to drink a lot of water when he ate dry food!

Some people never feed their dog any wet food like chicken/pork for its whole life. It is believe that eating chicken causes a lot of dogs to have skin problems and allergy problems. So I think the owner of the dog is the best 'dietician'. Try it out on the chicken/meat and watch your dog's progress. And feed on dry food and see how it goes also.

Having settled with feeding wet/dry food, now it is time to consider how many times a day to feed your pet. Feeding is just like human being also. When you are a baby, you eat more frequently at short intervals since your stomach is small. When you grow older, you eat more and at longer time interval. Likewise, for pets, when it is a puppy, you need to feed it with milk and soft food, say three times a day. When the puppy is bigger, mostly when they reach 6 months they are 'big' already. The feeding interval can be reduced to two times a day. When the dog has reached adulthood, say one year or even at 9 months, some people already feed their dog only one time a day. When you feed your dog with dry food, all the directions will be clearly stated on the plastic bag.

The reason why the frequency of feeding is important because, just like people, if we overfeed the pet, it gets overweight. When it gets overweight, dogs, like people, will get heart disease, diabetes, bones problems ( the legs cannot support the body weight).

Just like people, we need vitamins and minerals, dogs too need supplements. You can find these in pet's shops. With proper nutrition, our pet dog/cat can have a better immune system. A dog with good nutrition has better skin coat, better defence against infection like ear infection against ear mites.

So to the owner of the pet dog/cat, if you want to have a healthier pet, watch the diet of your pet. With proper nutrition, you have a 'prettier' pet with a better immune system to fight against illness and infection. You save time going to the vet. You can have a pet with a longer life span as well. So it all starts from the mouth. Feed your animals wisely. Read wisely feed wisely.

Whenever you finish writing your article, they would need to tick the box which says you cannot copy information from elsewhere. And its like taking an exam again. I do not know whether there is any time limit. So its like producing everything out from what is in my brain. I cannot be interrupted. Once I am interrupted, the 'flow' and inspiration is gone. Its like I am going back to school time taking school exam! And later on it was being 'marked' and you get to see your results. How well you fare!

I am very tired now. My eyes aching. Last night my last post was nearly 2am. And I have to wake up early in the morning. Tomorrow again need to wake up early. But I am busy today and I had spent my time well. No regrets.

My articles can be found here:

Coping with loss of a dog

Feeding your dog or cat

Check it out.