Feeding

Puppies are fed twice a daily with a grain free puppy food available at independent pet food stores. We use ProPlan Shredded Puppy food for puppies and ProPlan food plus cooked meat and veggies for adults.

Each puppy feeding is half a cup for a total of one cup of dry food per day. After they are four months old, you may add a soft scrambled egg or some boiled minced chicken to the food. We do not recommend canned dog food as this is over-processed and has lots of chemicals. 

As an adult, the dog should be fed once daily with a half cup of grain free, quality, dry dog food and a half cup of cooked meat (either chicken or ground beef) OR a scrambled egg instead of the meat. If you use only dry dog food, the amount for an adult dog is one & a half cups. We cook for our dogs and feed half cooked meat and veggies and half, grain-free dog food. However, if I had only one or two dogs, I would cook all their food and not use commercial dog food at all.

If you would like to cook your dog’s food, use meat (either ground beef, ground turkey or chicken leg quarters) cooked with green beans, yellow squash, celery, and a little garlic in a small amount of water. Allow this to cool then debone and skin the chicken if chicken leg quarters are used. Chop up the meat and mix well with the veggies and broth. This makes a thick stew and is not soupy. It has  the consistency of cooked oatmeal. If you feed only homecooked meals to your dog, give a daily multi vitamin. Pet tabs is a good brand. Also, add a teaspoon of NOW brand Bonemeal to their daily meal.  This is available at amazon.com. 

It is important to feed some meat as a part of the dog’s daily food as all dry dog foods are too high in grains and this can cause some problems with weight gain and diabetes. Also, Cavaliers tend to be gluttons so it is extremely important to NOT overfeed them. Obesity causes the same serious health problems in dogs as it does in humans.

I highly recommend the documentary “Petfooled” which is available on Netflix or you may rent it from amazon.com in the video section. It is an eye-opening video on the nutrition in commercial pet food.