Do Healthy Dogs Need Diet Supplements? Diet Needs of a Dog

If you are a caring pet owner, you would definitely want your pets to live a happy and long life. These days pet owners resort to medications like pet multivitamins, health supplement for their pooches. Do you need to buy one for your pet? Are they safe in nature? The answer depends on your dog and the list of nutrients they need.   

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Do Healthy Dogs Need Diet Supplements

Planning and getting the perfect nutrients for your dog could be difficult, and confusing at first.

Where should you start from?

Simply look into your dog’s bowl and analyse what is being fed and how it’s going to come to use for your pooch’s health.

When you look up to your dog’s cereal box, you will find words like ‘vitamin-enriched’ and ‘fortified’.

If the dog food says fortified, then it surely means that the food was missing out  on something in the first place.

Whereas, the food enrichment is done by adding the nutrients that were lost during the processing.

Your Dog’s Daily Diet

A healthy dog nutrition starts from the quality of the food that is fed everyday. Sounds good? However, there are many dog food brands who self-claim themselves to be the best among other brands. As you study the food ingredients and vitamins more closely, you will feel a bit discouraged with the nutrients present to what your pooches actually need.

Do Healthy Dogs Need Diet Supplements

The six basic nutrients for a good healthy pet life include – protein, fats, water, carbohydrates, minerals, and vitamins.

Each dog requires different proportions of each of these nutrients, this is why understanding your pet’s nutritional requirements comes at the first place. Then only you could decide the right health supplement depending on the age, vitamin level, health issue, genetic problem, etc. that suits right with the pet’s nutritional needs.

If you trust your pooch’s diet plan and you consider all the nutrients for their daily meal, then we can call it a ‘Healthy Dog Diet’. Or else, you can meet your vet and discuss the food recommendations for your pooch. They may prescribe a dog food or a dog health supplement.

Important Dog Supplement & Their Purpose

There are a huge variety of dog supplements that you can buy for your pet. The most common ones include probiotic, fiber, supplement, fatty acid, multivitamin, fatty acids, joint or hip support pills, etc.

Multivitamins

One important thing to note, you cannot use the human multivitamins for the dogs. If the vet suggests to buy a daily-multivitamin then ask him out his recommended brand. You must choose the multivitamin that is meant for the dogs. Also, you can choose a multivitamin that’s made for special needs like joint support, skin, ageing or digestion. Our favourites are Zesty Paws, ProSense, etc.

Glucosamine/MSM

They are the joint supplements that could be beneficial to orthopedic issues like arthritis, hip dysplasia or any other injury. They help with reducing the inflammation and works like a lubricant for the joints.

Fiber

Yes! Your dog needs fiber in a suitable amount. They take care of the bowel movements and prevents diarrhea, constipation. The vets usually suggest this supplement for all the gastrointestinal issues.

Probiotics

They help with restoring back the good bacteria inside your pooch’s body. All kinds of animals have good and bad bacteria inside their body. Probiotics are recommended for all the pets going through gastrointestinal problems and even diarrhea. They also reduce the side-effects of antibiotics. Examples include; Purina Pro, PetUltimates, Dr. Marty ProPower Plus, and Nutramax Proviable.

Omega-3 Fatty Acids

These acids are found to be good for the skin, heart, joint health, and also for certain type of cancer. You can’t offer the normal fish oil for this purpose. Make sure you check the EPA and DHA levels in the medicine before giving it to your pet.

So, our question is ‘does my dog need health supplements?

And, the answer goes like –

Considering a dog health supplement is not a bad idea, especially when they need additional vitamins to meet up the daily nutrient requirement. However, it’s important to keep a look on their daily activities, behaviour and their energy levels at all times.

Finally, do not skip meeting your vet as you may know your pooch but your vet knows him better in and out.

What are you thoughts about it? Is your pet on any health supplement? How’s it going for them? Share your answers in the comments section below!

1 thought on “Do Healthy Dogs Need Diet Supplements? Diet Needs of a Dog”

  1. Thanks for the interesting article about diet supplements for dogs. I’m glad you mentioned that you should know the nutritional requirements your dog needs in the first place, because each dog needs different ones. Maybe it could also be good to think of what nutritional requirements the dog will need in the future so you can start looking for those supplements as well.

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