I've read a lot of the suggestions for the amount to feed your puppy and everything pretty much says 2-3% of their expected adult weight or "up to" 10% of their current weight.

Did you all follow that guideline for your puppy and did it work out well?

On Monday, Aurora weighed 8 lbs. I'm not sure how much she weighs now because I don't have a scale at home but I'm going to try to find one. her mom was around 35 lbs so I guess I'd use that as the expected adult weight.

We just started Darwin's yesterday, which is one of those frozen packaged types that will ship it to you. She absolutely loves it.

She's had 3 meals so far; lunch and dinner yesterday and breakfast today and I've been giving her 4-5 oz/meal. I can tell she wants more and was wondering how much you think I should up it to? On monday the vet said she looked great and her weight looked really good, so I'd like to keep it that way haha =)

Hey Jaime, Aurora's mom was on the light end of breed standard weight. Any idea on weight with dad? The math does get a little tricky. The break down to me is 3% of say 40 pounds would be somewhere around 1 and a quarter pounds per day of food, or 1.2 pounds. 10% of her current weight would be .8 pounds or about three quarters of a pound. You are currently feeding her three quarters to a full pound a day. Seems good, you do have a little leeway, perhaps upping her breakfast and lunch and keeping her dinner the same, if her potty breaks are working for you at night considering your living arrangements. On her next vet visit you can re-exam her food intake by her weight, seeing if she's still at a good weight or is heavy, etc.

My girl is way over breed standard in weight, she's taller too, is far from being overweight, and doesn't eat a lot, she has been a meal skipper at least once a week since she was about 6 months old. Yes huskies can become overweight, but some I believe can regulate a good weight for themselves, imho. If she is super active, like most husky puppies are, she may be expending her food faster, hence why she's hungry.

See how that works.
Renee

Btw, when Miya is in her full on munching mood, she will lick her bowl clean, giving me the impression she's still hungry. Don't let her trick you, haha, you are feeding her right, even if she doesn't agree with you. An idea would be to use kibble rather than treats as a reward or snack, since it's more nutritious and filling, just don't mix with raw, they digest at different rates. I also know you were staying away from kibble, but a small bag of high end kibble could be used as treat/reward. I believe you mentioned Merrick's, don't know if you kept it, but obviously available to you. Stick with grain free if you choose to do it that way.

I don't know the dad's weight but I can find out. I did meet the mom, dad and grandpa so I should be able to get a close idea (maybe?) from their weights.
I like your idea of upping the breakfast and lunch, I think I'll try that. Her next vet appt is in 10 days so I'll try to keep her on the same schedule/amounts until then, that way I can adjust properly at that point.
Potty breaks seem to be working, although I haven't been as consistent as I'd like for dinner times so I'm going to work on that. It's obvious when she's hungry because she gets even more energy and runs around like crazy, and she'll also try to bite things more. I just felt bad when she kept going back to the bowl for more food and it was all gone lol I wanted to give her everything I had but I don't want her to be a little fatty haha.
When I was using the raw food the first couple days I got from petco during the transition (nature's variety) she actually did really well with portion control. I'd actually give her just a little extra and she was really good about stopping when she was full and not eating more than a normal amount. But with the Darwin's it's like there is no stopping her haha, which is a good thing that she likes it.

She's definitely active, as much a she can be, or I let her be. I just know you aren't supposed to let puppies get too much exercise at once so I try to regulate that and go out in small increments. But being active is definitely not an issue

Good idea about the kibble too, yeah I remember reading not to feed it with raw (at the same time) since they digest differently. I took the Merrick's back but I can always get more. treats have been hit or miss with her actually. the first 2 small bags I got she isn't super excited about so then it doesn't work for training. the first bag of raw food before the Darwins arrived was in little bite size pieces so I actually used those before each meal to practice "sit" haha. but it worked great now we are working on "down" but she keeps standing up, in time

Hahaha, down is up, they don't want to miss out on something.    Miya is not real big on treat rewards, she's more of a verbal reward kind of girl and yea it does make training more difficult. So I read up on Darwin's, I didn't want to keep asking questions when I do need to just know a product. Now I do. I'm not sure how young I started Miya, but you might want to try RMB'S, raw meaty bones. I know she gets the bone meal from her meal, but rmbs make good, healthy snacks and it will help clean her teeth and maybe help with being hungry. Just throwing that out there. If you want ideas on how to get them on the cheap, let me know.

Yeah I just always use verbal rewards. other times the treats don't interest her enough for her to want to do something for it haha.

Awesome, thanks for reading up on Darwin's, now you're a pro and can answer all my related questions haha

actually I was going to look into bones/chew snacks today, I'd definitely love any tips on that, especially how to get them any cheaper everything is more expensive up here in AK lol

I don't know about pro, but think I got a good understanding of it. Protein levels seem low to me, although a very good product.
The easiest way for bones is to buy bone in meat for yourself, ribs, t-bones, or rib eye bones because they are a softer and smaller bone, make sure not too small. Just de- bone it yourself, and watch her to make sure she chews and not try to swallow. The cheapest way obviously is to hunt haha. Next would be to go to a mom and pop or IGA or smaller grocery store and talk to meat department manager, or butchers in general. Tell them you feed raw and require bones, depending on who helps me I get charged 50 cents to a $1.50 and get a minimum of a weeks worth of bones. They will tell you that most meat comes to them already boneless, however there are times where they will get bones that are thrown out, ask them to save them. Then bug the crap out of them, haha, I gave them a sob story, mostly true, of how she can't eat kibble and has to eat raw, and I don't want my beautiful little girl to starve, ha. Show pics pull at heartstrings. It works, they save them exclusively for me and my freezer is full. In a pinch I buy short ribs on sale and cut a couple off as a treat. Totally up to you on what meat you use for this, I use beef only, however some people feed pork, we are not pork eaters. You can also give raw chicken bones, although I would stick with the drumstick bone, imo the rest of a chicken has too pointy/small of bones to be a benefit to you since she gets bone in her meals.

Chews are a tough decision, most people stay away from rawhide. Miya's favorite chew would be pig and cow ears, look for made in Canada/USA/ or South America, the two I use is a company called Barnsdale farms/Bullwrinkles/Eurocanpetproducts they can go by any of these names here I can get individual treat for a dollar at my local IGA grocery store and they offer several types of treats made in Canada/USA. The cow ears I have found at my local Family Dollar one huge ear for a $1.50 if Miya is in a mood takes her about an hour or more to consume the whole thing or over a few days, by Rush Direct, Inc. pet products Ultra chewy tail wagging treats, made in Brazil/Mexico/Colombia. If you need web sites I can give you them because I think you can order through them as well. These are very cost effective, there are numerous other items, however you're talking more money. If you want more ideas let me know.

Let me know how shopping went,
Renee

Here is how my Breeder broke it down for me:

"Puppies should eat at least twice a day until they are a year old. As puppies, they need to eat about 8-10% of their body weight in food a day, but as they grow they eat a lower percentage of their body weight in food, so by the time he/she is a year old, he/she will only need 2% of his/her body weight per day in food. This sounds complicated, but it's not and there is no need to weigh the food to make sure it is exactly the same per day. The bottom line is that the puppy will eat 1 lb to 1.5 lbs per day their entire life (puppy through adult hood). At 8 weeks they will weigh around 12-15 lbs, so 8-10% of that is 1-1.5 lbs per day of food. As an adult, huskies will weigh about 40-55 lbs for females and 50-65 lbs for males, so 2% of that for a 50 lb dog is 1 lb of food per day. You can feed this in a single meal as an adult, but as a puppy, you will want to divide this up into 2-3 meals per day."

Hope that helps some

FirstAscent wrote:

actually I was going to look into bones/chew snacks today, I'd definitely love any tips on that, especially how to get them any cheaper everything is more expensive up here in AK lol

Find a butcher that does custom cutting - ours sells the scrap bone for $2 a bag.

Also - I'll bet there is a LOT of hunting up there - ask hunters for the detritus! Here the hunters live the remains in the ditches - my boy spent the winter collecting the pieces and either dragging them back home or burying them along the roadside. He was really funny, too - he couldn't pant and carry the bones at the same time. That's why he ended up burying so many