What's new
Mastiff Forum

This is a sample guest message. Register a free account today to become a member! Once signed in, you'll be able to participate on this site by adding your own topics and posts, as well as connect with other members through your own private inbox!

  • Welcome back!

    We decided to spruce things up and fix some things under the hood. If you notice any issues, feel free to contact us as we're sure there are a few things here or there that we might have missed in our upgrade.

Too skinny?

1happyemma

Member
I have a 1 1/2 year old female mastiff that has been through two heat cycles, she's AKC registered and I was waiting to see how she turned out before I did anything with her or got her fixed. (That's a different post though!)

My other female mastiff gets chubby easier, but she's a year older, and my mastiff mix (fixed) male gets chubby quite easily too.

She's the first dog i've ever had that no matter how much I try to feed her, she's lean.

She runs all day, digs all day, plays and romps around all day. She's very sensitive to the texas heat, and she got spoiled, in the summer to get her to eat, i'd put yogurt on her food, or mix in broth to make it taste better so she'd eat it. to *me* she's way to skinny but my husband said she looks fine to him, just lean.

She's the first skinny mastiff i've had, and not for lack of effort on trying to bulk her up a little bit. She's perfectly healthy chemically, no thyroid issues or vet-trip worthy problems, and very active. I know they can continue to bulk up until age 3, but I guess I just want to hear from other mastiff owners that she's "fine" and to stop stressing about it.

To me, she looks more like a great dane then a mastiff right now- she's tall and skinny! From the side she doesn't look so bad, but from the top, I can see 3 ribs instead of two, which to me seems to skinny - Any tips on helping her bulk up a little bit? she's solid muscle under her wrinkles, so it's not a mass issue. She can run circles around our other mastiffs who drop after walking around the block. She's that athletic.




(as you can tell, she's really bright, she knows how to open gates.)

She definitely is picky about eating when it's hot which in texas is hard, she hates when it's too hot, or too cold, but she gets bored sitting in the house all day and wants to go outside and dig and play with the toys and the kids, which is great when it's not 110.... I've had to work hard to keep weight on her, if she chooses not to eat for a few days, she drops weight really fast.

She's a picky eater and she's not a pushy eater. (all three of our dogs are fed separately so there's no stress while eating, but half the time she leaves her food completely untouched.)

We feed 3x a day in smaller amounts since she won't eat a larger amount in one sitting. (that was one way to get her to eat a little more.)

I dewormed her too, to make sure that wasn't the issue... but so far, this just seems to be her norm.
 

1happyemma

Member
Is it normal for them to be this skinny under 2 years? I notice that some mastiffs seem to be really leggy for a while before bulking up, the only other female I've had, I got as an almost adult (18 months), and she was solid.. but she's also an uber couch potato.


(The pics below being my 150lbs female Bree)




I guess I keep comparing her to my other female who just turned 3 and wondering why she's so skinny in comparison. Ignore the cat, she thinks she's the queen around here.

I was also under the impression mastiffs were lazy dogs, Lexi however never got that memo, I swear I have 6 foot holes in my back yard courtesy of her trying to dig us a swimming pool. (Half kidding, I've met a few atheletic mastiffs, but I never expected to get one myself. haha)

She looks fine to me! :)
 

Smokeycat

Well-Known Member
She looks good to me. Some lines are just leaner than others. Given how active you say she is it wouldn't surprise me for her to be leaner and less prone to gain weight than a lazier dog.
 

1happyemma

Member
Makes sense.

And, just to be clear in case anyone ever reads this and I post again, I've had ONE other female puppy besides her, but she died at 11 months due to some neurological condition where she had a stroke at 11 months, so I've never had a a female mastiff between that 1-2 year range So Lexi's my first... just below 1 and above 18 months. She's my first in that awkward female stage. That one still stings. (Lost her less then a year after I lost my 23 month old bulldog to lymphoma cancer. That was some bad dog luck right there.)


Thanks for taking the time to reply.
She looks good to me. Some lines are just leaner than others. Given how active you say she is it wouldn't surprise me for her to be leaner and less prone to gain weight than a lazier dog.
 

1happyemma

Member
I would say she's between a 3 and a 4, which is why I felt she was too skinny. She turns into a 3 if she skips any meals at all, I have to work hard to keep her closer to a 4. It also depends on the angle.

I actually went out there to take some new pics of here, and while my other two dogs where just sitting there - she was off digging up a cactus. She's not aggressive with her food and she's not possessive of it, she willingly shares it with birds.. Not even kidding, She'll sit 3 inches from her bowl while there's birds sitting all around her and she won't move a muscle - she just watches them.

The only other thing i'll say if it makes a difference, is my 3 year old has been 29inches for a while, so she's had time to fatten up, my Lexi just keeps growing and growing and growing.. she's as tall as my 3 year old now and she seems almost like she's still growing! LOL At this point, i'd like her to grow wider, rather than taller. She's grown like 5 inches since march. She's got paws the size of dinner plates, and I'll give you an example of the difference in activity level here.


Here's a picture of her before breakfast this morning.


I was trying to get a good picture of the top side, but she doesn't hold still.


The activity level difference they just sit there, she never sits still.... She's out there digging up cactus, burying metal, pulling out trees, digging up our water pipes and faucet system in the back, figuring out how to open fences and if we dog proof it, she digs under it. (she never gets out of our yard she just doesn't like that we portioned off part of the back yard for our toddler to play with out dogs running over the top of her, they dig up her sand pit and it upsets her...) we went from 5 acres to a half acre - we will be buying property again in a couple years, but for now, a half acre is all we've got, so I've got toys out there to entertain her. In the form of buckets, balls, a tire, etc. Her favorite thing is to dig up any garden type thing we've got planted, and the trees.

Prior, we had goats, and a potato garden (that her and the goats routinely dug up.)

When she's in the house, she's a couch potato, and just hangs out and sleeps for the most part - which is fine, I like my dogs to cuddle. But keeping her inside doesn't make her eat more, or fatten her up, I tried when it was 110 degrees, and she'd want to spend all night outside when it was cool to burn her energy off. LOL


Where does she fall on this body condition chart?

View attachment 50107
 

1happyemma

Member
I feed her as much as she's willing to eat. My other mastiff stays fit around 4-5 cups per day.

Lexi, I usually try to get 6-8 cups into her because of how active she is. I feed a large breed formula for her (and we used a large breed puppy formula when she was under 12 months.)

My husband when he has time, also makes his own dog food in the croc pot. (brown rice, veggies, meat, fruits, etc.) He used to do this for his large breed working dogs for shutzhund and we found Lexi would eat more when it was home-made - I think this may have actually spoiled her to the point of why we have to put toppings on her dry dog food now to get her to eat it... Our issue is he works 10+ hours 5x a week, so he doesn't always have time to make it. (and I'm a homeschooling mom of 3 kids, 2 of which are special needs.)
She's one busy bee!!! She looks great. How much are you feeding her and what food?
 

Hector

Well-Known Member
Have you tried a higher quality food? even though you didn't specify what brand you're feeding.
 

1happyemma

Member
We've tried high quality, low quality, anything to get her interested in eating. She just plain doesn't like dry dog food much. When we make our home-made dog food, she's the only dog who even gets it and she eats it till shes full. she never over eats. Our vet said she's just picky and she wouldnt starve herself to death. We've tried everything from Iam's to pedigree... if its dry she just picks at it... we tried just putting water on it and that doesnt work either its not a texture thing i dont think..... it has to have something smelly on it, like broth or (dont laugh my 10 yr old used bbq sauce) to get her to eat it. we even tried mixing in canned dog food and it didnt make a difference. She just doesnt seem to like the smell of dog food.
Have you tried a higher quality food? even though you didn't specify what brand you're feeding.
 

1happyemma

Member
We tried a small bag of dr Tim's with her and she refused to eat it at all. We haven't tried Arcana, i've never heard of that before, I'll look into it. We live a couple+ hours from a big city, so if our local walmart or feed store doesn't carry it, i'll have to order it online to try it. We have a mobile vet who comes through (they only neuter males, any females you want fixed, you have to take them to the big city.) So their supplies are limited locally as well for stuff that the vet would normally carry to try as well. (This town was an upgrade from our last one believe it or not... haha) At least we have a walmart here.
Have you tried any of the higher quality foods such as earthborn holistics or arcana or even looked into Dr. Tim's ? Dr. Tim's has a highly athletic formula. He formulated this dog food for his sled dogs. I personally haven't fed it.

Premium All Natural Pet Food | Dr. Tim's
 

Hector

Well-Known Member
Yeah some pet stores don't even carry food like earthborn. You can check out chewy.com and order food there. Free shipping for anything over $49. They have competitive prices and great customer service and fast delivery.