Pet Health Protection

To must pet owners it makes perfect sense that you should take care of your pet which means that you are to feed it properly and make sure that it will get sufficient exercise on a consistent basis. Again it makes perfect sense and everybody knows it. But why is it that so many pet owners aren't following these simple steps if they know that they should? Why are they feeding their pets human food, excessive amounts of food or anything in between except for the food that their pets actually need for their bodies to function at their best? Why is it that pets are being carried around in bags and cages, transported in cars or are never leaving the backyard? What kind of non-exercise is that and again we can only shake our heads of the people that know what they must do but still don't do it.

Having a pet animal is a huge responsibility and it is not something that should be taken lightly. It is very much the same as raising children but then again the same "symptoms" are also seen in children. Malnutrition and no exercise are the main reasons for diseases and obesity in our society today. Children and pets are in the same boat and it is sinking fast!!

This hub is meant to share concepts and ideas that will hopefully benefit not only pet owners but also the pets. If only one pet owner gets one idea that will improve the life of his or her pet it will be worth it. So if you are a pet owner and you feel that you have neglected your pet's health condition for too long then keep reading because I will share some ideas with you that will not only be easy to do but they will also have a huge impact on the wellbeing of not only your favorite pet but also on you as well.

Notice: If your pet is in bad health you should consider a pet health insurance before you're going to need it.

If you are a cat owner this might not be for you as cats are a far more independent animal and exercising a cat can be very difficult compared to how easy it is to exercise a dog. So this first advice will be for the dog owner that will need an easy and cheap solution to start getting his or her dog in shape.

It is important to remember that if your dog haven't done much exercise for a long time and maybe even be obese then you will need to start slowly but for most people with obese animals that will be easy as you are probably also weighing a little too much yourself and the fitness condition might not be as great as it once were. But fear not... this is going to be easy.

All you have to do is put on a leach and start taking your dog for a walk. You don't have to walk miles and miles to begin with. If both of you are out of shape you will probably find that walking even half a mile can be difficult and exhausting. That is perfectly normal and that is how it should be.

The trick is to not only do it once and then give up. You must make it a routine to walk your dog that half mile once every single day. NO exceptions. I promise you that once you have done it for a week or ten days you will start feeling better and so will your dog. You might even be able to walk close to a whole mile before the first two weeks of walking have passed.

The idea is to do something consistently and slowly increase the distance and pace. Don't rush things as rushing it will only make you hurt yourself (or your dog) and when things starts to hurt most people will give up and go back to what they did before. And that is what got you in that situation in the first place. So don't go down that route.

So what if it takes a few months to get to 2 miles per day. It is still 2 miles more than you did before and over the course of a year it will be a total of 730 miles (365x2) and that is quite a distance to travel on foot.

Start now and stay tuned for more simple training tips to improve your pet's health condition.

The basic idea mentioned above is a great place to start if you are out of shape yourself or if your dog hasn't been too active for the last few months. Being out of shape requires that you start off slowly to avoid burning out and getting injured. Injuries have put a stop to a lot of well meaning effort from a lot of people. So the idea I am about to present to you should only be carried out if your dog is in a basic shape and you are as well.

Taking your dog out to ride a bicycle... Well not exactly ride the bike but follow along while you are riding the bike. Some people think that this is a cruel way to exercise your pet dog and I have to agree that it CAN be but it doesn't have to. What is important when doing this kind of exercise is to (like with the basic idea number 1) start out slowly. Ride the bike in a pace where your dog can easily keep up and then slowly over time increase the speed. Pay close attention to how your dog reacts and slow down if it looks like you are going too fast.

Pushing the limits are great if you do it to a small extend. You will need to push limits to improve but you don't want to go too far so it will hurt your dog instead of benefitting it. Start out with shorter trips at lower pace and slowly increase both the distance as well as the speed.

Depending on where you live and the level of control you have over your pet dog you might want to put a leach on him/her. You must however be very careful because having a leach on your dog that you hold onto while riding a bike will leave you vulnerable if your dog decides to take off into another directing and you might end up falling off your bike.

So now that we have covered the part about physical activity and making sure that your pet (and yourself) are starting to move instead of just sitting still (or lying still) we need to add another very important part to the equation and that is the topic of the right nutrition.

I talked about it earlier on but since I find it to be extremely important I'm going to repeat myself. Obesity is not something you get by not moving around a lot. Period! It is something that is caused by the amount of calories you eats vs. the amount of calories that your body can use/burn. It might sound simplistic and it is. There is nothing more to it.

But if you know something about nutrition you will also know that there are food that is good for you that will increase your vitality and help strengthen your body and muscles to that you can burn more calories and there is food that is bad for you as it will add nothing but empty calories and chemicals to clog up your system.

You've probably tried eating at one of the many fast-food restaurants that is scattered all over the world. Getting a burger, some fries and a coke might sound great and for what it is worth I too think that it tastes fine but the fact remains that it holds to many empty calories and very little nutritional value and can only be considered as a "filler" at best.

But what has this got to do with nutrition for pets? At first glance you might say that you are never taking your pet cat or dog to fast-food restaurants and I'm sure that is true. I'm not even sure whether pets are allowed in the restaurants.

The reason I bring up the fact that humans eat a lot of junk is that I have found that many pet owners are feeding their pets the same food that they are eating themselves. Some will serve them as leftovers while other will actually create separate portions for the house pet.

Unfortunately it is not just burgers and fries that causes the obesity problems in our society. It is simply a matter of calorie intake in the form of high calorie foods as well as excessive amount of food being eaten and this applies to pets too. Because pet owners are feeding their pet's leftovers or human food in any other form the cats and dogs are not only getting the high calories food but they're also getting portions that are far greater than what their smaller bodies can burn. Remember that a 5 pound cat should not consume a portion similar to that of a 150 pound human.

So the first VERY basic advice is to completely stop feeing your pet any human food. I don't care if it has gotten used to steak or salmon. Go back to basic dog or cat food and serve nothing else. If your pet won't eat then it is not hungry enough. I promise you that once the hunger starts to come out it WILL eat what you are serving it. It might take a couple of days but it will eventually happen. Pets don't know the concept of hunger strike.