Best feed for lactating females?

[catdogs]

What do you feed your females that have big litters to help them produce max milk? What about the pups once they are weaned?

[hounddude]

Liver for the Dam. Goats milk for the pups.
Mark

[Mountainhound]

Beuitiful pups hounddude

[cat and bear]

Boy all we do is keep them on their regular feed, and pick up a 50lb bag of calf milk replacer. Start her on it a week or so before the pups arrive, and keep her on it, and when the pups are ready for milk, start them, and finish the bag out with their regular dog food,seems everyone gets everything they need from it.

[Benny G]

Sort of along the same lines as cat and bear -- IF the female needs help, I mix unmedicated calf milk replacer in her feed. When the pups start showing interest in the food, I mix the milk replacer in thier feed and add hot water. I let it set long enough to cool off, as well as turn the feed to mush - I've seen pups break thier teeth off on dry dog food when they were too small to start eating. I feed the pups away from the female so that they can have thier fill. By doing this, pups are ready to go by 5 weeks, and the bitch is ready to lighten the load.

[cat and bear]

Benny your right on there, the only thing to add, is when i first start adding dog food to the milk, the first week, i actually, will mix the two in an old house blender, to break it down.

[BlacktailStalker]

Hounddude, thats a picture!

I dont breed but my buddy poors the meat to the female right from the week before conception and straight through.
His litters are always well!

[Melanie Hampton]

Just use a high quality puppy food.. Make sure your bitch is drinking lots of water. My Jane female stopped drinking water with her litter and stopped producing milk. Once I got her drinking again (talked her into drinking a little more then normal) she started producing LOTS of milk.

I soak up puppy food and mix it in milk replacer for the pups.. Make a sloppy mash out of it.. They get the hang of it really quick.

[Dale T]

Puppy chow starting the day the female is bread.

[thelineman]

not to hijack the post but benny why do you use unmedicated calf milk?

[Benny G]

I guess I don't have a sientific reason. I have just always believed that the meds in the calf milk were structured toward cattle. My wife raised calves on a dairy for 5 years, so we got to see all of the medical issues with calves. I always figured that if I didn't have to subject my pups to all of the extra, and most likely unneccesary, medications, they might just build up thier own imune system.