WEIGHT MANAGEMENT

As with people, weight gain is usually the result of eating too many calories for our need especially when combined with insufficient exercise. However, in some cases there can be some contributing factors.

Age: Older pets are less active so managing arthritis can help.
Breed: Some breeds are genetically more prone to gain weight. These include labradors, cocker spaniels and King Charles spaniels.
Neutering and spaying: Studies have shown that neutered pets have a lower basic metabolism rate, and they require less energy.
Medical problem: Occasionaly weight gain is associated with hormonal disease.

Exercise

Cats

Encourage your cat to follow you from room to room when you move, particularly up and down stairs. Hide food and make him or her "hunt" for it. Shine a small laser or flash light on walls or floor to be chased.
Dogs
Enjoy regular walks with your dog - walking at a constant pace. Throw a ball or play a retrieval game.

Nutritional Program

Just reducing the amount of food you feed your pet will result in excessive hunger which is not pleasant for pet or owner. This under nutrition also results in inadequate essential nutrients with resulting loss of energy, reduced immune health and poor coat quality.

It is therefore advisable to use nutrition specifically designed for this purpose, so your pet is still satisfied and healthy while reaching its weight targets. We trust Hill's Metabolic diet for this purpose with many great success stories, where pets lives have been transformed. This product also contains carnitine to help speed up metabolism and has a dedicated "Petfit" program which helps encourage and keep track of weight improvements.

At Whangaparaoa Veterinary Centre our qualified nurses run FREE weight clinics. 

Both Emma and Shanti are registered at MAF to be able to do exportation checks.

Cats and dogs exported form New Zealand to Australia must comply with the import requirements of Australia.

(i) The owner/exporter must make a statutory declaration which has been witnessed by a Justice of the Peace.

(ii) A registered veterinarian approved to export live cats and dogs to Australia must certify that he/she is satisfied by veterinary or council registration records that in case of a dog, it has been continuously resident in New Zealand since birth (otherwise a blood test might be required) and that the dog/cat was examined for export within 72 hours of the scheduled time of shipment.

More information is available from Biosecurtity New Zealand. www.biosecurity.govt.nz