6 day feeding

I heard somewhere that you are supposed to only feed your dog 6 days out of 7 and starve them for one day - does anyone do this and if so why??

Have heard it but no i don't, Roxy would drive me barmy if I didn't feed her for a day. I found this article on it on the web:

http://malsam.wordpress.com/2007/11/11/the-considerations-of-fasting-your-dogs/

Don' t get it!!

Jadey would probably chew her own leg off if I left her without food for 24 hours!!

So the principal is that you measure out 7 days worth of food and give that too them over 6 days. The seventh day of fasting is meant to improve digestion and replicate the behaviour in the wild when wild dogs would not eat regularly. My problem is that although they originate from wild dogs/ wolves etc they are not, they are domestic animals and they have been brought up being fed 7 days a week and are healthy enough on this feeding programme why change.

I've heard about it aswell but never done it

I've heard of it but monthly though so it can help the digestion

According to my book on holistic care for dogs, Fasting is necessary to give the digestive tract a rest and the kidneys a rest from dealing with the nitrogen waste from meat. Meat should only be fed 5x per week and cottage heese on the 6th....7th day is a half day of fasting. So if you divide your dogs daily intake into 2 meals as I do then they would only get the evening meal. Your day of fasting should be on the day he is least active ( a day you don't usually go for a walk perhaps). 1/2 day fast per week and 1 full day per month. Dogs under 7 months and over 12 years are not fasted but given a smaller meal of say only cereal instead. Water is never taken away. A dogs digestive system is different than ours and they don't necessarily feel the same as we do going without a meal. They only beg for food at the regular times we feed them out of habit. In the wild, wolves only eat about 3 days a week and lay around sleeping the rest. Fasting lightens the load on all internal organs and studies have proven animals fasted once a week were healthier and lived longer than animals who weren't.

I must say its an interesting topic but I could see my 2 eating the furniture if they weren't fed regularly or for a complete day