Feeding and hunting

[69firebird]

8 to 10 hours before hunting. They can get twisted stomachs. Perfectly fine feeding them once a day.

[maplevizsla]

If you are unsure - feed a few hours after you have finished hunting for the day.

[Stuart22]

My hounds don't like watching me eat breakfast and then they have to chase a coyote for hours through snow, swamp, corn fields , etc on an empty tummy.
They have the option of eating their twice daily meal, if they are loosing weight I feed them more. The old timers only fed in the evening, small wonder some of them didn't want to come home. Just saying. I'm no expert , just have happy hounds.

[kjay]

There was a very good article in gun dog mag about this very topic a while ago you maybe able to find it with some research. This article was written by an old gun dog vet that is at the u of g. He goes on to say is what most of us are doing and that is to feed once a day. It also does recommend trying to get there food into them within 2 hrs after a day's hunt, and I believe he said try and get it in about 30 mins after (kinda like us and the need to get protein when exercising). I generally go by the 2 hour rule. He does go on to say that if doing a full days hunt rather than using a supplement to aid with fatigue feed a cooked sausage to up the levels of fat for them during their hunt. I actually adopted this tip and find it works especially in my older boy Jim.

I used to feed two times a day like others as well, and found he would have about twenty mins a hunt of doddling around before he found a place to poop I called these exercise poops and most of us likely know all about these too. After his poop and belly issues he would be ready to tear up the fields. Again the article goes on to talk about this and it has to do with dogs tendency to have sensitive digestions.

Any way hope you get something from this, I know where you are coming from.

[69firebird]

You'd be mistaken to think they perform better with a full stomach. My experience with foxhounds and coonhounds is you don't feed them before they run. You are increasing the odds of a twisted stomach and you will have to give the dog a final lead pill.

[yellow dog]

Most dog food performance brand dog foods are fed typically the night before a hunt in order to prevent bloat. Extreme working dog foods such as Red Paw, National Dog food, Caribou Greek and Eagle Pak can be fed a couple of hours before working in small amounts throughout the day. Reason being is kibble size and ingredients. Typically these foods are slightly larger than rabbit food(pellet) and do not expand like other larger kibbles made up of meat base, corn, wheat and other ingredients that expand and cause bloat. The smaller kibble made up of 2 or 3 meat base first ingredients do not expand to the same degree and do not contain corn, wheat etc. But also keep in mind a performance dog food fed the night before made up of grains will cause diarhea while working. Corn and wheat middlings because they are sharp will rub against the intestinal tract causing irritation and the end result diarhea. A performance dog food with the first 2 or 3 meat based ingredients and no grains will not create this result. A small kibble heavily meat base performance dog food breaks down much faster and is quickly absorbed into the blood stream as fuel needed to perform. I have always fed 2 hours before working my sled dogs and hunting dogs proven by extreme dog food manufacturers myself and most competing dog mushers who will feed continuously throughout a long distance race and never get bloat.