Just Eat It? Fat Labs Proven Fat, 'Um FACT... According To Scientific Study
This might just land in every Labrador Retriever owners' “yeah, tell us something we all haven't figured out on our own!” file. From the 'we already figured that out' pages, comes a stunning new study that tells us all what those of us proud and lucky enough to own a Lab or a part Lab already have known forever~ Labrador Retrievers love food. All food. Your food. Other's food. Garbage. Dropped food. Spoiled Food. Commercials about food. Pet food stores.
All joking aside, coming from having Dalmatians sharing our lives for many years, then having two service dogs that were half Lab, half Golden Retriever, its night and day in how they approach the concept of food. I thought I was doing something wrong, because Frax in particular has always begged for more treats and food. The Dals' loved food and treats, but their entire world didn't revolve around them. Frax's does.
Frax watches for dog food commercials. He has his favorites. He can be in the middle of something completely different, hear the jingle on TV or a bag opening, the rustle of a garbage bag....and he is all over it! He drools. Copiously. It's better to keep him distracted, rather than dealing with a drooling 75lb dog who knows you are by necessity, a hard case as far as extra treats are concerned.
At least now I know it isn't that I am crazy, or that Frax is. (to be determined.) A scientific study published today supports the fact that Labrador Retrievers have an extraordinary food drive. (That's putting it mildly). They've found the gene that makes Labs fat. It's called POMC. It's good in that training Labs for service work because training is made easy due to their love of food and snacks. They will do anything for a snack. Anything. Now science proves it. It's a genetic mutation, disrupting the dog's ability to sense the amount of stored fat it has and affects the brain's reward system. This makes it really easy for a dog to overeat without sensing that he's doing it. Bummer. Bummer big time!
With each copy of the gene that the canines have, the worse the issue is for them, and the more weight that they put on. A 4.5lb weight gain was associated with each copy of the gene that the Lab had.
The reason that this gene has persisted for so long is due to the fact that a food driven dog is easier to train. Over the years, as the Lab has worked as a hunting dog, and now largely in the service dog area, food driven dogs are easier to train, and over time, more food driven dogs were bred because of this trait. Hence, the gene had plenty of time to become common in the breed.
Another scientific fact is that Labs have weight issues. A dog after my heart. Overeating however, is as serious in dogdom as it is with humans. For a Lab, it can shorten their working years, leading to early onset arthritis due to overweight. Now that we know the gene that causes Labs to be so food-driven, perhaps there might hope on the horizon, for food-driven fat Labs. And for their owners that have the same issues.
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I'm half-asleep. Someone is patting my shoulder. insistently.
Slowly, as the mist of sleep drifts from my eyes, I reluctantly roll them to the left and see a large yellow paw on my shoulder. The individual 'fingers' clutch my shoulder, scrunching open and closed. Then the paw disappears, to suddenly reappear as it plops on my shoulder again...and again and again.
I'm awake. Now I notice that there seems that there is warmth, perhaps~ steam? that intermittently is blowing warm air into my left armpit. I bend my head a bit more, and there is Frax's eyeball staring at me intently, as he expires warm air into said armpit.
It's an unusual way to wake up. It's better than the time recently, when Frax decided neither my hubby nor I had any concept of the word 'breakfast'. So he stood up, then flopped his 75lb bod, plop, right down in the middle of the bed, causing the overloaded boxsprings to propel both Bill and I several inches in the air, then thudding back down on the bed. We woke up. And Frax got fed.
If you have a Lab you know they dream about food. About eating food. Frax does. At first I couldn't believe it, but yes, he dreams about eating. Two am. All is quiet. After being asleep several hours I awaken to smacking, licking and masticating noises. It's Frax. Sound asleep and dreaming of eating. I'm not saying I've never dreamt of eating....but, well, not every night and I don't remember awakening my husband with eating noises, or eating my pillow in my sleep, thank goodness!
Frax hasn't mastered the art of subtlety. He isn't polite. Especially when food is involved. And it's his food. His internal clock is wired to 9am (breakfast) 5pm (supper) and 9pm (evening snack). The evening snack became instituted after Frax decided he was hungry at 2am and 4am, twice in the middle of the night. That's even after we started putting green beans in with his food, and water as well, to fill his tum up so he didn't feel hungry all the time.
Frax's trainer had seminal last words for us. “With Frax, it's all about the food.” she said. Those last words have run through my mind many many times in the past four years. Aways listen to what the trainer/puppy raiser says as last words when you leave the premises for home. They are gold. And they are always right.
When we left for home with our first dog, Hannah, her blubbering foster-mom sniffled and said “She doesn't ride well!” and ran crying into her house. She was soooo right. Hannah did NOT ride well. Especially after eating a green tomato in the neighbor's garden right before we loaded her into the car for the three-hour ride home. She upchucked the entire way home. We stopped five times to clean her and the car up. Hannah did not ride well. Not at all. Not for a very loooong time.
Frax loves food. All food. And garbage. All garbage. And inedible things from the backyard. Sticks. Grass. Unmentionable things. He will eat anything at least once. And, conversely will upchuck them pleasantly, then attempt to 'recycle' them. It's been a battle to keep him from snarfing up anything remotely akin to food. His life revolves around it. It's amazing. Alarming. I've stuck my little hand way down his throat on several occasions to snatch an item he thought might be tasty.
Shortly after Frax came to be my service dog, my elderly mom came to stay for the weekend. Disaster ensued. She left out a sleeping pill. Frax decided it was a treat. He ate it. We packed him up in the car at midnight and raced to the Vet Emergency Clinic near our home. We had to leave my mother, who was distraught. I plopped her on the couch, gave her the remote, had her walker nearby. Told her not to move. Gave her the telephone. For once she obeyed.
We spent an hour waiting for Frax to finish having a charcoal lavage of his stomach, which he upchucked as scheduled, then tried to eat. Then he decided he wanted to play with the Vet and vet techs. He was fine. I wasn't. My last nerve was frayed. The Vet laughed. Said that Frax was so big he would have been fine, and slept a bit better than usual. She also shared that Ambien is the 'preferred' sleeping pill of choice for most Labrador Retrievers to eat!!! To much information! We raced home, to find mom ensconced on the couch~ holding the remote in one hand and the phone in the other! After everyone settled down, mom decided to take her sleeping pill again. I made sure she'd been up to the bathroom, brushed her teeth, was all ready to go to sleep. She took the pill. I tucked her in. Fifteen minutes later she got up to the handicap bathroom I have. I heard a big "THUNK" she fell asleep and fell off the toliet. Scraping her skin off her arm! Bleeding everywhere! We called the ambulance when we couldn't wake her. I pressed a towel to her profusely bleeding arm. She had her arm fixed. Found out she had a urinary infection. Got admitted. Bill, Frax and I finally got home and slept at six am. Mom doesn't stay overnight with us anymore. Frax loves her to distraction. I suppose that night was their bonding time!
To keep Frax focused it falls upon me as his handler to: feed him on time. Have plenty of low-cal snacks. Not run out of the latter.
Life is hell when it's time to get more dog food or snacks.
He is acutely aware when his 'treasure box' is getting low on food, or the MBDB box (Milk Bone Dog Biscuits) have gotten low. Worse than either one of those is when we've run out of 'Crunchy bones'. We cannot say the words 'crunchy' or 'bones' in any sentences. He is aware when we are running low. They are what finally kept him asleep and sated overnight.
'Crunchy bones' are actually rolled cowhide sticks. Yuck. Frax loves 'em though. There is a method to our madness. He gets his crunchy bone at 9pm. When he is half done eating it we ask him “are you ready to make a really bad deal?” He sweetly gets up and dashes for the living room, where the MBDB's are stashed. Sits. The crunchy bone juts out of his mouth like a stogie. A doggie stogie. I get a handful of MBDB's (super-mini sized for miniature dogs...only 2calories per snack!) We go to the kitchen, Frax sits, then we exchange the slobbery half-eaten crunchy bone for the handful of MBDB's. I stash the crunchy bone on the top of the fridge, where it will be waiting, nice and dried out after Frax's crunching on it the previous evening.
After eating the bone, Frax is thirsty, and has a nice sip of water from his fresh water bowl alongside our bed. Sighing with satisfaction, he plops into bed. Finally sated. The 'crunchy bone' poofs up when he drinks his water, and gives him the sensation of fullness that he craves. He sleeps all night without waking up twice a night begging for a snack.
It works for us. Might not work for everyone, but we tried many different things to keep him from being a beggar when we went out to eat or visiting. He is very good when we are out working. Never begs. Now I know just how difficult that is for my good boy. It's literally in his DNA to love to eat. Horrible. I think though this just might be the biggest thing that Frax and I have in common. The love of food, and having to watch our weight!
So here's an appropriate song for you Labrador Retriever lovers out there, a blast from the past from Wierd Al Yankovich “Just Eat It!”
"Eat It"
How come you're always such a fussy young man Don't want no Captain Crunch, don't want no Raisin Bran Well, don't you know that other kids are starving in Japan! So eat it, just eat it! Don't want to argue, I don't want to debate, Don't want to hear about what kind of food you hate! You won't get no dessert 'till you clean off your plate! So eat it! Don't you tell me you're full, Just eat it, eat it, eat it, eat it! Get yourself an egg and beat it! Have some more chicken, have some more pie, It doesn't matter if it's boiled or fried~ Just eat it, eat it, just eat it, eat it! Just eat it, eat it, just eat it, eat it, ooh! Your table manners are some cryin' shame, You're playin' with your food, this ain't some kind of game! Now, if you starve to death, you'll just have yourself to blame! So eat it, just eat it! You better listen, better do what you're told! You haven't even touched your tuna casserole! You better chow down or it's gonna get cold! So eat it! I don't care if you're full! Just eat it, eat it, eat it, eat it! Open up your mouth and feed it! Have some more yogurt, have some more spam, It doesn't matter if it's fresh or canned... Just eat it, eat it, eat it, eat it! Don't you make me repeat it! Have a banana, have a whole bunch, It doesn't matter what you had for lunch! Just eat it, eat it, eat it, eat it! Eat it, eat it, eat it, eat it! Eat it, eat it, eat it, eat it! If it's gettin' cold, reheat it!!! Have a big dinner, have a light snack, If you don't like it, you can't send it back! Just eat it, eat it, eat it, eat it!!! Get yourself an egg and beat it (oh lord)! Have some more chicken, have some more pie, It doesn't matter if it's boiled or fried! Just eat it, eat it, eat it, eat it!!! Don't you make me repeat it (oh no)! Have a banana, have a whole bunch! It doesn't matter what you had for lunch! Just eat it, eat it, eat it, eat it!!!!
http://www.sciencealert.com/your-labrador-might-be-genetically-predisposed-to-weight-gain-study-finds
http://www.livescience.com/54629-why-your-labrador-dog-is-fat.html
http://www.sciencealert.com/your-labrador-might-be-genetically-predisposed-to-weight-gain-study-finds
http://news.discovery.com/animals/pets/lab-retrievers-hardwired-to-crave-food-160503.htm
Raffan et al. A deletion in the canine POMC gene is associated with weight and appetite in obesity prone Labrador retriever dogs. Cell Metabolism, 2016 DOI: 10.1016/j.cmet.2016.04.012
Cell Press. "Why Labrador retrievers are more interested in food than other breeds." ScienceDaily. ScienceDaily, 3 May 2016. <www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2016/05/160503130342.htm>.
