Malamute panting.

We have taken in a rescue dog. When they brought him to us he was panting and they said that it seams to be normal for him as he does it all the time. To me this just does not seem right. From what I have read a Malamute should have 20 respiration's per minute he is having 80 respiration's per minute. How ever when he is sleeping he is at 20 respiration's per minute. He had been diagnosed with Heart worms positive and has been treated and cleared. I read through some other questions and pressed his gums and they went from white to pink in a second or less.

Any help would be great.

Thanks for your reply. I kind of expected that answer. Testing is not an issue. When we take him in for an evaluation we will request these tests.

One other thing. My wife tends to over feed our pets. We were told that he needs 3 cups of food a day using "Taste of the Wild" dog food. We did not want to change his food and he does seem to love it. Xander is not hyper active in fact he is more of a couch potato. My wife bumped him up to 4 cups and if she had her way would probably push him up to 6 cups or rather fill his bowl and let him eat when ever he wants which was her past practice. But since our other two were hunting dogs they seamed to burn it off.

Should we follow the advice of the Rescue people and leave him on 3 cups which is 1/2 morning and 1/2 at night. I forgot to mention he is 85# and his ribs are not showing but can be felt with light pressure fells like he has about half an inch of fluff between ribs and coat.

Thank you for having this service it makes it so much better to be able to ask questions when we are so unsure of what to do that even though you don't get to see them but just confirm what we need to do as pet owners. The fee is very reasonable.