You should be careful with feeding a dog, because as all dynamic and energetic dogs, also springers need high quality food. Usually breeders give the needed directions to feed your dog right and it is also good to follow these directions.
When puppy the meal often contains industrial dog food for puppies, which contains all the vitamins, minerals and trace elements the puppy needs. This kind of food from good quality is not the cheapest one and often you get those only from special pet shops, but they quarantee your puppy gets all the nutriment it needs. Especially for puppies but why not also for adult dogs you should soften up the dry food by putting the food to warm water for 15-20 minutes. When the food is softened, drain it and add some sour milk (containing Gefilus, Asidofilus or other bacterium). This sour milk offers some needed bacteriums for a puppy to protect the tummy. Usually it is also recommend to use linseed oil or some other vegetable oil about 1-2 teaspoonfuls per day.
One meal for puppy contains about 2 decilitres food, but you may give more if the puppy is ready to eat it. So if the food cup is empty after eating, you should consider to give a bit more next time. It is almost impossible to feed your puppy too much, because they know how to use all the energy they have from the food. There is some quite rare individuals, which are so lazy they do not use all, but these are not very common in this breed. It is anyway good to keep puppy "in good meat", not ever too skinny.
Usually little puppy gets about 4 meals a day. After first 3 months it gets 3 meals a day and after 6 months only 2 meals. For adult is usually given 1-2 meals a day and this depends how much the dog also uses energy.
It is common to see directive amounts of food in dog food bags, which the manufacturer recommends. These amounts are anyway only directive so you should not only look at them: give your dog as much food (=energy) as it also uses. If the dog gets lots of exercise, it also must get more energy from food. By time the owner will learn what is the right amount of food for the dog. The food amount is depended also from quality of food. From pet shops you may buy these foods for more active dogs which include more energy, so when you use this for very active dog, you don't have to give as much as normal food.
If springer spaniel eats mostly high quality industrial dog food (80 % or more of the diet), you don't need to give any extra vitamins, minerals or trace elements. But if the dog eats so called home food for example half and half is industrial dog food, you could consider giving at least some lime. Be anyway aware of that giving too much lime or vitamins is as bad as giving too few of them!
De-worming must be done to keep the internal parasites and ectoparasites away. Dog should be de-wormed 1-2 times a year even if there wasn't any symptoms of parasites (recommended to do it twice a year, but at least every time week before the vaccination). One of the most useful and dextrous de-worming medicine is Canex spread, which you give 2 cm per kilo (of your dog's weight). This spread is good to put it to dog's food which might help it to go easily to stomach. For puppies this can be given direct to mouth with fingers. Canex has an effect to dog's common intestinal roundworms etc. (Toxacara canis, Toxascaris leonina, Ancylostoma canium, Uncinaria stenocephala).
Usually the breeder has already de-wormed puppies twice before puppy moves to new house (this should be confirmed from the breeder). Puppies will be de-wormed first time when they are 3-4 weeks old. Treatment should be repeated two times at two weeks interval (three times totally). The third de-worming is normally done by the puppy's new owner and it should be done before the first vaccination when 11 weeks old. And also when older the dog should be de-wormed every time before vaccination.
Bitches should be de-wormed also during the mating or soon after it. De-worming should be done to bitch also 3-4 weeks after whelping at the same time with the puppies.
The coat care of english springer spaniel or any other spaniel breed should not be underestimated. The coat needs brushing once a week and trimming at least two times per year (more often with show dogs). And should not be forgotten the coat needs to be washed and plucked. Puppy should be familiarized for coat care already when small. Couple of times a week it should be lifted up on the table and brush it. Also puppy's teeth should be checked as well as nails checked and maybe cut. When the puppy is used to these basic operations, all caring operations will become faster and easier in the future.
Recommended equipment for springer's coat care are iron comb and metal brush. With these equipment you can brush all the longer coat in ears, paws etc. Shorter coat is not even needed to brush while they are plucked (such as coat on back).
Pet does not need grooming more than 1-3 times a year and this is something everyone can do by themselves after seeing some times when someone more experienced has done it. Show dogs anyhow must be groomed every time before the show and with show grooming you must be much more careful (because grooming affects very easily to show result). Grooming a springer is easy when you know what to do. Equipment for grooming are nail scissors, sharp trimming scissors, thinning scissors, scattered and dense combs, a brush, dog shampoo of high quality and maybe also a grooming machine. Usually grooming is started from the head and after that you move to neck and ear bases (which you usually take with machine). Coat on the top of the head should be plucked and cheak, muzzle and paw coat will be fixed with the scissors. Back hocks coat should be thinned with scissors as well as are under the tail too. All shaggy coat should be fixed with the comb and brush (never cut it). The following picture shows how to trim your english springer spaniel:
Besides grooming and brushing coat needs also washing and how should we say it: if you do not know how the soap tastes like, you have never washed a dog! ;) When washing a dog it's important to use high quality products (products meant for people very often include different kind of perfumes and the ph-values are different). Good dog shampoo and information about those products you get easiest from special pet shops. After washing the dog, it should be dried carefully and protected from the air draft.
The best caring treatment for your dog's coat is exercise and good food. Besides washing, coat treatment and exercise also feeding and vitamins got from the food affect to coat shining. If the coat is not shining as hoped, you may try using B-vitamin product.
English springer spaniel is dynamic dog and it needs quite a lot of execise. If springer does not get enough exercise to use energy it has, it might get bored and start to destroy for example shoes, couch etc. Sometimes springer spaniel might also use this extra energy by barking or running all over the house. When you exercise your spaniel enough, this kind of histrionic actions and energy bombs will not happen.
You should be careful when exercising your puppy. Springer puppy under one year old should not let run too much yet (for example bicyckling runs or long walkings are not good for the puppy). You should let the puppy grow in peace. With this and right feeding might assure your dog will not get any hip problems or other skeleton or articulation diseases. About half of the hip diseases (hip dysplasia) are caused by the environmental factors not only by the gene.
When springer is adult, you should exercise with it regularly. And if you ask from springer, it would do ANYTHING with you, AS MUCH AS POSSIBLE and ANYTIME.
Because of this need of exercise this breed cannot be warmly recommend to buy if you live in the middle of the big city where is no forests or outdoor areas for dogs near. But of course springer does settle also in city when the exercise and hobbies are available. It is important to keep springer spaniel's activity state regular and stable, so dog should get exercise regularly and amount which fits to dog and owner. If you exercise your dog a lot and suddenly stop it, you may be sure the problems will follow (when dog does not get as much exercise as the activity state would demand). And also when keeping this state of activity you make feeding easier (when amount of needed food is not changing so much).
The eyes and ears of the spaniels need to be checked regularly, because they might get infected or dirty. Especially when dog is sleeping it might get matter to eyes and this should be removed with a clean non-fluffy towel. Ears should be cleaned once a month. This is enough for keeping the ears out of earwax, which could choke the outer auditory canal. The earwax should be removed with a cotton stick or swab soaked with oil or ear cleaner (but do not dig too deep, clean only the parts that you see).
Dog's teeths do not usually need any special caring, while they get clean when dog is eating also hard food. So bones and other gnawable food clean the teeth very efficiently. Sometimes still there might appear some dental calculus and if there is a lot of it, you should ask the vet to remove it (so your dog won't get any infections or other diseases).
Springer spaniel's paws should be checked regularly. Check especially the area between the toes and pads because the little stones and/or ice cubes might cling there (in winter also snow might pack as little ice balls between the pads). And if you live in urban area also gums might cling to coat. If the pads are grazed, you should powder them and if the pads are chapped, you should oil them for example with Vaseline. At least here in Finland you may buy from the pet store different kind of salves and oils to use when dog has dry and chapped pads, eczema, irritated or inflamed earlobes, sores and little wounds or dry and hard skin.
Dogs might get some mites and other parasites especially with those who move a lot in grassy areas and other terrain. So you should check the coat and skin regularly for parasites. Help to get rid of parasites you get from vet and/or chemist.