I agree wholeheartedly with Kathy Dettwyler's remark that we may not need
new weight charts if we breastfeed babies naturally -- as opposed to
culturally (ie with limited and scheduled feeds.) I have said before that I
believe that some day we will find that poorly gaining breastfed infants
relect either an artifact of poor feed management, or a failure to identify
slow gaining as a sign of a system-failure of which poor ability to eat
effectively is a first symptom.  The NORMAL pattern in my 20 years of
experience working with breastfeeding babies is for them to gain hugely in
the early weeks -- quite comprably with the formula fed infants, except the
quality and texture of the fat feels differently.  Then they slow down a bit
on the rate of gain, often weighing at a year only couple of  pounds  more
than they weighed at 6 mo.

I also agree with Maureen Minchion about the absurdity of feeding babies "on
a Pritikin diet while we grow obese." I always have to explain to mothers
that American weaning foods are low fat, high fiber (fruits and veges and
processed cereals) and that babies need cont. high fat/protein diets with
egg yolk, meat, avacado, potato mashed with hind milk, etc.  Placed on
typical weaning foods it's no wonder these babies don't gain -- esp. when
not much breastfeeding may be taking place.

Barbara

Barbara Wilson-Clay, BS, IBCLC
Private Practice, Austin, Texas
Owner, Lactnews On-Line Conference Page
http://moontower.com/bwc/lactnews.html