Picky Eater, or AM I THE CAUSE?
ok, my year old male (I have posted several times before about his eating habits) Is a picky eater, I have played with several brands and feeding techniques. And finally settled on feeding Innova with some boiled burger and rice mixture. And of course he eats now, not as easily as say my sisters female whom gobbles her food down. But he eats! I have grown to just live with his "finickiness" What does it hurt, right?
THEN I got a female a week ago. When she first cam home, she gobbled up her food, I was relieved she was not going to give me the run around Walk does, then a few days later, it happened! She is being picky!!! I put food in her crate, the bowl is always full by this I mean she never touches it? I tried feeding her 1 cup A.M and 1 cup P.M. as the breeder suggested, at first she would eat it all, now I am lucky if she eats a fourth of it. I keep her on a lead with me at ALL times, so I keep a dish of food with us as we wander, incase she gets hungry. since she really is not eating much......
Am I the one creating the monsters?
Willow came to me as a very healthy solid (I mean solid) girl. She is going to make her conformation debut this summer, I cant have her not eating!
What am I doing wrong? there is no way she could go from a gobbler to a picky pooh?
Could it be the fact her and Walk always have a chew bone, does that tell their brain not to eat? Or does a small amount of Innova really sustain them and fill them up? Its to soon to tell if she is loosing weight!! And Walker is "very healthy" according to my vet.
ALL THOUGHTS ARE WANTED AND APPRICIATED !!! thanks guys!
I forgot to add! today all she ate was maybe 10 kibbles, of a mixture of Innova sm breed pup and Euk. sm breep pup
THEN I got a female a week ago. When she first cam home, she gobbled up her food, I was relieved she was not going to give me the run around Walk does, then a few days later, it happened! She is being picky!!! I put food in her crate, the bowl is always full by this I mean she never touches it? I tried feeding her 1 cup A.M and 1 cup P.M. as the breeder suggested, at first she would eat it all, now I am lucky if she eats a fourth of it. I keep her on a lead with me at ALL times, so I keep a dish of food with us as we wander, incase she gets hungry. since she really is not eating much......
Am I the one creating the monsters?
Willow came to me as a very healthy solid (I mean solid) girl. She is going to make her conformation debut this summer, I cant have her not eating!
What am I doing wrong? there is no way she could go from a gobbler to a picky pooh?
Could it be the fact her and Walk always have a chew bone, does that tell their brain not to eat? Or does a small amount of Innova really sustain them and fill them up? Its to soon to tell if she is loosing weight!! And Walker is "very healthy" according to my vet.
ALL THOUGHTS ARE WANTED AND APPRICIATED !!! thanks guys!
I forgot to add! today all she ate was maybe 10 kibbles, of a mixture of Innova sm breed pup and Euk. sm breep pup
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by Samantha, Ian, & Toast on
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I don't know how to help, because my pup has the same problem. Toast will only eat a few bites of her puppy food but will inhale all of the cat food (which we've now started to mix a bit in to her puppy food as temptation, but that still won't work). Hopefully you can figure things out!!
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Permalink Reply by Joanna Kimball on
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Most cases of picky eating I've seen are the dog saying "I'm done, that was enough" (usually around six or eight months old, when they stop growing so fast) and the owner saying "No, that can't possibly be right" and playing around until they find a mixture of brands or ingredients that are so attractive to the dog that he'll keep eating even after he's full. It's sort of like putting ice cream in front of a kid who had pushed away his soup.
I've seen people piling last night's casserole on top of a full bowl of kibble and putting it down in front of a morbidly obese dog because "if I don't add leftovers he won't eat."
If Walk is at a healthy weight, ignore his shenanigans and let him stop eating if he wants to. If he's not at a healthy weight (if he's too thin) you need to build food drive by activity and competition. You send him on a fetch, he brings it back and gets a couple of kibbles. You get the two of them going in a big romp, then offer a little bit of food. You want to turn on the part of his brain that sees food as a huge reward, not as something that's around all the time so he can ignore it.
With the puppy, don't let your experience with Wash color your perception of what she's doing. If a puppy stops eating when she's been eager, the first thing I suspect is that she's not feeling good. How is she feeling, acting, behaving? Is her poop OK? If she seems healthy and normal otherwise, she could be having difficulty adjusting to being away from her littermates and no longer having the big pile of food and competition for every bite. You can try upping the palatability by feeding some canned food for a few days (the texture is often very comforting to puppies, who see the kibble as a little more of a challenge) or you can try bits of healthy people food like chicken.
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Permalink Reply by Beth on
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With a puppy, sometimes if they are teething or otherwise feeling yucky, about the only sign you will see is lack of eating because their energy and curiosity are so high that they keep playing and running even if they are not feeling well. If she might be having teeth issues, you might try softening the kibble a bit to see if it helps. If it is not teeth, I would try putting her bowl down for 15-20 minutes, and if she does not eat pick it up and don't offer again til the next meal time. How old is she? If she's only a few months old, next meal might be lunch time. Try that for a day (two or three days if she's mostly grown) and see if it helps. Most Corgis have very good appetites but with other dogs I've known, some are "grazers." Most of the dogs my parents have had were free-feeders where you can leave food down all day and they will just nibble when they are hungry.
Add-ins are great for a good eater, and I mix in things like yogurt or cottage cheese or some scrambled egg on a regular basis. But for picky eaters sometimes it can make a dog "hold out" for the good stuff.
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Permalink Reply by agneta creutzmann on
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You are right about that, they "hold out" for something better. One of my Corgi's eats anything, and I feed her the "add in style". But my 15 month old, she picks out all the good stuff ,I have thrown out so much dryfood. I know there is nothing wrong with her, she have alot of enegy, and when we go out, she runns alot, so she must burn all the calories she takes in. I wish I was like that.
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Permalink Reply by MagnoliaFly on
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From the moment I bring my puppies home if I'm not hand feeding meals for whatever reason (I usually consider this valuable training time) I put the bowl down for 10 minutes and give them their chance to eat. If they haven't finished in 10 minutes they will get another chance at the next mealtime.
Both of my dogs finish their meals quite quickly now because of this. They have to work for their food and I don't just set the bowl down for free. Sometimes I put the meals in a treat ball. Sometimes I have them wait in a stay before I release them to eat the meal. Sometimes I have them "wave", "roll over", "nose touch", "give paw" and weave through my legs before they get the meal. They are DYING to eat and will do anything to get to the food. Had I just free-fed them from puppyhood and added in all sorts of things to the food there is no way I would have ever been able to request these behaviors prior to mealtime.
A healthy dog will not starve itself. Some puppies decide to not eat an entire day. As long as the poop looks good, they are drinking water, they are in good spirits and not lethargic I wouldn't worry about it.
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Permalink Reply by Melissa S. on
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I am going to try this! I like it!....
I am a worry wart, and dont want to see them go hungry, but the way you put it kinda makes more sense to me, and I am sure they both will eat like good children in a few weeks :)
Thank you all for your great thoughts! feel free to keep adding them if you got em!
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Good luck and stay strong. I'm sure they'll be eating regular kibble soon and enjoying treats as they were meant to be - an occasional gift.
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Permalink Reply by Lucy & Ricky (Wendy/Jack ) on
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Have you tried feeding them together?
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she is on pup food right now! :(
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Permalink Reply by Michelle on
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Well.....If my brother was getting some fabulous smelling feast with yummy people food IE boiled meat....I would hold out to. Remeber they are not going to starve to death if they go without eating for 24 hours. PS I am not big on free feeding I have found that there is overeating or a complete lack of interest, and generally it is one of the two extremes. I have one of each, a kibble monster (my male) and a "if you would just hand feed me a few kibbles I would feel so much better about this kibble.....(my female)" . She is also prone to riual eating, sneaking up on it like it is going to bite her, circling her bowl, not eating if there are distractions. When she gets hungry enough she eats her food.....generally she might skip one meal....I will give her a couple cookies the next morning on these occasions, but by our evening feeding she if feeling real good about that kibble. I know that this seems harsh but the whole picky eating thing just makes me crazy.
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I'd be cautious about withholding food from a baby puppy. They can get hypoglycemic fast, and then they get feeling bad and don't want to eat, and they can get in real trouble. Adults, yes, tough love. Puppies shouldn't skip meals (at least not entirely) until they're several months old.
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Permalink Reply by vicky on
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I'm having a similar issue! I thought I was the only one-- but I guess I'm not alone.
Bonnie (8 months)- we brought her home when she was 9 weeks, and during breakfast & dinner she gobbled up all her food [wellness]. After a few months or so, she wasn't so eager to eat and we started feeding her with a spoon and she'd eat a little. We found out that if we call Scraper over she'll start eating her food, because she doesn't want Scraper to eat her food. After a while that method only worked every once in a while. I thought maybe she didn't like her food because I brought her over to my boyfriends parents house and they feed their dog Dog Chow [bad, i know] and she gobbled all of it up! Then I switched her food to Innova and she ate that without a problem for a month and now she's stopped again. I don't know what it is, because Scraper will eat anything you give him & it seems he never gets full!
I hope we both find a solution!
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