Problems With Mealtime

[Guest jcharles00]

Hello everyone!

 

I just joined here, but I've been reading these forums off and on for advice. Wondering if anyone has insight on my current situation.

 

My dog, Red Rover isn't eating all of his food. This has been going on for the past two weeks. He always eats a little, usually around half, but is very disturbed. He eats some, carrying it into another room to swallow and sometimes pacing the house before returning to his bowl for another bite. He stares at the food bowl like it's scared him and he's expecting it to jump at him or something.

 

Here's the backstory - I adopted Red in November from the Veterinary school/hospital I work at, where he has been a blood donor dog. He's 8 years old, and spooky. While not "obedience trained" he is very well behaved; no accidents, is good with my cats, generally does what he should and doesn't get into any trouble. When I initially brought him home, he wouldn't eat much. After much observation, I guessed that he was 1. scared of his own shadow which cast behind his bowls and 2. afraid of the sound the metal bowl made when scooted around inside the high plastic pedestal. I started leaving the light off in the room where is food bowl is, and put foam inside the bowl holder to reduce the movement. Then I basically knelt down and fed him by hand, one piece at a time, moving my hand closer and closer to the bowl until he was eating out of it. Since then he did really well until a couple of weeks ago. He went in in the morning for a blood donation, and I brought him home at noon, then went back to work. when I came home at 5p, he came to the door to greet me, but was acting very odd, and immediately threw up a large amount of fluid. he committed 3 times in total before I got him to the emergency vet. he had already perked back up by that time, but they checked him out and gave him fluids anyway. I fed him his regular kibble mixed with hills I/D canned (rather than his regular purina canned) for a couple of days and he generally ate all of it. we went back to the purina and he was eating all of it and then at some point started only eating half or less.

 

Tonight I tried moving his bowls from the dining room to the living room near his main bed. His behavior was the same. If also wondered if the cats are bothering him, as they sometimes like to drink out of his water.. for a few days I put them in the back room while he ate, but there was no change in behavior. Yet another possibility is that he isn't getting enough exercise, since we've been snowed under here in Indiana for a while. I've made efforts to get him out and running more, but still not seeing a change.

 

Anyone have advice? I know he's not going to starve, but I'm concerned that he's not getting enough.

[macoduck]

How much food is he being fed?

Can you try switching to plastic bowls?

[TheFullHouse]

It sounds like he became upset at going back to the hospital to donate. Have you done this at other times since bringing him home to live with you? He's still so new to home life that taking him back may have confused him a little. The other thing that comes to mind is you changed his food a little bit and putting him back on his regular food may have upset his stomach a bit. The other option is a food allergy and his regular food isn't setting right with him.

[GeorgeofNE]

Maybe he would be comfortable eating in a crate, since I assume he was in some sort of kennel while he was a donor?

 

Some dogs truly do feel a crate is a "safe space."

[Guest jcharles00]

How much food is he being fed?

Can you try switching to plastic bowls?

 

His regular food (as indicated when I got him) is 3 cups dry + 4 tablespoons of canned, twice a day.

It's probably also worth noting that he still enjoys biscuits/treats with no problems.

 

 

It sounds like he became upset at going back to the hospital to donate. Have you done this at other times since bringing him home to live with you? He's still so new to home life that taking him back may have confused him a little. The other thing that comes to mind is you changed his food a little bit and putting him back on his regular food may have upset his stomach a bit. The other option is a food allergy and his regular food isn't setting right with him.

 

He donates every 2 weeks, and seems to be generally happy when we go in since he's familiar with all of the Techs that he encounters there.

[OwnedBySummer]

6 cups is a LOT of kibble. Summer is 68-69 lbs. She gets 2 cups of kibble for breakfast, and a literal handful of kibble along with 1/2 a large can of meat for dinner. Treats are fairly limited but she does get a cookie every night at bedtime.

 

My suspicion is that you're feeding way too much and he is only eating what he actually requires. I'd reduce his food down to where he himself has placed it and then monitor the situation. If he doesn't lose weight, no problem!

 

My other question is: Isn't donating blood every two weeks too frequent? The veterinary college here only does it once every two months AND the dog must be 5 years old or younger.

Edited February 7, 2011 by OwnedBySummer

[Guest OMGiluvgreys]

 

His regular food (as indicated when I got him) is 3 cups dry + 4 tablespoons of canned, twice a day.

It's probably also worth noting that he still enjoys biscuits/treats with no problems.

 

 

I have a 95 lb male and he only eats 4 cups a day, sometimes less.

[TheFullHouse]

My 90lb. boys get 4 cups of food a day. He just may be full.

[DesiRayMom]

DesiRay is also 90 lbs & only eats 4 cups/day.

 

It also seems to me that donating blood every 2 weeks is a little too often.

[Guest tysmom]

I own two blood donor dogs and its only every three months at best.

[Walliered]

I have 2 85lb. males and they eat 2 cups 2xday or 4 cups per dog per day. Only one treat at bedtime and nothing else.

[Guest jcharles00]

Here's a follow up, just in case anyone else encounters a similar problem.

 

Red Rover is eating all of his food again. The solution was.... to leave him alone. My fretting over him eating must have stressed him out. I just quit worrying about it and after a couple of weeks he eventually started eating again. I'm trying to adopt a similar strategy to his new behavior of hanging out in the basement most of the time. I figure he just doesn't want to be around the things going on upstairs and excuses himself to his hideout. seems to be happy.

[Laurenbiz]

Here's a follow up, just in case anyone else encounters a similar problem.

 

Red Rover is eating all of his food again. The solution was.... to leave him alone. My fretting over him eating must have stressed him out. I just quit worrying about it and after a couple of weeks he eventually started eating again. I'm trying to adopt a similar strategy to his new behavior of hanging out in the basement most of the time. I figure he just doesn't want to be around the things going on upstairs and excuses himself to his hideout. seems to be happy.

 

 

 

You are not alone! Bernie went through a picky/weird stage in the first month or so that we had him. He was underweight when we got him, so my big priority was for him to eat since I really wanted him to gain weight. I always stayed in the kitchen to make sure he would eat. Sometimes he would, sometimes he wouldn't. But, our meal time is now a consistent procedure: I prepare his food, he watches me, I put his food bowl down, I go do something else in the house, and when I go back into the kitchen - the food is ALWAYS gone!

 

If I read another post correctly, your hound gets 3 cups of dry kibble plus some extra tablespoons of wet food - twice daily? That's nearly 6 cups per day. He may have been not eating because he is just too full!

 

Bernie is 70 lbs. I was giving him 2 cups of kibble twice a day originally. Then, a friend of mine (a dog lover/trainer, so I listened to her since Bernie is my first dog,) told me that dog food brands typically print misleading suggested values per dog's weight on food labels. Even though my bag said 2 cups, I cut back to 1.5 cups. And Bernie got better with eating.

 

Nowadays, I give him 1 cup of kibble for his meal, mixed in with roughly a 1/2 - 1 cup of a protein-rich food (raw lean hamburger, yogurt, hard-boiled egg, etc.) and I've actually seen him gain weight.

[Guest jcharles00]

If I read another post correctly, your hound gets 3 cups of dry kibble plus some extra tablespoons of wet food - twice daily? That's nearly 6 cups per day. He may have been not eating because he is just too full!

 

That seems to be the consensus of the folks on here, but his feeding directions came directly from the technicians who cared for him for years in the vet school where he was a captive blood donor. He maintains his weight and doesn't have any (non-behavioral) problems. He is on Thyro-tabs, which probably have some effect on his metabolism. Perhaps thats the difference. Regardless, things are back to normal now.

[Guest LokisMom]

I had a 75lb boy with a thyroid condition and once he was on the correct dose of medicine, he ate the same amount of food as any other 75lb greyhound. About 3-4 cups per day depnding on the type of kibble. He may actually be maintaining weight at that high an amount due to too high a dosage or a misdiagnosis of hypothyroidism.

 

Our boy came to us as a senior bounce who was on 3x the amount of Soloxine he should've been because that's what it took to get his bloodwork to come out correct. He was 65 lbs, skinny and bald in patches and he panted and drooled constantly. Not ex racer bald either. We took him off thyroid meds and he blew up to 90 lbs within 2 months, so we put him back on but at a low dose, then upped it based on symptoms not blood work.

 

This was all our vets idea. He said a lot of people get so caught up in reading bloodwork they stop actually looking at the symptoms the dog is displaying.

 

I am not starting the thyroid debate! Just giving an example of how that sometimes works and the fact that he is eating that much food and maintaining weight seems like a red flag for something being not quite right. Particularly when combined with thyroid meds. I don't know where you are located but I'd consider a second opinion from a different vet (another one with sighthound experience)

Edited March 23, 2011 by LokisMom

[krissy]

6 cups is a lot of food. My boy gets 3 cups per day, plus about 1/4 cup in his Kong, and he gets a tonne of treats because he's in obedience and agility.

 

That said though, if he's going in EVERY 2 WEEKS to donate blood, his body needs a little extra to make new cells. That's insane to me... every 2 weeks, especially at his age. I'm a vet student so my grey is a blood donor for the school's clinic. All the dogs go in once every 2 months (occassionally students and staff get their dogs calling in earlier if they're really desperate for blood, but not if they donated less than a month ago), and they have to be between 1 and 5 years of age. Summit will be turning 6 in May, so the only reason they are using him is because I'm a student and he's a greyhound (convenient because I can bring him in at a moment's notice and of course he's the Universal blood type and very well behaved for the collection). Dogs are retired after 2 years (i.e. about 12 collections). We used to keep dogs at the school as blood donors (lots of greyhounds, but also other breeds) but they were all adopted out a couple years ago and they now use privately owned community dogs (the cost of keeping the dogs was the reason for scrapping the original program). But even when the dogs were kept at the school they were retired and adopted out after 2 years. We still keep cats as blood donors and they too are retired and adopted after a 2 year stay.

 

Honestly, I think he's donating too often. I don't know of too many clinics that require that much blood except emergency vets and referral vets (like University clinics). If they require that much blood they should look into adding more dogs to their donor program.

 

ETA: Just re-read the original post and noted that it is a University clinic. However, it still stands that if they need to be bleeding their dogs once every 2 weeks then they have too few dogs in their program and they need to expand.

Edited March 23, 2011 by krissy

[Guest Tequila]

Just a few suggestions for dogs who seem "afraid" of their bowls....

 

1) You might want to take off his/her collar for mealtime. I discovered that my grey got freaked out when her tags bumped the bowl -- it made a loud "clang" type of noise, and she RAN away from the bowl. So I always remove her collar so the tags don't make any noise.

 

2) Perhaps try placing the bowl on his/her bed. For some reason, mine will happily drink water out of the raised feeder, but will not eat food out of it. Odd. But she WILL eat food if I place her bowl on her bed.

 

3) As you mentioned, leave them alone. For awhile, I was trying so hard to "coax" my grey to eat, that she developed a habit of waiting for me to "help" her eat. It actually got to the point where she PREFERRED that I feed her with a fork. I'm serious. I would feed her bite by bite, off a fork. She loved it. It was the only way she would eat. Then, of course, I realized just how ridiculous this was to do EVERY DAY, morning and evening. (I mean, ONCE, okay, fine. But I was having to do this for every single meal and it got silly). So, I went with the "take it or leave it" method. Here's your food. Eat it....or don't eat it....I don't care. When she realized I wasn't going to sit on the floor and feed her, things began to change. I gave her 20 minutes. If she didn't eat, the food got picked up, and she had to wait until the next scheduled meal. Guess what? She started to eat on her own!

 

Hope these suggestions help a little bit!

 

Kathy

Edited March 23, 2011 by Tequila

[rascalsmom]

I agree with Kathy. Rascal sometimes gets spooked if her tags hit against her bowl. She also developed a 'fear' of her stainless steel bowl, so I bought her a heavy ceramic one. It doesn't move around, and it doesn't make any reflections. Sometimes she's even disturbed by the sound of the OTHER two dogs eating; so she eats in the dining room, alone.

 

Perhaps your dog could come here and convince my Jack that the basement is NOT a bad place --he's developed a fear of going to the basement. It's sad, because we spend every evening there, in the family room. Jack is upstairs all by himself.