About 3 weeks ago, I was given a purebred Cavalier King Charles Spaniel from a friend (it was his parents and his stepdad is an *******), and she is about 3 years old. She is cute and cuddly and EXTREMELY affectionate. She was most likely abused, because she cowers when you go to pet her and yelps sometimes if picked up under her front arms.

Well, we have had one major problem with her that is growing quite frustrating. She will not eat DRY dog food on her own. To get her to eat we have to "coach" her or feed her by hand (which is a really bad habit for dogs). We think that she was probably given "scraps" from whatever they ate, so she has become used to really tasty food, unlike her dry dog food. We only feed her and our other dog high quality organic natural dog food.

We have fed her canned dog food and chunk canned chicken JUST to get her to eat something, but we need to get her off of it.

Reasons being, dry dog food is cheaper, it's easier to feed her if we go out of town, etc.


I tried pouring chicken broth on the food to give more taste and wetness, but she just licked it instead.

Our vet said her teeth need a good cleaning so we were thinking that maybe dry food is hard for her to eat.


So guys and gals, do you have ANY recommendations as to what dry dog foods she may eat? Like something really tasty? Any help is appreciated as we can't continue to coach her to eat or feed her by hand or give her expensive canned dog food.



Thanks
Rob

 

i adopted a dog a couple years ago and it was the same way.


just leave the dry dog food out... eventually she will get hungry enough and eat.

if the dog food is too hard for her to eat get some puppy food. usually the kibble is a little bit softer for puppy teeth. the onyl thing you need to watch out for is puppy food has a higher calorie content because pups are so energetic, so you might have to monitor how much food she is eating.

the other side is maybe get it some seniors dog food, depending on brand the kibble for the seniors is a bit softer witha lower calorie content

i personally really like royal canin. its a great dogfood and doesnt have crap in it. i have used it for all my dogs and their coats have been very shiny and their teeth very healthy. its easy for them to digest and they dont have to eat so much of it cuz there is no garbage in it.

also maybe think about getting it some raw hides, these are usually good for keeping dogs teeth clean, or at least helping.

good luck, hopefully you figure soemthing out.





if she just dopesnt seem liek she will eat. mix the dry dog food up with the wet dog food and slowly change the proportions. start off 50-50 maybe and then eventually you will ge tot where there is no wet food.

or try the dry dog food and pour a little bit of chicken broth over it and slowly reduce the amount of chicken brothe

 

bingo

 

Our little mutt is part Cavalier King Charles Spaniel too. She has never been fed anything but dry food but she still doesn't have a very healthy appetite. We switched from Science Diet to some other premium dog food and it really helped. I'll find out what kind it is tonight and post it up.

My GF is a vet tech so I'll ask her advice too. One thought, if you really are stuck on the organic food, you might try the broth idea again but this time, allow the broth to soak into the food before you feed it to her so she can't just lick it off. Then every day slowly reduce the amount of broth until she eats it without the broth. You may just have to give up on that food and try another brand though. As I said, that helped a lot with our dog.

 

mix it and try to slowly faze it out. or try to add water to the food

 

The dog needs a teeth cleaning b/c it hasn't been eating dry dog food, which is good for their teeth/helps clean them. Give the dog the dry food, and let it sit for 15 minutes. If she doesn't eat, take it away, and try again later. Don't give it any scaps/wet food, and eventually it will eat what you give it. A healthy dog won't starve to death.

 

For the teeth, try dog biscuits designed to clean teeth and compressed raw hide bones. With the raw hide, give them nothing that they consume quickly as too much is bad for them. It takes our dog a month or two to eat one though and her teeth are always clean.

The dry food will definitely help too.

 

also, if you just want her to eat something healthy just for the sake of it eating, get some raw tripe.

 

I give my dog Nutro Brand dog food. He has a really nice shiny coat and gets complimented on it all the time. I give him the High Energy food as my dog is really lean, but built like a runner (Egyptian Pharaoh Hound & Black Lab mix).

Part of the dry food problem may be that the brand or the flavor is not something your dog finds enjoyable. You may have to switch to a few different ones before finding something he likes. However, you cannot just completely switch the brand and food on your dog. They can get pretty sick fairly easily if a severe change is made. A lot of places don't mind you even returning an open bag of food if your dog flat out refuses to eat.

You may want to consult your Vet before changing the dog food type though to see what they recommend for your specific dog. Also, it sounds like your dogs teeth need to be cleaned. That may help to at least give your dog a healthy appetite again as maybe he has sensitive teeth right now which causes him to not want to eat the dry food.

 

fo sho, that always works...they will eat when they are hungry, try to cut the treats until your dog start eating they food daily...

alan'09

 

All good suggestions.

1. Establish a routine
a. Exercise: More walks than play
b. Feed upon returning from the walk
c. Give a bit of time if it doesn't eat pick it up

2. 50/50 mix then slowly decrease wet to dry
a. good for the digestive system too
b. no more table scraps
c. no hand feeding

3. Work on the trust
a. Any animal that's been wooped will have a difficult time regaining trust.
b. understand the dog is new to you and it's surroundings it may take some time to adjust. Don't think about the past, just move the dog in the direction you 'd like to see it.

 

Thanks for the advice everyone.

To clarify, the dog would have starved herself if I didn't help her. Seriously. She's lost noticeable weight in the weeks that I've owned her, so using the "she'll eat when she's hungry" trick isn't going to work. We WILL NOT EVER feed her table scraps because of the issues she already has with food. She has only been given raw hide to strengthen her teeth and no other treats.

We've been walking her and playing with her. She has been adjusting great to my family and is really happy with all of the positive attention she is getting.

 

Briefly reading the above posts, I like the idea of only putting the food down for a period of time and then pulling it, thats cool.

Another idea,

You could mix some luke warm water with the kibble so it softens the food. Olive oil and cultured yogurt is cool to mix with the food also.

Not that any of the following matters but,

Eagle Pack and Diamond Natural are the "best" kibble to feed dogs, IMO + a bunch of research + multiple generations of Great Dane champion show dogs. BUT, the adult Kirkland Dog food from Costco is Diamond Natural relabeled and costs the same as crappy Dog Chow. I forget if its the Chicken and Rice or Lamb and Rice thats the better one. Just food for thought.

Chicken broth is a good idea, but are you softening the kibble with it or just splashing it in thier. I would wait 10~15mins and let it completely soak in the food and stir it around.

Last idea, slowly wein the dog off the soft "canned" food by mixing in more kibble and less soft food very slowly over a couple weeks.

 

She's eating Natura's Innova dog food.

http://www.innovapet.com/product_line.asp?id=1672

 

yeah, thats stuff is pretty much the same as Eagle Pack. Expensive holistic whatever. In the end, best value is the Kirkland and mix that Mountain Somethin Somethin yogurt with all the cultures.