Question about feeding.....

[MoonandBean]

Sunny has gotten real picky when it comes to eating. She loves treats and she loves the cats wet food (which we try not to let her eat but it's a constant battle) but when it comes to eating her own food, she snubs it. I give her a cup of Blue Puppy chow mixed with some wellness puppy canned. Sometimes, I use Blue canned or wellness cans for adults because I figured she was bored and needed some variety but it really makes little difference. She shows no interest and we have to pretend to mix something into it and then she'll come over and eat a little. I know, I know...she is really spoiled!
I feed her once at 7am and again at 5pm. My question is.......

Should I feed her once a day so she is really hungry and will eat whatever we put down for her? Is it ok to feed an 8mo. old once per day? I assume she's just not hungry enough to eat with her current feeding schedule. As you can see, she is by no means lean so I know she's getting enough but I want her to have the proper nutrition.

Thanks!

[Twisterdog]

I think you already know the answer to your question ...

Your dog is getting treats, canned cat food, different varieties of canned dog food ... I would say she knows that if she doesn't eat what's in her bowl in a certain amount of time, you will give her something different. Dogs are very smart - she has you well trained.

I have boarded, rescued, fostered many, many dogs over the years where the owners swore the dog simply would not eat dry food, would not eat this, would only eat that, etc. Guess what ... without fail, every single one of them ate what I fed them. Not the first day, maybe, or the second or third ... but they all learned that what was in the bowl was dinner, and it wasn't changing.

As for your cat's food, put it up on the counter or another high place that the cat's can jump to but the dogs cannot.

[lute]

I also wanted to throw in that it is not bad to feed an older puppy once a day. It's just a good idea to keep it twice a day. You can even feed her twice a day forever. You don't have to make it once a day when she's an adult.

[chocolatepuppy]

Yep, it sounds like a case of someone's getting spoiled. I feed my dogs twice a day. When I just had L&L if one of them didn't eat, the food went up and they didn't eat until the next meal. Since I got Jake my girls have not refused to eat a single time.

[MoonandBean]

Thanks everyone. Yea...I get it. Yesterday I only gave her 1/2 cup at breakfast and she snarfed dinner right down! After I use up the 4 started cans of different dog food in my fridge...LOL!!!!, I will stick to one kind of food and add it to her dry and that's it. I'm sure if she misses a meal, she'll eat whatever we give her the next meal.

As ALWAYS, thanks for your help!

[Glacier]

In addition to what's already been posted, I'd suggest giving her a set amount of time to eat. I have two fussy eaters. They each get 20 minutes to eat. If they havent' in that time, the dinner bowl goes away. I might offer it again later in the evening. I sometimes let one of the skinny dogs have it instead. They both eat the next evening without fail!

An otherwise healthy dog will not starve itself to death!

[Seravieve]

I know that variety isn't an issue here, but I just wanted to through it out.

We've fed B and Z Lamb & Rice formula for a while and when Eli graduated to Adult food, he started eating that as well. He got really finicky with it and would go without eating. He'd walk to his bowl, smell it, and then try to turn it over. Thats even with two other dogs as competition. So I branched out and got a different formula, Fish & Potato. He LOVES it. Will eat the kibble straight from my hand, unlike the L&R that he'd spit out. We did the whole time limit thing with him and also mixing other stuff in, and even then he'd eat the good stuff and leave the kibble. So it could be that he just didnt like the lamb and rice... =)

Or that he thinks he's special and needs more expensive food.. lol.

My RB Pepper (dalmatian) ate Kibbles and Bits, Science Diet (What the Humane Society recommended at the time), and Ole Roy and she lived to be 15 yrs. Of course, we didnt know better at the time. We would have bought her better food if we'd have known then.