LouieDog

ok, so here's Louie, our baby. He's 5 months old and he's a silver tricolour. A big suck!!!

this is when we first got him at 2 months




and now...grown a bit more




one issue we're having is his craziness over his food. Treats and peanut butter he's well behaved, but when it's feeding time he's mental. We've tried several things and they're just not working...any ideas? He gobbles his food so fast he sometimes doesn't chew and we want to curb this behaviour to prevent him from choking and so that it doesn't turn into aggression later in life.
thanks so much...

shallhb

one issue we're having is his craziness over his food. Treats and peanut butter he's well behaved, but when it's feeding time he's mental. We've tried several things and they're just not working...any ideas? He gobbles his food so fast he sometimes doesn't chew and we want to curb this behaviour to prevent him from choking and so that it doesn't turn into aggression later in life.
thanks so much...


Oh, is he cute! So far as his fast eating goes, there are bowls out with posts in them that slow their eating down a little bit--they are supposed to help prevent bloat. I think I got mine from Fosters and Smith. Why are you worried about him getting aggressive around food? Does he show food-guarding behaviors now?

__________________
Sharon Hall

Grace (puppy in training)
Bella, UD, VER, TD, RE, CGC
Pearl,UD, TDX, RE, CGC (Waiting at the Bridge)
Samantha, Theodore, CGC, Louella, Zeke and Arty, Bassets All; (All Waiting at the Bridge)

Yogi's Mom

Louie is just so handsome! I love your avatar! Hope to see more pictures as he grows up.

Maggie's Mommy

He is adorable!! My Rusty inhales his food I am concerned about bloat or just throwing up all that food. So I got this from the internet. It doesn't make him eat slow, but it does slow him down. It was about $20. Here's a photo:





www.brake-fast. net

murraysmom

That's a great avatar- and Louie is so handsome!

Mommy2Indy

How handsome! Great pictures.

Houndsong

Put a tennis ball in his bowl. How often are you feeding him? Maybe he needs more frequent, smaller meals?

LouieDog

we're feeding him one cup (plus a bit) twice a day. We did give him more frequent meals when we first got him at 2 months and he was pooping 6 and 7 times a day...lol
so that's why we switched to twice a day...should we be feeding him more? He's also on a special "gastro" food because his poops weren't solid...(ok...now i'm getting gross).


as far as the aggression thing goes...if you try to take the bowl away while he's eating, he growls a bit. He doesn't do it as much, now but i can see how his behaviour could turn into food aggression later on. He goes absolutely nuts when we take his food out. He sits and appears good, but he shakes like a leaf from excitement and piddles a bit if you try to calm him down and wait...it just makes it worse. Then he DIVES into his food and it goes everywhere. We're hoping that since he's still young, he might grow out of his food obsession a bit..but we're not sure if that will be the case.

we'll try the tennis ball thing but i'm afraid he'll try and eat it..lol..
as for those cool blue bowls you send the pics of, they look interesting and i've heard of them, but he's gonna push them all over the floor cause they're plastic. We had to a really heavy bowl set and he moves that!!


thanks!

Yogi's Mom

I think you are probably not feeding Louie enough food and should go back to three times a day feeding. He is still very much a puppy. What kind of food are you feeding him? My dog, Yogi is five years old and he gets 2 1/4 cups of food total in one day, divided up into two meals. Now it has been a long time, but I am sure he was eating close to 4 to 5 cups of food a day when he was a puppy. Did you check with Louie's breeder or your vet to see what amount he should be eating? For every dog that I have had, when they were puppies I would go up and drop a "special" treat in their bowl while they were eating so that they would associate a human coming up to the food bowl with something good. I don't like to bother my dogs too much while they are eating but to this day, I still drop something in their bowl from time to time. Occasionally, I have given the wrong food to the wrong dog so it is nice to be able to get the bowl back if needed. If he is not getting enough food that might be why he is getting too excited and possibly causing some aggression, since he is probably very hungry. Anyway, I hope that this helps you.

LouieDog

We were never sure how much to feed Louie but apparently the vet is very happy with his weight. I've always wondered weather we should be feeding him more, but the vet doesn't think so.

About his aggression...don't get me wrong, he's actually not as bad as i'm probable describing. He lets us pet him and touch him and put our hands in the food bowl while he's eating...it's just if we move him or try to take away his food...which is understandable. But the excitement i've heard can turn into aggression later in life so that's why we wanted to curb that behaviour now before it becomes true aggression. He only growls quietly and has never bared his teeth and it's very seldom that he does growl, it's more that he gets so over excited that he's shaking and being a mental case over his food...but with his treats and bone, he's wonderful.

Perhaps it's just puppy behaviour and something he learned when he was with his brothers and sisters.

Thanks so much for all of your suggestions...this is great!!!
It's nice to have some support, as we have been dog owners before, but never owned a Basset!

Thanks again!!