How do I get this dog to eat (and does it even matter?)

In My Humble Opinion
1

About 10 months ago, my girlie pug got very sick, with a disease that caused her esophagus to expand, making eating dangerous due to the risk of inhaling food and contracting pneumonia.

She’s fine now, but part of getting her through all that was changing her over to canned food. For a while during and in the month or so after she was sick, we had to really watch her, because if she got any dry food, it came right back up.

Now, though, she’s snuck the dry food enough and had no problems with it that I’d like to try to get her back on it. I’m going slow, and if I see any issues I’ll back off. Problem is, she won’t eat the #!@# stuff now. Back when it was forbidden, she’d try to sneak it all the time. Now, I watch her, and she rarely eats any.

I’ve been decreasing the amount of canned food to the point where I’m giving her about half a can a day, down from nearly a whole can previously, and keeping the dry food out all the time so if she’s hungry, she can easily supplement what I’m giving her. But she simply doesn’t eat it; she comes into the kitchen (where her food is) and stares longingly at the food dish, then looks at me, then looks at the food dish, then flops down on the floor with her head down like she’s staaaaaarrrrvvvviiing. But she doesn’t eat the dry food.

She seems to be a little lethargic as well, like she’s not getting enough food. Not hugely lethargic, but, for example, her play times seem shorter. Or maybe that’s just in my head.

Long story short: do I care that she’s not eating the dry food? Will she eat when she’s good and hungry? It’s always out and available, and she does get a few ounces of canned food twice a day, as well as a few treats. She doesn’t seem to be losing weight quickly or anything like that.

She was at the vet last week, the vet said she looked good, though I didn’t specifically bring up the food issue.

Worry, or no?

2

As long as her weight and body condition score are normal, meh. We have three dogs who I feed pretty high-end food twice daily. Each feeding varies slightly according to their activities. I skip two or three feelings a week, and find that helps stop them from being food oriented. I stop for a weigh-in at the vets every few months, and each dog stays within two pounds of ideal.

Oh, and I would never tempt an innapetant but healthy dog to eat. I’m the one buying the food. It’s eat what’s in your bowl or go without.

3

I had problems getting Dolly to eat what she’d been eating before she got sick (just some sort of stomach bug). She wouldn’t eat it unless I hand-fed it to her, or unless I mixed in some pumpkin.

I switched her food and now she eats like a champ.

You didn’t mention it but…did you try changing her food?

4

I’ve heard that if you leave out just the food that you want the dog to eat, after 3 days they will start eating it. Usually we humans give up too quickly especially when the doggy starts giving up sad looks.

5

I can vouch for this. Several times I’ve had to dogsit for my parents and they actually prepare the meals for the dog. My dad gave instructions on how I was to mix his food with ketchup, broth, and microwave it and all this. He was a perfectly healthy middle aged dog so I just gave him dry food. Day 1, nope. Day 2, nope. Day 3, couldnt wait to chow down.

6

OTOH, my little dog, who normally weighs about 18 pounds, lost three pounds once because he refused to eat the higher quality food I was trying to switch him to. We’d just moved and I think he was confused on top of not liking it. So it can work, but keep a close eye on her, is all I’m saying. I put my dog back on the food he likes and that works well for him. He’s been fine ever since.

I’m not sure I’d bother trying to switch your pug back to dry since she got sick eating dry food and the wet food helped her get better. I’d be inclined to keep her on whatever food suited her best, that I could afford.

7

Is there a reason you want to get her back on dry food? I know there’s an idea that circulates about dry food being better for their teeth, but I’ve also read studies that say the reverse is true, and there’s plenty other ways to keep their teeth clean.

My maltese can’t stomach dry food (gives him the runs). I’ve resorted to wet food only – I buy the best I can (an organic brand in the UK called Lily’s Kitchen which smells so good I reckon I could stick it in a meat pie and everyone would happily eat it). It’s not cheap, but still cheaper than what everyone else in the house eats!

8

I want to get her back on dry food because 1) the canned food is bloody expensive, 2) it’s a pain in the butt to have to feed her twice a day and 3) the canned food grosses me out a little.

If she actually can’t tolerate it, I can deal with all of those things. But given that she seems to like the dry stuff enough to sneak it, at least pre-diet-change, it’s cheaper, it’s not gross, and I can just leave it out and both pugs can free-feed, I’d like to at least try to get her back on it.

And to clarify - the dry food didn’t MAKE her sick. It was just while she WAS sick, the canned food was easier on her. Now she seems to be totally well, so thus, the diet change.

9

The standard advice for feeding dogs is to put the food out, and pick it up after 15 minutes or a half hour. Then do the same the next feeding time, etc. Eventually they get hungry enough and eat, and they learn to eat promptly when the food is out.

However, we don’t do that. We put it down and let him take his time eating it. He doesn’t beg and we don’t want to turn him into a food-hound, and it’s OK with us if his dry food sits out. For our last dog, we just kept her bowl full, and she ate an appropriate amount. We’re hoping to try that with our current one, when he gets a bit older.

10

Have you considered mixing a little of canned food in with the dry food? I had to do that for my dog for a while. I kept putting less and less in until she was weened completely off the canned food.

Even if you can’t ween your dog completely off the canned food, it would make the canned food last much longer. I have a big dog, and I only had to mix 1/3 can with 3 cups of dry food once a day. So for a pug, you may be able to get away with 1/8 can per feeding. Just get one of those plastic dog food lids (or saran wrap) and put the leftover in the fridge.

Anyway, it worked for me, and thought I would throw that out there. YMMV.

11

Update: As of noon today, the silly bitch (hey, it’s ACCURATE!) scarfed down a ton of dry food, and now won’t eat her canned-food dinner. My take on this is she snuck onto my computer while I did errands, read this thread, and said “oh, now I know how to REALLY screw with Mom’s head.”

That said, I got some good ideas from this thread, and I’m sure by tomorrow she’ll come up with some other trick, so keep 'em coming.