Normal for a dog to refuse dry food? Homemade dog recipes?
I started my dog on a kibble dry food diet and she was fine on that for the first few months we had her but for the last couple months, she has really been turning her nose up at it. She eats eventually, but is hesitant. So we switched her to wet food and a mix home homemade food and she seems much happier. Is this normal for a dog to reject dry food? Any good simple healthy recipes for dogs?
She's an Akita mix, and she's 14mos.
2011-02-25T21:09:01Z
We tried tough love for a while, but she would starve herself - eating only a little at night before bed - very late (around 10pm), but she would occasionally get sick from not eating anything. We just took her to the vet to make sure nothing's wrong and it's all A. OK healthwise.
I'm going to check into better dry food brands and work on removing the dog bowl routine. We were working on this for a while, we'll have to get back on that schedule.
?2011-02-25T20:53:26Z
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Yes, this is common. She's simply being picky. Changing her food won't solve the problem. Offer her only her dry kibble and if she won't eat it, put it away until the next meal time. She WILL learn that if she wants to eat, she will have to eat her kibble.
Cut out the mayo, the grapes (Why would you feed a carnivore grapes? They don't feed lions and wolves grapes at the zoo, I assure you), the flour, the chicken broth, and the chocolate. That leaves you with chicken breast. But don't cube it, dogs have teeth perfectly designed for chewing their food and don't need your help. But chicken breast isn't a balanced diet so add in some heart, liver, gizzards, kidney, green tripe and the like. Add a little salmon oil for Omega 3 and 6 and tada. You'll be feeding your dog the healthiest homemade diet possible, a raw (aka uncooked because, dogs don't have thumbs, start fires, nor do they cook, nor are they evolved (as we are) to eat cooked meat) prey modeled diet!!!
Haha all this means is that your dog is a picky eater. Wet food can actually stick to the dogs teeth causing dental problems in the future. Your dog will eat the food if shes that hungry. Just show her some tough love. she will not let herself starve if she is a picky eater. Try different tastier brands ad see what she likes the most. hopes this helps!
Try using different brands of dry food and if all that fails you can make your own "wet" food. For an akita though, it will be very expensive. Our recipe is 1lb. ground beef or chicken 2 cups cooked rice and some sort of vegetables such as peas.