Stitch Posted June 16, 2010 Share Posted June 16, 2010 Normally my lot know when they have had enough, however it is becoming quite obvious that I have bred a pup that is an absolute glutton!!! He is nearly 6 months old and has always been a big pup that absolutely loves food, in fact he is now starting to demand to be fed every afternoon. I normally feed all dogs at about 3.30pm or 4pm but if it doesn't happen quickly enough this one stands outside the kitchen window and barks. This is while all the others are running around playing and not caring what is happening in the kitchen. He would much rather eat than play!! Today I went outside when he barked and claimed the area that he normally barks in - this put a stop to the barking but I know it will continue to be an ongoing battle. Has anyone else had a furry glutton in the family??? Would love to hear your ideas on how to control the problem so it doesn't escalate to wanting to be fed at 2pm!!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cazxxz Posted June 16, 2010 Share Posted June 16, 2010 I'm far from an expert, so I don't have any real advice. My dog demands food from other people - the ones he knows will give in and feed him! I am responsible for feeding my dog. I feed him twice a day (sometimes just once), but not at regular times. He is very relaxed about meal times and isn't demanding, despite being obsessed with food. Have you tried varying meal times? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lyla Posted June 16, 2010 Share Posted June 16, 2010 I had one who barked when we had a very set routine, ie: play time at 10am, feed at 4. I ended up having to swap things around a lot, which took a few days of confusion but when he didn't know exactly when to expect things he got a lot better. Maybe try pushing meal time back slightly, but going and distracting the dog with a game or something to avoid the barking becoming too ingrained. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stitch Posted June 16, 2010 Author Share Posted June 16, 2010 Thanks for your replies. I will definitely have to try varying the meal time as you say. I have also converted to turkey necks because chicken necks get sucked down like spaghetti!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cavmad Posted June 16, 2010 Share Posted June 16, 2010 I am going to have to try the meal time variation thing as well as I used to feed my dogs when I got home from work around 4pm. Now that I am at home on maternity leave, Stella will come and sit wherever I am at 4pm, as if to say 'Ok, its 4, feed me'. Last night she carried on, pacing and staring me down for a good half an hour, which totally confused Cooper. He gets fed outside and he would go out and wait, then come back in after about 10 minutes as if to say 'Well, where is it'? I ended up making a cake and muffins and preparing all of our dinner before feeding them. Due to me working full time, I have created two dogs that are slaves to routine. Now that I am not working and trying to take it easy a bit, they are having to make some big adjustments. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
labsrule Posted June 16, 2010 Share Posted June 16, 2010 Yeah I have a 9mth old Lab pup that is an absolute glutton and is by far the greediest Lab pup that I have had (he is my 4th lab pup) . He was also the biggest of the litter He gets himself so worked up with excitement at feed times, I actually feed him first as he eats so bloody quickly that when I make him wait until after I feed my other two boys, he has worked himself into a frenzy and just virtually swallows the food with very little chewing. I have tried feeding him in the slow feeder bowls, but it doesn't slow him down, he is just obsessed with food and eating it as quickly as possible, even though I feed my dogs separately, so they all get to eat in peace without the other hanging around, but this doesn't seem to slow him down either I have already had a trip to the emergency animal hospital late one night after he swallowed a large chunk of turkey bone, which luckily he did vomit up before we went to the emergency hospital, but I still took him as he was in a very distressed state. Anyway he was then hospitalised the next morning at my vets on a drip :D I actually feed all my dogs separately, twice a day, morning and evening and is essentially the one meal divided into two smaller meals as my breed is prone to bloat and my pup is a sure fire candidate with the speed at which he hoovers up his food As meal times approach, yes he does know the time be starts running around getting himself all excited and some days he is more excited than other days, so I actually delay the feeding time until he settles down a bit. Interestingly enough, he will sit side by side with my other two lab boys when I feed them fruit treats of cut up apple and pear etc and he actually chews these treats quite slowly, so I wish he would do the same at meal times . As greedy as he is, he has fantastic bite inhibition and has never nipped me or any of my family and we have never had any of the mouthing/nipping issues that a lot of owners have with their pups. I have been able to take bones out of his mouth when I have had to as his greediness prevents him from dropping them when I tell him to He has already found two rats, one of which he has dragged inside and another when I let him off let during one of our walks and he goes behind this big tree and then comes running out very excited with this large freshly dead rat which I actually thought was a kitten as it was big Because of his greediness and speed eating, I am always very vigilant when I give him bones and I get the butcher to cut the brisket bones into large bones and I buy the largest lamb necks and chicken frames I can find to force him to chew his bones. The one bone that really slows him done is the neck bone :D Why don't you try feeding your pup twice a day by dividing his meal into two smaller meals :D as this may help to take the focus off the one meal by giving him something in that greedy tummy of his in the morning Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SeeGee Posted June 16, 2010 Share Posted June 16, 2010 There is a a bowl called *skid stop* and another called *scoff stopper*. I have the skid stop. Mia is insane for food, gets herself so worked up that she would eat so fast the vomited it right back up. Now, with the skid stop, she is forced to eat slower and digest her food as she has to work for it around the bowl. Google them, they are fantastic. I got my skid stoppers off ebay from the usa - cheaper than buying them in aus. These bowls have changed feeding time, and, though we are implementing other methods, we are noticing a change in Mias behaviour surrounding food. Cheers, Jacqui Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
labsrule Posted June 16, 2010 Share Posted June 16, 2010 (edited) There is a a bowl called *skid stop* and another called *scoff stopper*. I have the skid stop. Mia is insane for food, gets herself so worked up that she would eat so fast the vomited it right back up. Now, with the skid stop, she is forced to eat slower and digest her food as she has to work for it around the bowl. Google them, they are fantastic. I got my skid stoppers off ebay from the usa - cheaper than buying them in aus. These bowls have changed feeding time, and, though we are implementing other methods, we are noticing a change in Mias behaviour surrounding food. Cheers, Jacqui I brought a couple of similar bowls maybe 3-4yrs back for my other labs to slow them down when I feed them kibble for one of their meals and whilst it did slow them down, it wasn't by much I tried these bowls with my current greedy pup and they were unsuccessful when he was a baby as he was able to get his small snout in the paritioned areas easily and as he grew he would actually get frustrated with the bowls and would pick them up and tip the food out clever little bugger and then hoover the food off the ground . As he got bigger still, he then proceeded to eat the bowl by taking large chunks out the bottom and sides of the bowls , so I stopped using these bowls and reverted back to the normal stainless bowl. I have been considering purchasing the stainless slow feeder bowl, but I am sure my pup will find a way to scoff down his food irrespective of the bowl he is fed out of when he has the kibble component of his diet. Edited June 16, 2010 by labsrule Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mas1981 Posted June 17, 2010 Share Posted June 17, 2010 Yeah I have a 9mth old Lab pup that is an absolute glutton and is by far the greediest Lab pup that I have had (he is my 4th lab pup) . He was also the biggest of the litter He gets himself so worked up with excitement at feed times, I actually feed him first as he eats so bloody quickly that when I make him wait until after I feed my other two boys, he has worked himself into a frenzy and just virtually swallows the food with very little chewing. I have tried feeding him in the slow feeder bowls, but it doesn't slow him down, he is just obsessed with food and eating it as quickly as possible, even though I feed my dogs separately, so they all get to eat in peace without the other hanging around, but this doesn't seem to slow him down either I have already had a trip to the emergency animal hospital late one night after he swallowed a large chunk of turkey bone, which luckily he did vomit up before we went to the emergency hospital, but I still took him as he was in a very distressed state. Anyway he was then hospitalised the next morning at my vets on a drip :D I actually feed all my dogs separately, twice a day, morning and evening and is essentially the one meal divided into two smaller meals as my breed is prone to bloat and my pup is a sure fire candidate with the speed at which he hoovers up his food As meal times approach, yes he does know the time be starts running around getting himself all excited and some days he is more excited than other days, so I actually delay the feeding time until he settles down a bit. Interestingly enough, he will sit side by side with my other two lab boys when I feed them fruit treats of cut up apple and pear etc and he actually chews these treats quite slowly, so I wish he would do the same at meal times . As greedy as he is, he has fantastic bite inhibition and has never nipped me or any of my family and we have never had any of the mouthing/nipping issues that a lot of owners have with their pups. I have been able to take bones out of his mouth when I have had to as his greediness prevents him from dropping them when I tell him to He has already found two rats, one of which he has dragged inside and another when I let him off let during one of our walks and he goes behind this big tree and then comes running out very excited with this large freshly dead rat which I actually thought was a kitten as it was big Because of his greediness and speed eating, I am always very vigilant when I give him bones and I get the butcher to cut the brisket bones into large bones and I buy the largest lamb necks and chicken frames I can find to force him to chew his bones. The one bone that really slows him done is the neck bone :D Why don't you try feeding your pup twice a day by dividing his meal into two smaller meals :D as this may help to take the focus off the one meal by giving him something in that greedy tummy of his in the morning I dont know how easy it is for you to get roo bones Labsrule but I go to a petfood place that slaughters the roo's on the premises and i ask them for their biggest roo bones, the ones I get Mason can eat the meat off and some of the bone but as it is so huge he has to take his time! I will post a pic in the lab thread of him and his huge bone he had yesterday. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
whiskedaway Posted June 17, 2010 Share Posted June 17, 2010 My puppy is a glutton, and we've been working pretty hard to try and calm her down around meal times. Once again she was the biggest in the litter and I'm pretty sure the breeder used to just throw food in for them and let them all fight for it so she used to go insane. When we first got her, she knocked the entire bowl of food out of my OH's hand in excitement. Now she gets fed outside next to her kennel. She gets told to sit and we fill her bowl up on top of her kennel so she can watch what we're doing (the kennel has a flat roof). After the bowl is filled, we tell her to stay and put the bowl on the ground. She watches it, we take a step back and tell her to stay again, and then after about thirty seconds, we tell her to "eat" and she goes and gets her food. It's helped heaps, and we also mix up meal times, so she could get fed anywhere between 4:00pm and 6:00pm. We want to get to the point where we can actually walk away from her and she doesn't move even if there's a bowl of food sitting there. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
labsrule Posted June 17, 2010 Share Posted June 17, 2010 Yeah I have a 9mth old Lab pup that is an absolute glutton and is by far the greediest Lab pup that I have had (he is my 4th lab pup) :D . He was also the biggest of the litter He gets himself so worked up with excitement at feed times, I actually feed him first as he eats so bloody quickly that when I make him wait until after I feed my other two boys, he has worked himself into a frenzy and just virtually swallows the food with very little chewing. I have tried feeding him in the slow feeder bowls, but it doesn't slow him down, he is just obsessed with food and eating it as quickly as possible, even though I feed my dogs separately, so they all get to eat in peace without the other hanging around, but this doesn't seem to slow him down either :D I have already had a trip to the emergency animal hospital late one night after he swallowed a large chunk of turkey bone, which luckily he did vomit up before we went to the emergency hospital, but I still took him as he was in a very distressed state. Anyway he was then hospitalised the next morning at my vets on a drip I actually feed all my dogs separately, twice a day, morning and evening and is essentially the one meal divided into two smaller meals as my breed is prone to bloat and my pup is a sure fire candidate with the speed at which he hoovers up his food :D As meal times approach, yes he does know the time be starts running around getting himself all excited and some days he is more excited than other days, so I actually delay the feeding time until he settles down a bit. Interestingly enough, he will sit side by side with my other two lab boys when I feed them fruit treats of cut up apple and pear etc and he actually chews these treats quite slowly, so I wish he would do the same at meal times :D . As greedy as he is, he has fantastic bite inhibition and has never nipped me or any of my family and we have never had any of the mouthing/nipping issues that a lot of owners have with their pups. I have been able to take bones out of his mouth when I have had to as his greediness prevents him from dropping them when I tell him to :D He has already found two rats, one of which he has dragged inside and another when I let him off let during one of our walks and he goes behind this big tree and then comes running out very excited with this large freshly dead rat which I actually thought was a kitten as it was big Because of his greediness and speed eating, I am always very vigilant when I give him bones and I get the butcher to cut the brisket bones into large bones and I buy the largest lamb necks and chicken frames I can find to force him to chew his bones. The one bone that really slows him done is the neck bone :D Why don't you try feeding your pup twice a day by dividing his meal into two smaller meals as this may help to take the focus off the one meal by giving him something in that greedy tummy of his in the morning I dont know how easy it is for you to get roo bones Labsrule but I go to a petfood place that slaughters the roo's on the premises and i ask them for their biggest roo bones, the ones I get Mason can eat the meat off and some of the bone but as it is so huge he has to take his time! I will post a pic in the lab thread of him and his huge bone he had yesterday. Masons mum I also give him large Roo Tails as well which I get from my local pet supply store that sells roo and I also get him large beef brisket bones and large lamb necks from two different butcher and large chicken frames from a chicken place. Whilst the large bones slow him down, he does eat bones faster than any of my other labs, both past and present He is just a guts, pure and simple I spend more time on sourcing their food than I do my own Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
labsrule Posted June 17, 2010 Share Posted June 17, 2010 My puppy is a glutton, and we've been working pretty hard to try and calm her down around meal times. Once again she was the biggest in the litter and I'm pretty sure the breeder used to just throw food in for them and let them all fight for it so she used to go insane. When we first got her, she knocked the entire bowl of food out of my OH's hand in excitement.Now she gets fed outside next to her kennel. She gets told to sit and we fill her bowl up on top of her kennel so she can watch what we're doing (the kennel has a flat roof). After the bowl is filled, we tell her to stay and put the bowl on the ground. She watches it, we take a step back and tell her to stay again, and then after about thirty seconds, we tell her to "eat" and she goes and gets her food. It's helped heaps, and we also mix up meal times, so she could get fed anywhere between 4:00pm and 6:00pm. We want to get to the point where we can actually walk away from her and she doesn't move even if there's a bowl of food sitting there. As gutsy as he is, I also trained my boy from day 1 to sit and wait for the command "eat" and I make him wait for different periods. The longer he has to wait the more he drools He is excellent with waiting for the magic command but once it is given, he is off and racing Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stitch Posted June 17, 2010 Author Share Posted June 17, 2010 Well it's heartening to read that I don't have the only 'piggy' dog in Australia!! I actually do feed twice daily - a small amount of Royal Canin in the morning and then the BARF & turkey neck of an evening. I don't put the dry in a bowl, I just spread it out on the kennel room floor. That way he has to hunt for it!! I can't put another dog in with him until all the food is gone or their would be a brawl over one tiny piece of dry food. All my dogs are fed separately of an evening. He isn't fat but he would be if I didn't limit what he eats. He also was the biggest in the litter but he is also the laziest dog I have had. I have bought a treadmill so he is going to be learning to use it soon. I spoke about him to the vet and the vet said that these type of dogs will always be gluttons and will always have to have the amount they are allowed to consume monitored. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cazxxz Posted June 17, 2010 Share Posted June 17, 2010 I have been considering purchasing the stainless slow feeder bowl, but I am sure my pup will find a way to scoff down his food irrespective of the bowl he is fed out of when he has the kibble component of his diet. :D Have you tried putting his food in a Kong? They are pretty good. My dog got so good at eating out of his. He'd lick the top to remove the seal I'd made, then toss the toy in the air so that all the food was dislodged when it hit the ground total pro After the bowl is filled, we tell her to stay and put the bowl on the ground. She watches it, we take a step back and tell her to stay again, and then after about thirty seconds, we tell her to "eat" and she goes and gets her food. It's helped heaps, and we also mix up meal times, so she could get fed anywhere between 4:00pm and 6:00pm. We want to get to the point where we can actually walk away from her and she doesn't move even if there's a bowl of food sitting there. This is a good idea. "Sit" and "stay" before meals is great for many reasons, but it doesn't really address the excitement when it's food o'clock, does it? Or is the training intended to get the dog to relax about mealtimes? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cazxxz Posted June 17, 2010 Share Posted June 17, 2010 I spoke about him to the vet and the vet said that these type of dogs will always be gluttons and will always have to have the amount they are allowed to consume monitored. :D Yep. Haha My dog wants to be morbidly obese too, silly dogs. I think our dogs are lucky that we are so careful to keep them at the right weight. I want to be a dog! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stitch Posted June 17, 2010 Author Share Posted June 17, 2010 (edited) You know its not the speed that he eats everything, I can control that to an extent, and its not the fact that he would eat and eat until he burst, I can control that too. What it is, is the vocalisations that he gives if meals are not on time or if he has to wait - I draw the line at that as it takes a bit more imagination on my part to overcome. Yesterday I took everyone for a walk down the back paddock prior to them getting fed and that worked, the turkey necks really work as it takes him 10 minutes to get through one instead of the 2 seconds it used to take for the chicken necks to be sucked down like spaghetti. :D Edited to add: Thanks for the idea JE2910! Edited June 17, 2010 by STITCH Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
whiskedaway Posted June 17, 2010 Share Posted June 17, 2010 After the bowl is filled, we tell her to stay and put the bowl on the ground. She watches it, we take a step back and tell her to stay again, and then after about thirty seconds, we tell her to "eat" and she goes and gets her food. It's helped heaps, and we also mix up meal times, so she could get fed anywhere between 4:00pm and 6:00pm. We want to get to the point where we can actually walk away from her and she doesn't move even if there's a bowl of food sitting there. This is a good idea. "Sit" and "stay" before meals is great for many reasons, but it doesn't really address the excitement when it's food o'clock, does it? Or is the training intended to get the dog to relax about mealtimes? Well, because we vary food times slightly she never knows when it's exactly meal time anyway. But now when we get her food out, she's not quite as excited, because she knows she's going to have to wait anyway. It's been really helpful because there's no more food that she's sent flying anymore! :D Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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