For the last 6-8 months my Great Dane has been acting strangely with his food. He doesn't seem to have much of an appetite, and he will usually nose the food around in his dish, until he either tips the bowl over, or we take the food away. Does he simply not like his food?

Question

Hi Ed,

I've been visiting your site for about a year now, and I recently purchased a trio of DVDs from you. I'm starting from scratch with my 1 1/2 year old Great Dane, he's developed some aggression and other problems, so I'm starting with the Pack Structure DVD, along with the Dominant/aggresive and Basic obedience DVDs.

My question is about his eating habits. For the last 6-8 months he has been acting strangely with his food. He doesn't seem to have much of an appetite, and he will usually nose the food around in his dish, until he either tips the bowl over, or we take the food away. If he succeeds in tipping the food over, he nudges the kibble with his nose all around the floor, almost like he's trying to sweep it into a "pile." I read something on the internet that said a dog will do this if they are not hungry, and they are attempting to "bury" the food to save for later. Do you agree with this analysis? The problem is he doesn't eat much of it, and he's lost weight. So I've taken him to the vet several times over this time period, and first we found he had hookworm. We got that taken care of, and thought that would also take care of the appetite problem. But it didn't. The vet said that it was probably hormones, so I got him neutered this last week. He ate really well the first couple of days, but now he's back to pushing the food around. Now that I've started the pack structure program, the bowl is in his crate, and he's making a big mess in the crate, and outside the crate where the food spills out.

Does he simply not like his food? I have been hesitant to change brands because Danes are notorious for being picky, and if you change food once they'll expect it again when they decide to get "bored" with the new brand. I know you advocate feeding raw, which is something I'd like to do but we can't afford it right now.

One other question--in the groundwork for pack structure, with him being socially isolated, I am concerned that he will develop other problems because of the social isolation--such as aggression towards other people/dogs. Is this something that could potentially become a problem?

I really appreciate your time in reading this and responding.

Thank you,
Natalie

Accepted Answer

What are you feeding him? It may be that he really doesn’t like his food or you may be overfeeding him, so he’s never truly hungry. I wouldn’t allow this. He’d be fed in a crate or kennel and if he didn’t eat in 15 minutes or so, I’d pick up the food until the next day. I also would make sure the hookworms are gone, they are VERY hard to remove from the environment (outside) and it may be worth looking into. If he’s becoming reinfested with hookworms it would explain his lack of appetite. A large percentage of the dog owning public overfeed their dogs though, and you may be feeding him more than he actually needs, so he’s not finishing his meals.

The social isolation part of the groundwork is not for a long enough time period to cause the issues you are concerned about, it’s just for a short time. You wouldn’t want to leave him isolated for months, but for a number of days or a couple weeks it should not affect him long term in regards to people/dogs.

Cindy Rhodes