I'm not sure if this fits as a "feeding" problem but here goes.

Sorry for the long post.

Liberty, my 5 month old male GSD has started for lack of a better term "hacking up" his treat rewards when I am playing with him in the back yard.

Here is the scenario, we play fetch with various toys, he retrieves quite naturally. I noticed that he would respond inconsistently when I would call him to come to me. At first I thought he was still learning or maybe some distraction in the back yard (noise, cars in the alley, birds,etc.), but I noticed a couple of times after I gave him a treat for coming to me laying down and releasing the toy, he would jump up when I gave the "OK" (our release command) and he would seem to "launch the treat I just gave him. I have seen this several times. And it seems to happen when he runs to retrieve and stops quickly once he reaches the toy. It's like the inertia it too strong and the treat just "jumps" out of his gut!

Now a little back ground. He has NO problem holding down food. Has high food & prey drive. When I give a treat reward I give ONE treat at a time, similar to the techniques demonstrated in the Leerburg videos. If I give him treat for other specific training that is not physically demanding he has no problem with the amount or rate that I give the treats and he holds them down.

Also this is not a vomiting/gagging kind of reflex. He gulps a treat, I throw a toy, he runs like crazy to retrieve and out pops a treat!

I'm concerned but I'm also puzzled by this.

Thoughts?

Thanks!

Tasha does this sometimes during training sessions when she gets worked up and begins to anticipate the next task. It will look like she swallowed the treat but she is really just holding it in the back of her mouth.

I have noticed softer textured treats in slightly larger portions, closer to the size of a marble than a pencil eraser, have helper. String cheese, semisoft dog food rolls and liverwurst all work really well for her. No more choking!