Does Your Dog Eat Too Fast? Indian Trail Pet Sitter Has Your Answer

How to Slow your Dogs eating habits 

Does your dog eat too fast?  If your dog is anything like my big lab Buddy and eats his dog food in one full gulp, then I have got a great find for you.  I was in Target in Wesley Chapel yesterday and saw this product that you just put in your dogs bowl and it makes it a bit difficult for your dog to devour his food.  It actually works great.  All you have to do is put it in your pets dog food bowl and it will slow down his food intake and make him work a bit harder to get his food.

When feeding your dog is more like throwing raw chicken at an alligator, it can be frustrating. But more than that, gulping down food can lead to several potentially harmful issues. In order of least dangerous, to life-threatening, here are the concerns you should be worried about:

• The faster the dog eats, the less he chews. This can cause him to choke if something large that needed to be chewed down to size passes down his esophagus.
• When a dog races through his food, he is also swallowing a large amount of air. This can result in something simple like burping or passing gas, which is not enjoyable for those around but it is relatively harmless.
• However, for some dogs, typically large deep chested breeds (but small dogs can do it too), eating too fast can cause a food bloat from the large amount of air and how much they eat. With food bloat, their stomachs have not twisted, yet. The chance of the stomach twisting while they are bloated with food/air is greatly increased the longer they are bloated. There are many theories of what causes a bloat that twists (Gastric Dilatation Volvulus) and eating fast is one of the most common. When the stomach twists it greatly decreases, or cuts off, blood supply to the stomach. This is life-threatening and can cause serious irreversible damage to the stomach or death. A dog suffering from this must be seen immediately by your veterinarian, there is no home remedy. Any time your dog looks bloated or suddenly ‘fatter’, he should be seen immediately since it’s impossible to determine if the stomach has twisted, or not, without x-rays.

Another way and cheaper by far is to place a large rock in your dogs bowl.  That will also help slow down his eating.  Just make sure the rock is big enough and your dog wont eat it.

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