Ask Me Help Desk - Dog refusing to eat dog food

My 8 year old German Shepard recently started refusing to eat her normal dry dog food. I'm nervous in the wake of all the pet food recalls. Her dog food is not listed on the recall list and does not contain wheat gluten. I have always let her self feed as she has always been good with how much she eats. Timed feeding never worked with her. Anyhow, I noticed she wasn't eating when she kept bothering me and bothering me for dog treats. This is pretty normal for her, but my husband asked me if I had fed her in the last day or two. I said no as I assumed he had. He hadn't. So she has been refusing her normal dry food and I have no idea why. At first I figured she would eventually eat again. They won't starve themselves, right? Anyhow, after more days of her not eating the dry food we give her, I decided to give her cheerios, left over steak and rice. She happily ate all three of these. So there are no problems with her appetite. Still won't touch her dry dog food. I'm wondering if she senses something that we don't know yet about her food. What should I do? Should I just put her on rice and ground meat until this is sorted out? I'm worried if I do this she will never eat dry food again. I can't afford to feed her ground meat and rice for the rest of her life. That will get a little pricey. Her health and mood have been normal. No changes except for refusing her dry food. Any suggestions would be great.

You might want to check out the links at the bottom of this page to questions that have been similar to yours.

Also, the following sites:

https://www.askmehelpdesk.com/dogs/d...-eat-3946.html

Dog Food And Nutrition - An Article by Superk9.com, A Comprehensive Online Dog Resource That Is Dedicated To Helping You Take Good Care Of Your Canine

Something strange is going on. I would have the dog checked by a vet. If you go to the sticky on ''My dog won't eat'', https://www.askmehelpdesk.com/dogs/i...tml#post254171 It starts with the case of a dog needing to see the vet for a sudden loss of appetite. It is much more comprehensive than the old question refereed to above.

No, a healthy dog won't starve itself. For an 8 year old to make such a sudden change, means that something has changed. I doubt that part way through the bag, the food became contaminated. Try www.(your brand).com Most of the brands will have a link to their recalls on their home page. If not, see https://www.askmehelpdesk.com/dogs/c...ll-72873.html? or post back with your brand and I will check on it This recall thing has just grown and grown. I am feeding one dog Pro Plan dry chicken and rice and the other dry Iams lamb and rice. I calmed down a little after I realized I would be personally notified if there was a problem with either. My dogs are both part of a large service dog program, and they would immediately notify everybody with a dog in the program if there was a problem with the chow they feed. If you want to switch, I am sure both the chows above are safe.

You don't want to feed the hamburger and rice very long. As mentioned in the sticky, such diets are only for temporary use. You need to get her back on a regular dry chow as soon as you can. It is about the only way the average dog owner can insure their dog is getting the complete and balanced diet dogs need. It would be best if you can stick to the old food. Most Shepherds are fairly light eaters, refusing to eat more than they need. Free feeding works well with them.

The site referenced above is Purina, a reliable site, but often people Google up sites put up by some kook. I have seen some terrible advice on such links. Frankly, I didn't think the first post was very good. For all theother suggestions, it missed the sticky. You would have done as well to do your own search.

Quote:

Originally Posted by kellygren

My 8 year old German Shepard recently started refusing to eat her normal dry dog food. I'm nervous in the wake of all the pet food recalls. Her dog food is not listed on the recall list and does not contain wheat gluten. I have always let her self feed as she has always been good with how much she eats. Timed feeding never worked with her. Anyhow, I noticed she wasn't eating when she kept bothering me and bothering me for dog treats. This is pretty normal for her, but my husband asked me if I had fed her in the last day or two. I said no as I assumed he had. He hadn't. So she has been refusing her normal dry food and I have no idea why. At first I figured she would eventually eat again. They won't starve themselves, right? Anyhow, after more days of her not eating the dry food we give her, I decided to give her cheerios, left over steak and rice. She happily ate all three of these. So there are no problems with her appetite. Still won't touch her dry dog food. I'm wondering if she senses something that we don't know yet about her food. What shoudl I do? Should I just put her on rice and ground meat until this is sorted out? I'm worried if I do this she will never eat dry food again. I can't afford to feed her ground meat and rice for the rest of her life. That will get a little pricey. Her health and mood have been normal. No changes except for refusing her dry food. Any suggestions would be great.

Hello,

I read your message on here and have exactly the same thing going on with our keeshond. Just curious what your normal food is? We were feeding Performatrim Premium, but a couple of weeks ago switched to Nutro Max. I, too flipped when I discovered that Nutro canned was some of the stuff that was recalled. Anyway, since we switched to Nutro Max, he has refused to eat any kibble of any sort at all, even when we went back to Performatrim. Same as your finding, he'll eat ground meat, a hot dog, dry cheerios and whatever other "people" food we've tried. We never feed him people food, but for fear of him starving to death, we've had to try something! He was at the vet Friday and she didn't seem worried, but now I'm kind of freaking out. Have you found anything that works? I'm about to give him an aspirin (vet approved this) thinking maybe he has a cavity in a tooth or something... mind you doesn't seem to both him eating anything else, but maybe the kibble is just too hard. I just ground up a bunch of kibble to powder and he ate a little of it, but then snubbed it too! Will be calling the vet tomorrow again. Just wondering how you are making out.

Thanks.