im at the end of my tether with it all ,our bitch isnt eating much !! 3 scrambled eggs in a morning ,chicken breast lunch time ,minced meat at tea time very small amont and 2 eggs at night !! shes medium breed gun dog ,she not drink water inless it has whelpi in it ,been to vets and carnt find anything wrong with her ,she drinks about 3pints aday ,pups are feeding on her every 30-40 mins ,shes very thin to thin for my likeing ,am i just worrying for nothing ,SHE WILL NOT EAT PUPPY FOOD AT ALL ive tried it all different ways !!!
mixing in the meat ,socking ,everything!!!! her puppy food is pro plan , she seems depressed to me ,i just dont know what to do any more !!

had the same trouble  ,  hand fed her  and after a day  was back to normal,  just a thought

She should be eating heartily now, her full milk will be starting to come in soon.

How long ago did your vet give her the once over?

She needs plenty of fluids, the whelpi is fine for her mixed with water, my bitch is on goats milk from giving birth, she has a cup in the morning and at night time and food in-between, (3 pints of whlepi mix may be over filling her so that she has no room for food, I would just give morning and evening) and then leave water down during the day, is she eating the scrambled egg, chicken and minced meat, but just not the puppy food?

If so mix the chicken and minced meat with rice not just on it's own, and then soak the puppy food in with that bit by bit.

I always feed my bitch with her pups and take her bowl to the whelping area, are you doing this?

Sals suggesting of feeding her by hand may well work too.

When a bitch looks depressed it generally is their sign for pain, I'm a little worried about her as eclampsia is something you need to look out for, keep a very close eye on your girl, any changes get her to the vet, best to be safe than sorry, don't want to scare you, but I'd rather look an idiot infront of my vet than anything happen to my girl, on a board it is hard for us to see her condition and judge, so use your instincts if your worried trust those insticts.

Hope that she is ok, and it is just her being a fussy eater.

Just a thought re: her depressed look too, have you checked her for mastitis, and is she partial to chicken wings at all as another source of food?

she dont like being in the bedroom ,she gets in to feed them as long as im there !!! her temp is fine ,she will eat anything as long as its not dog food !!! she dont like the heat over the pups i think ,its 75/80 i turn it on and off all the time to make sure the temp is right ,i know she picking up my stress over her not eating puppy food ,can you plase list all the foods i can feed her that will be ok for her milk ,im tired and my brain just want work lol ,ive checked her teats and milk ,all is fine there ,she was a fussy eater ,but not like this ,
thankyou x x x joanne .

ive just gave her pasta and chicken and she woffed it down !!

hi joanne, i had same problem with my girl, pups are just over 3 weeks old now and at first she wouldnt eat hardly anything, just a bit of chicken, she wouldnt touch puppy food, i started giving her goats milk (lactol) she absolutely woofed it, i take her food and milk to the whelping bed so she dosnt have to leave her pups and then starting mixing puppy food in with her chicken, now i cant feed her enough, eats puppy food on its own now. She was a fussy eater to begin with and only ate small amounts, now she is always hungry, and eating plenty, although still only thin. So i wouldnt worry to much she'll probably get there in the end.

hand eat her with lamb nature diet it worked with brie

hi briedog ,ive tried hand feeding her she not take it ,well she will if its not dog food lol but thankyou i will try that food x

My girl wouldnt touch dog food for ages so i cooked up mince and added the dog biscuit too it while cooking. She did eat it that way. She was having small meals of this along with chicken, scrambled egg etc but every 2 hours. Little and often was better for her

thankyou il try cooking it with the meat ,im running out of ideas now ,
wet to vets with her last night ,shes just shatterd ,vet as told me i must get more puppy food down her ,but if she not eat it im going to have to force feed her !!! this morning i made her 3eggs she loves them ,i socked puppy food added it ,SHE NOT EAT IT NOW ,i just want to sit and cry .

get her nature diet or tripe

eggs make me feel sick atthe best of time just the smell may beputting her off

or go and get hill,s wet puppy food form pet at home or another good wet puppy food not dry.

If pups are 11 day of a medium breed I certainly would switch of heating altogether.

My pups are nearly 4 weeks and have had no heat since they were born, and the first 10 days I had all the windows open and no Vet Bed to keep them cool.

Pups gradually begin to regulate their own body temperature and this process should be totally complete by 3 to four weeks, so for all but the most thin coated and tender pups I think keeping them so warm all the time is unnecessary and in fact can cause distress.

Admittedly I do have a double coated Spitz breed, so in their case I never find I need any heat past the first week, and if I have litters born in Summer or warmer weather have trouble keeping them cool enough.

I once whelped a bitch for a freind and had to for4ce feed her the entire lactation.

I soaked puppy food four times a day and put balls of it down her throat.

thankyou brain ,ive started forceing it down ,dont like doing it but if that what it takes so be it !!! she carnt live on chicken and mince x

The bitch I force fed didn't seem to get upset or object, but simply woudln't eat it herself, and especially as she wasn't mine I did not want her to loose condition.

i think she dont mind , but if i dont get it right to the back she spits it bak out !! just need to get right amount in her now ,not sure how much to give her as its hard to know cus shes takeing what she needs herself !

I find with mine that they need 4 times their normal maintenence rations.

thanks brain , poor bea im going to need to get alot down her x

another thing worth a try is cooking up a big pan of mince and pasta, if you cook it all together the pasta becomes mince flavoured and they generally love it!!! my bitch ate and ate when feeding pups but was very very picky whilst pregnant but this was the one thing she would eat with gusto!! good luck di x

she will eat that but im still worried that its not enogh fat to it .shes looking so thin ,i know thay will look like that but she wasnt this thin last time x

what about buying cheap mince that has lots of fat in it and not draining it or adding extra olive oil or similar to it.  Can satin balls be fed to nursing bitches?

i dont know !! but mum is feeding pups every hour and half ,and thay dont seen to feed long ! not sure if mum is makeing enough milk for them all ?
should i let bea feed them every 2h so she has more milk ?

I would not try to alter the feeding frequency just pile in nutritious protein rich food.  Be careful of too much fat as it can make them loose.

ok thankyou x

The first bitch that i bred hardly ate anything but drank a lot, made plenty of milk and seemed fine, until day 12 when she left her litter and just lay on her side ignoring them. She was a great mum and usually had to be dragged outside to do her business, then would scratch frantically at the door to get back to them so i knew something was very wrong for her to do that! Over the course of about four hours her breathing became very laboured and her gums turned really pale so i rushed her to the emergency vet (2am - isn't it always?) and thank God i did! She'd developed pyometra and the vet said another 12 hours and we'd have lost her. She had to be speyed immediately. I couldn't believe how quickly she went down hill, but it's a very hardy breed and the vet reckoned the infection had probably been brewing a few days, she just didn't show any outward signs of it.

Don't want to scare you, just to make you aware that these things can sometimes happen. Hopefully, your bitch is just being fussy and has started to eat with gusto now.

so right kiskamom ,she was bak at vets yeserday ,she on antibiotis and was given an injection ,shes doing fine now ans as started eating xx

Hi White lilly

I had the same problem with one of my bitches.  She would eat anything but dog food.  And the puppy food !!  She wouldn't even look at that.  I ended up feeding her minced meat, rice, chicken, liver, pasta, basically anything that she would eat.  I spent a fortune on different puppy foods trying to get her to eat them, but nothing.  She didn't lose any weight though as she wouldwolf down all the other things which I gave hertoo eat.  The pups did wonderfully also.  I would basically give her everything and anything to eat.  And don't worry about her.  It is the worst thing you can do as it is very MAGNETIC !

thankyou spugsy ,yes i think she has picked up on me !!! and the strass of her not eating x

I had same problem with my bitch, she got so thin her spine was sticking out! she hardly drank either, which was a great worry as she needed fluids to produce milk. After about 2 weeks she started to eat, all puppies were healthy, although it was a worrying first 14 days. I was hand feeding too :-) When i put the food bowl down she ran away, it was like she was scared of the food lol!

my girl is still running away from the food ,but soon as i walk away she eats it but only off the kitchen floor !!! good job my floor is clean lol