My 16-week border terrier puppy is refusing to eat. I got her at 8 weeks and she was on Beta puppy which I carried on with for 10 days or so, but it made her very runny and manic with hunger, so I changed to Hills Science Diet. She changed immediately - much calmer, normal stools - but after 2 or 3 weeks (and to coincide with me running out of sample packs and buying a huge sack of Hills!) she started refusing. I held out for a few days, knowing you're not supposed to change pups' diet too often and thinking she'd eat when hungry, but she was visibly wasting away! I thought maybe it was because of teething and various people told me they'd been unable to accustom their puppies to dried food, so I changed to Nature Diet. Again, she loved this at first, but then - just as I'd bought 18 boxes of the stuff! - she stopped eating it. She hasn't done more than pick at her food since Friday now and is definitely a bit lack lustre today (though hectic weekend). I've tried heating in microwave, adding chicken, corned beef, dried cat food and even crumbled up treats, but while she eats the bits of "nice" food on the top, she won't even burrow into the Nature Diet to get buried pieces. She remains hungry for treats (of all kinds) and appears hungry when I'm preparing her food (looks interested, barks), but then turns her nose up. I don't want to change her food again - and feel that she may be holding out for me to do so - but can't stand by and watch her starve! Any advice appreciated. (I've also tried mixing Hills with ND, but still no interest).

It maybe worth getting her checked over by your vet as Nature diet is one of the most palitable foods you can get for a dog !:)

It may well be that she is just a fussy eater but is she is not herself and lethargic I would get her checked out.

Lucy

Sounds like she's doing the usual puppy trick of trying it on!!!:D She got you to change it once before and now she's trying again. If she's eating other "nice" stuff that would suggest her health is OK - but you might want to get her checked out anyway. Try mixing stuff she can't separate out. I use raw beaten egg, gravy that type of stuff. I also found that bashing the kibble a little to break up the monotonous texture helped with mine. The pther thig is perseverance. Put the food down for 15 minutes and 15 minutes only. What she's not eaten take away. No treats or anything until next meal time. It's tough but it works.

Some dogs are picky eaters - others are gannets - you just have toi find which one yours is a feed accordingly.

hth

Pam n the boys

Thanks for the advice. I did take her to the vet and she had a slight temp and inflamed gut but all better with injection. However she won't go back to eating the Naturediet! At the moment I'm feeding her boiled chicken and rice with some Pedigree Mixer which she wolfs down, am so relieved to see her eating properly I don't mind but can't imagine this is a good long term diet for her. I think maybe the sore tummy put her off Naturediet (don't think she could have been reacting to anything in that), so will carry on with the chicken for a while and then try weaning her back onto a dog food. Any suggestions? Meantime, does anyone want 15 boxes of Naturediet Puppy??

Hi
Why don't you try a natural diet - like the barf one? Read Ian Billinghurst's 'Give Your Dog a Bone'. It might be that your dog has really good taste and doesn't like commercial dog food! My puppy's diet is based on the barf diet and he eats lots of raw chicken wings plus other fresh and normal food. I am happy because I can identify everything he eats (as opposed to fillers etc). It's as easy as feeding kids (but less time consuming!) and there are lots of benefits.
By the way, I've never heard of a dog starving to death when there's food around and so perhaps you ought to try and relax a bit. She might be picking up on your anxiety and that's not going to hurt. She will eat when she must (dogs often self-fast) unless there's a medical problem. Perhaps she's very fussy? Does she eat lots of treats? Perhaps cut out all the extras until she's eating normally again and just make sure she has lots of water.
Good luck!
Canchi

Hi, just a quick note, I always believed that a dog would not stave itself either, but after the last few months that I have had I can now strongly disagree, my Gsd bitch who had a phantom turned her nose up at everything that was offered to her, she had bloods done etc in case there was something more going on than the phantom but no it was physcological my bitch dropped to 24 kg in weight which is nothing for an adult gsd, and it got to the point of having to put arden grange through the liquidiser alongside her meat and literally force feed her I did ythis for 4 weeks before she eventually started eating for herself again I agree with the posts that the pup can be trying it on and try to stick to one brand of dog food, or change to barf if she will eat that although I feed arden grange I feed an awful lot of raw meat as well

JANINES