I have a 3 year old westie who is an extremely fussy eater. I take all responsbility for this:-
1. as an adult he was my first dog,
2. I wanted to buy what I thought was the best commercial dog food.
3. I did not want him to be fed dry food as I did not regard it to be appetising for my dog
4. I bought every brand of little foils going so he had a big variety of flavours.

Mack lets me know when he is hungry (woo woo!!) so I will put a foil out for him. He wont eat it so I will give him some treats to encourage him. This is a bit of a game in itself as they have to be thrown into the air and chased!!!! Then he may eat his foil, other times he wont. Some days he wont eat anything until 4 or 6pm. By the way I am out at work all day although Mack is with his grandparents!!

I know all of this is really bad! Its such a vicious circle.

I would love to get him on a dry food, say Burns, but I find it impossible. He does like Pet Project's thrive and fresh start, mixed with a foil, but as has been said on champdogs recently it is VERY expensive.

Any ideas as to how I can get him off foils and onto good quality dry dog food.

You could try adding a little tuna, my Bulldog went off her food a little untill I mixed a small amount of tuna in with the JWB and she cannot get enough of it now.

Just make sure the tuna is in sunflower oil and never brine.

You could try adding a little of the dry to the foils (you will have to watch the amounts as both are complete feeds and you don't want to over-feed him!) and gradually reduce the wet food but increase the dry in an attempt to wean him off so to speak?  My lot really enjoy the flavour of Burns (especially the Venison & Rice) but I still just mix in a spoon full of Naturdiet (better quality wet food) in with their Burns just to make sure everything gets eaten as my lot have the inclination to be fussy when they want to be!  Hope that helps. :)

-Kay

I had the same problem with my first dog.  ;)  We took him to the vet who told us to get him off the wet and onto the dry.  (The wet was a last step in a million bag series of dog foods).  We were told to pick a dry food and stick with it.  We filled up his bowl, he sniffed it, huffed and walked off.  He didn't eat for 2 days...finally ate when he got hungry enough and we've not had a problem since. 

thank you to everyone for their replies - I have been online and ordered a bag of Burns - so fingers crossed it works

gillie x

Hi Gillie,

I've used Burns for about 4 years now and will be starting off my 3rd pup on it. I always dampen mine with warm/hot water about 5 minutes before feeding, the heat brings out the oils a bit and makes it smell a bit more appetising. I particularly like the venison and rice as it has a wee bit more oil in it and as my dogs are working outside in all weathers, it helps to keep their coats nice.

Good luck with the Burns, my dogs love it.  If you have any questions, please feel free to send me a message.

Cheers  Ali :)

thanks for that. The bag of Burns landed today and I had to hand feed Mack, but he did like it. Fingers crossed!!

gillie, if hes a fussy eater you need to get him out of this bad habit.
Put his food down and after 20 minutes take it back up if hes not interested.  Dont give him any treats or anything inbetween and again put fresh food down again for dinner.  If he doesnt want it again, leave it down for no longer than 20 minutes and throw it away.  After a few days he will get hungry and get the idea that he eats or doesnt get anything.  No healthy dog will starve himself, so just be persistent :D  and make sure u dont give him treats inbetween or we wont eat at all thinking you will give him something better

I will try to do that as from tomorrow whilst I am off for the weekend. Will let you know how he progresses. I am keeping everything crossed.