Food question

**konadog** · 02-25-2010, 11:02 PM

We've been feeding Kona Iams Mini Chunks for about a year. She recently has become completely uninterested in eating her food. We have to add some little "extras" to make her want to eat it. She still loves her daily treats and still really interested in our meals so I doubt she's sick. Should we already be changing her food after only a year? If so, what other brands are good to look at?

**labby** · 02-25-2010, 11:06 PM

Could you be feeding her too many treats or too much food?

**Bob Pr.** · 02-25-2010, 11:07 PM

Like a number of others, I feed Kirkland C&R (sold only at Costco but similar to "Diamond Naturals" available at Tractor Supply stores and others). FYI, there's a HUGE difference in quality between "Diamond" (poor) and "Diamond Naturals" (very good). "Taste of the Wild" is also a good food.

http://www.diamondpet.com/dealer_locator/

**konadog** · 02-25-2010, 11:12 PM

I don't think we're overfeeding. She gets 2 cups/day and then about 4 treats/day. She tends to get a mouthful of food out of her dish and then walk away and spit it on the floor. It's really odd.

**labby** · 02-25-2010, 11:35 PM

Is it a new bag? Maybe there's something wrong with the food. I myself won't feed anything except ProPlan (not the Shreds). I've got a few on their Sensitive Skin and Stomach which is salmon based and some on their Performance which is chicken based.

**kassabella** · 02-26-2010, 04:12 AM

Hope it is o.k. to chim in here, as I would like to know too.
. Gemma is the same as Kona. She has been getting good quality food and has gone from wolfing it to not interested at all. Gems doesn't get many treats, beacuse Ernie can't have them. Gems takes some then spits it out too.

**MicksMom** · 02-26-2010, 08:21 AM

Caleb did the same thing at about the same age. Turns out it was his body's way of letting me know it was time to cut back the amount I was feeding.

**konadog** · 02-26-2010, 09:23 PM

I'll have to look into the ProPlan food. I tried mixing in a very small amount of wet food and she gobbles everything up. Seems like the dry stuff isn't tasting very good to her anymore. Since she's only getting 2 cups/day, I would hope that I wouldn't have to cut back.

**labby** · 02-27-2010, 07:41 AM

No, I wouldn't cut back more than that. Maybe they made a formula change and this is her way of telling you she doesn't like it.

**Bob Pr.** · 02-27-2010, 10:12 AM

My Puff is one of the rare (<10%) Labs that is self-regulating in food intake.

As the runt of her litter, at age 9 weeks she weighed 6 lbs (to her littermates 12 lbs.).

At that age, Puff ate about 1 cup/day of about 380 kcals/cup food.

That gradually increased to 5 cups/day at around 8 months.

At that point, she began skipping eating for a day or two and, when she began again, it was a reduced amount.

So I gave her that reduced amount until she again stopped eating for a few days until she resumed eating a reduced amount.

We kept going through these steps until we finally got down to a smidge over 1 cup 2X/day at around 12-13 months.

I mention this just in case ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~