Help me help my dog!!

[kaiservbismarck]

My gsd isn't eating. He's 11 months and sometimes goes a couple of days without touching his food. The vet did a blood workup before neuturing him and said there is nothing in the blood indcating why. He has been dewormed a couple times. He's getting to the point where I can see his ribs!! I'm making an appt with the vet but being Friday night, I won't get in until Monday at the earliest. Can someone help me with this? I don't know what's wrong!!

[Jelpy]

Could you supply a little more info? How long has it been since he saw the vet? How long has this been going on? Are you trying different foods? Any vomiting or diarrea? I'm assuming no since you haven't mentioned it.

(Not that I'll know what's wrong, I'm certainly no diagnostician, but folks will probably need a lot more details to try to help.)

Jelpy

[Elaine]

I can see some ribs on all my dogs and that's a good thing. My first dog was a terrible eater and was always a couple of pounds under where I would like him to be, but that was normal for him.

Can you post a good picture of your dog?

[doggiedad]

he might not like his food. what are you feeding?

[shilohsmom]

I agree, it could be the food. If your feeding dry kibble you might want to add some canned food and mix that in. Also look in his mouth-is there anything going on in there that might make him reluctant to eat, ie. did all his baby teeth come out or do you see any sores?

[MaggieRoseLee]

Clearly make sure with the vet that he's ok.

When you say 'won't eat' is that just his meals? Or will he also not eat any cheese/meat/treats? BIG difference.

I had one GSD, Elsa, who never cared about normal mealtimes... just wasn't exciting enough and she'd also not eat for days and loose weight.

But since all other food she WOULD eat, I just always supplemented her kibble with small amounts of yummy food mixed with water (yummy gravy) and she'd eat her kibble right up then. So I'd open the fridge and look.

Leftover human food was ALWAYS a winner. Pizza, spagetti, meats, mac and cheese................ A few small spoonfuls of extra then her nutrition was coming from the kibble.

CANNED CAT FOOD! 1/4 can cat food plus water..............then added to kibble was always a winner too.

[raysmom]

When Kaiser was younger, he'd go for up to two days without eating anything. He didn't care about his meals; he didn't touch people food and didn't like treats - we'd offer it to him and he'd take it and spit it out. Once we actually offered him a piece of steak in one hand and a tennis ball in the other - he chose the tennis ball! He was healthy as a horse - full of energy, no signs of sickness, etc. - he just was so un-food motivated it was ridiculous.

All that changed when he was neutered. The vet says there's no link between the neutering and his appetite, but I firmly believe that the testorsterone has some kind of hormonal influence on appetite. He wasn't neutered until he was 3 yrs old, and up until that time he couldn't have cared less about food.

But now it's a different story and we have to make sure he's not eating too much! Maybe your dog is the same as the pre-neutered Kaiser!

[kaiservbismarck]

Thanks for the help everyone. His pano is acting up right now so that's definatley contributing to his not eating. I will post a pic of him in a little while to get opinions on if he is "too skinny".

The vet says his bloodwork is fine and he's healthy. This was 2 months ago. I feed him "blue seal". When I switched him from Iams (what the breeder had him on) to the Blue Seal he gobbled the new stuff up....so i know that he at least USED to like it.

also, he will eat treats etc. If i mix wet food in with his kibble...he takes a mouth full...spits the kibble (one by one) on to the floor, and eats the wet. If i dont' offer him wet with his kibble then he'll go days without eating and not bat an eye....

[chargerpuppy]

Try adding fish oil.