Should I Teach My Dog ​​to Eat Slowly?

Dogs sometimes develop habits that can surprise us. Among the most common, is the unrestrained eating. To answer the concerns of many caregivers, in this article we’ll discuss the benefits of teaching your dog to eat slowly.

Our pet’s appetite is always a cause for concern, as appetite is one of the main alarm symptoms for many diseases. However, swallowing too quickly can cause some gastric difficulties that are best avoided.

Possible problems your dog could develop

• Swallowing fast, the dog usually does not chew correctly, or does it anyway, slowing down and harming the digestion process.

• By consuming poorly chewed food and, therefore, hindering the digestion process, the body ends up not assimilating the nutrients that the dog eats.

• There is a risk of suffocation.

• He may begin to suffer from digestive system blockage, a product of very large pieces of food entering the intestine.

• If the feeder is deep and the dog “digs” the food and water, he may bronchoaspirate the food and develop lung problems.

• The dog swallows, along with the food, large amounts of air, which end up accumulating in the stomach, causing gas, colic and other digestive problems.

It is not proven whether gastric torsion occurs due to accumulation of gases or if they accumulate due to torsion, but it never hurts to prevent. Gastric torsion is a serious complication, more common in large dogs, which can lead to death in a few days.

How to teach your dog to eat slowly

This is a situation you should pay attention to, with a little patience and training you can get your dog to eat slowly. The first thing you should keep in mind is to try to determine the causes that trigger the habit.

This can have several reasons, so before taking corrective action, you must address the root of the problem. Some possible catalysts are:

Hungry

If your dog only eats once a day, even if it’s a large portion, and however much he is used to eating this way, spending the day with just one portion of food, it is certain that the next morning he will be hungry and it will quickly devour whatever you put in your trough.

It is preferable to give small portions several times a day, usually three. Remember that dog food varies by age, so keep this in mind before setting meal times.

Set times for drinks

Dogs also tend to drink water too quickly or excessively, so the best thing is to establish a drinking schedule to avoid saturating your pet’s stomach. A good strategy to achieve this goal is to always serve fresh water, preferably not after meals, and remove the drinking fountain as soon as they have had the water.

Keep in mind that if you spend a lot of time away from home, the best thing to do is to leave the drinking fountain with fresh water; that way, he can hydrate when you’re not.

special feeders

If your dog is fed several times a day and still eats too fast, the best thing you can do is buy a special feeder to correct this problem and encourage him to eat slowly.

These types of feeders are readily available at pet stores and have a design that leaves only a small access for the food, forcing the dog to eat slowly.

avoid competition

When you have multiple pets, the problem may be that your dog competes to eat faster and thus prevent food from being “stolen”.

To correct this it is better that you feed your dogs separately, preferably in different spaces, where they will not be disturbed, so they will not feel threatened by each other, and will eat more easily.

It is also important that if you have children at home that you teach them not to disturb the dog while he eats, as this can also be a catalyst for the dog’s fast-eating behavior.