Virgo won't eat

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I've had her since Saturday and I've only seen her clean her bowl two or three times. She's already skinny, the vet wants to put at least 5 pounds on her, but she won't take more than a nibble of her food at a time. I even set it next to me while I was eating tonight, thinking maybe that would help, and she just layed in front of it and went to sleep. I've tried just feeding her in the evenings...I can't do much for her if she's trying to free feed, because Sawyer will finish her bowl if I don't watch him. Of course, that's about the only time I've seen her eat, is when he's standing there licking his chops.

Ideas? Or should I just keep offering her the food for 15 minutes and then pick it up, she'll eat when she gets hungry enough type of deal?

 

[Herschel]

Have you tried:

1) Pouring the food out onto the floor?

2) Adding water to the dry kibble?

 

[Brattina88]

Did the Vet give her a clean bill of health? Other than her being underweight, of course...

What are you feeding her? *just out of curiosity*

Keep offering it to her like you are doing. I sometimes still have to add water to Missy's food. To the best of our knowledge scraps and stuff were thrown outside for her to eat, so kibble was foreign to her and I couldn't get her to eat it like the other dogs for a long time.

Avoid adding more tempting foods to her kibble unless you plan to feed it all the time, because she'll learn that if she doesn't eat you'll add goodies to it later.

 

[Zoom]

She just saw the vet today and got a clean bill of health.

I'm in the process of switching her from Iams to Innova, although depending on a phone call I'm waiting for, she may be staying on the Iams.

I would pour it out on the floor if I thought she would eat it faster, but it's like it holds no interest for her. Sawyer will eat it if it's on the floor and I'll get yelled at for the mess if it doesn't disappear quickly enough.

 

[PoodleMommy]

Have you tried adding warm canned food?

 

[Zoom]

Found out today that she'll eat if I put her bowl outside and sit with her. Someone must have kept her in an outdoor pen for most of the day or something...