# Puppy hungry even after dinner?



## im_nice1 (Mar 12, 2009)

Our 10 month old lab mix puppy has been on Natural choice kibble from 5 month onwards. Acc. to the feeding instructions on the bag we were giving her about 7 cups daily.

Since she seemed to dislike eating her dinner, we shifted her last week to science diet large puppy lamb and rice. I know ppl here dont like the SD, but we didnt know any better and she loved it and now gobbles up her dinner in 2 minutes. . except that the bag's instructions say to feed a pup her age and weight 4.5 cups daily (lot less than her previous food) and she seems to be v hungry even after her meals, foraging around desperately for food and licking her bowl repeatedly to find even a small piece of kibble. her potty times have become less too..though she has firm stools.

my question: should we feed her more than bag recommends? or let her stay hungry? or..any other advice? ..


(Note: after doing research on dog foods recently here, i saw that the SD is not v good..so we plan to shift her to blue buffalo or TOTW after this small bag of sd finishes. Hope thats OK)


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## im_nice1 (Mar 12, 2009)

This is bessie


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## pittsabowawa (Jul 26, 2009)

shes cute.. 7 cups was way too much to be feeding her. Some dogs are just always hungry.. bella is this way. This does NOT mean that you should feed them more it just means that you are going to have to do more training on not begging etc than a less food motivated dog. I used to think that I should give bella a lot of food bc she was always hungry.. then she got fat so I put her on a diet and she now gets the correct amt of food. As your pup gets older she wont seem so hungry all the time.


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## moluno (Apr 29, 2009)

Since cutting back from 7 cups to 4.5 cups is a pretty significant decrease, I probably would have gradually decreased it, like giving her 1/2 a cup less each day until you're finally at 4.5 cups. That's 2.5 cups of food that she's no longer getting, and I'm sure she notices. 

I doubt she's really hungry, some dogs just want food all the time. Juno is the same way. If I put a whole bag of food in front of her, gosh darn it she'd probably attempt to eat the whole thing. As it is she gets about 2.5 cups a day, she licks her bowl clean in 15 seconds flat and sniffs and licks around looking for more... but she gets no more. As long as she's at a healthy weight, I wouldn't dink around with how much you're feeding.


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## im_nice1 (Mar 12, 2009)

thanks all for replies. bessie is a food hog..its the lab in her ..though thankfully she hasnt got fat.

i guess i should have decreased the food amts slowly..but didnt occur to me. will try it now.


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## DogsforMe (Mar 11, 2007)

It's also important to grow large breed puppies slowly to help prevent joint problems. If you want her to eat slowly & take time forraging for her food try scattering her kibble around the back yard.


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## Ayanla (Jun 11, 2009)

I used the food calculator linked in one of the sticky posts to give me a guideline for how much my pups should be eating. So far it seems pretty good and my pups are both maintaining healthy weight and growth. 

I've got two at the opposite ends of the spectrum. Kira, my Boston, would eat all day and night and acts like I'm the cruelest mom in the world when I take her food bowl away. Odo, my maltese mix, picks at his food and will only eat if you have your back turned and he has no other option. He'll take two or three kibble and drop them on the floor of his crate, then eat them one at a time. Sometimes I hand feed him or use his kibble as training treats because he'll refuse to eat for two or three meals, but I try not to make that a regular occurrence. Oddly Odo is the one that's the most motivated to play with treat dispensers and/or work for treats/food. He would rather get his food as treats for training than eat it out of a bowl.

After we get back from our trip (the pups are going to a boarder), I'm going to be getting Kira one of the bowls that slows down the pace and getting Odo a buster cube. I'm starting to think Odo eats the way he does because it's boring and he has to take time out of all of the interesting things to do it. Maybe a buster cube will help mealtime be a little more interesting for him.


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## JustAnotheRunner (Mar 31, 2009)

I started out with Science Diet too, and Dexter did love it, he gobbled it up quick. Since then everywhere I look online, and even our local Pet Store all cringe when you mention Science Diet (Even though they carried it). 

If you check out this website http://www.dogfoodanalysis.com/how-do-you-rate-the-foods.html

It rates a lot of dog foods for you, and teaches you how to read labels for ingredients. I hear that cheap foods like Science Diet are made from the left over barley and grain that breweries have left over. You want your dog to get a lot of the meat he is missing from his diet, so the more meat products you see in the first 5 ingredients the better.

Since a lot of these 5 and 6 star dog foods are hard to find in normal pet stores I will suggest starting off looking into EVO, Innova, and Wellness. Skip over purina, Iams, or anything you see on TV.

Also, when switching between foods try to gradually mix the kibble over a week or 2 to introduce the new food. That avoids diarrhea.

No single kibble is perfect for every dog. So you'll have to switch it up to find which your dog enjoys while providing him with good stool. I am on the 3rd or 4th type. So it's not easy but in the end I think he will benefit a lot more then sticking with Science Diet.


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## KarliMom (Jan 7, 2009)

I think your making a good choice switching over to totw Karli loves it and she doesn't care what flavor she has we keep all 3 around and rotate them .
That little girl could eat 24/7 so we increase or decrease by her weight and to slow down so she isnt finished in 2.1 seconds we keep her kong in her food bowl . If she is really hungry she will take it out but most of the time she leaves it in and thinks she is getting more because the food is lasting longer .
Good luck on finding the happy median for Dexter he looks so sweet .


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