Does your doodle eat lying down?

[Stacy]

I always have the silliest questions. Maggie is the first dog I've ever had who lays on the floor while she eats her dinner. 

I assume it doesn't make a difference. I just think it's funny. 

I do have elevated bowls for Maggie. But she's still a finicky eater. The best way I've found to get her to eat is to sit on the floor with Maggie's bowl on one side of me and Katie's on the other and we sit there while she eats. She's a good weight, so I guess it's fine, but I wish she was just a little more enthusiastic about her food. It makes me worry that there's something wrong with her. 

[Amy and Annabelle]

As long as she is a healthy weight and isn't sick, she is probably fine. Annabelle has never been an enthusiastic eater. Sometimes she only eats once a day. She is healthy.

[Stacy]

I know you're right. And it's summer and it's been incredibly hot this year, even though they aren't out much. That effects their appetite too. There's nothing at all about Maggie that seems even the slightest bit sick. I'm just still kind of paranoid. I know I need to let it go, and I'm trying. That stuff just has a way of sticking with you. I will probably never again experience anything like what happened with Katie and Ava, but I am still so on edge that something will happen.

[Karen, Jasper and Jackdoodle]

Stacy. Every other discussion in The Food Group is about a doodle who is an unenthusiastic eater. There's nothing wrong with her. Relax. :) 

[Stacy]

I know. Really I do. Mostly I just wondered if other people's dogs lay on their bellies with their bowls between their feet when they eat. She looks like the laziest eater in the world. Sometimes I eat in bed. Maybe it's the same thing.

[Karen, Jasper and Jackdoodle]

I had a German Shepherd foster who ate that way. It's actually the way dogs in the wild eat. Except not with a bowl, lol. 

[Stacy]

I'll have to tell her she's like a wild woman! ;)

[Nancy, Ned, Clancy, and Charlie]

Hahahahaha

[Lynda Kamrath]

My dogs all stand to eat and gobble their food.  My cousin had a mastiff who always laid down to eat and ate his gallon bowl of food very slowly.  He only ate once a day but it was strange watching him.

[Nancy, Ned, Clancy, and Charlie]

Ned almost always lays down with the bowl between his paws. We call that 'serious eating' :-}.  Ned is not my chowhound. He is very picky, which I don't give in to - well mostly I don't.  If one of the others needs a special kibble temporarily or if we have dogs visiing, I might toss a couple of kernals of their kibble into his bowl. Of course, he might go over and eat those couple kernals and walk away too. LOL.  Ned self-regulates his eating - he is within one pound of the weight he attained when he first became an adult.  He is ten.  Ned often skips a meal and sometimes three.  I do tend to worry when he hasn't eaten for a day and a half, but eventually he eats.

[Stacy]

Sometimes she doesn't even get up when I'm putting their breakfast together. Katie is waiting anxiously for the bowl to hit the floor and Maggie is like, "Servant mommy, you may place the bowl right here in front of my nose and I will determine if your food prep was acceptable." It's a good thing Her Highness is a benevolent ruler.

[DonMarie and Picco]

Picco would lay down and eat as a pup sometimes. I forgot about that till I read this. He has an elevated bowl now but he will eat at his bowl sometimes and other time he grabs a mouthful of food, walk to living room carpet (same color as food) spit it out and eat one piece at a time and leaving a few piece behind for us to step on of course. Sometimes I'll pick up a piece of kibble from the floor hand it to him and he'll eat it! Picco self-regulates too. Eating alot a day or two then eating very little a couple days. He can ignore or walk away with food in the dish. His weight never wavers. I've finally gotten use to it. My former dog was a husky mix that would eat herself to death if she had the chance!

[Stacy]

The ones who can self-regulate are probably much better off for it. Our society is so hard-wired to feed. Try telling my grandma that I don't need a fourth serving of whatever - it's like I'm dying. Worse, try telling a parent that they can't feed their child because they might need medical tests. They truly think we're torturing them. Sometimes I want to tell them that no one has ever ever ever died from not eating for six hours. But it's just such a natural thing to feed your child. I have it too. I want the dogs to be in the clean plate club. I have to remind myself that it's a good thing that they stop eating when they're full. They are not starving, and really they probably get too many treats. So anything they don't eat in their dinner is already accounted for.