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Feeding your dog should be more than just filling up their bowl in an identical fashion every day. Depending on what you’re training goals are, you can accomplish multiple goals in different fashions simply by adjusting the way you feed your dog. Let me explain to you what is possible by changing breakfast today. Firstly, I am a huge advocate for scheduled meals versus free feeding. FF comes with a few big problems such as obesity, lacking motivation, and removes all ability for impulse control to be applied. There is also a health concern of bloat, we will talk about that later. If you do a scheduled breakfast and dinner, don’t go through the motions and put food in their dish and walk away. You’re wasting a very important opportunity for them to learn. At a minimum, I want you to practice having your dog stay on their dog bed throughout the preparation and placing down of the food. When you pick up their food scooper, they get excited, and that excitement is something they do not know how to control, because we have never practiced it. Let’s try Option 1 first. Put your dog on leash (so you have control) and put them on their dog bed. Whatever command you are using for stay (stay, wait, place etc) give it, and walk to go get their dog dish. Throughout the process of preparing and giving, if your dog breaks, stay calm and pick up their leash, and restart the process. While it may take 10 minutes on the first day, that’s okay! It gets quicker quickly. Release your dog verbally to eat. Option 2. When you have a dog who loves eating their food and gets excited around meal time, this can turn into an amazing training session. Instead of putting your dog’s food in the dish, put it in your pocket and go outside for a quick training session. Remember, your dog is hungry, and they know it’s feeding time, you are guaranteed to have their attention. Go outside and practice anything you want, preferably some eye contact, leash walking and following, and some recall games! By putting their food in your pocket or fanny pack, you have taken the power away from the dish and giving it to yourself. Option 3, Scatter game. This is one simple, and super rewarding. Take your dog’s dish full of food, and scatter the food in the grass in the front/backyard. If your yard is fenced in let them go, if not, use a long line and sit and hang out. Scavenging for food is more than just feeding them, it’s fulfilling a need to search and find food. Your last option is to use a feeding toy. There is multiple options for the “right toy”, all you have to do is find something that your dog enjoys, and use this as a mixup every now and again. This also makes for a great babysitter if you need 10 minutes. If you guys enjoyed this, or any of the content that we have up, please follow this link and vote for Say It Once Dog Training. Thank you! 
12 Comments
Kathy P
4/26/2022 11:44:12 am
I love and do all those! But we had to stop the grass searching because it was leading to some digging. Now we just do it on the deck and other areas besides the lawn. 9/12/2023 01:42:27 pm
Personally I have a dog named Browny, both of us are couples since childhood, Browny has been with me since I was 18 years old until now I am 23. But during our 5 years together, this is the first time Browny has become a great dog, I mean, since I watched the video course Brain Training for Dogs and practiced it with Browny, he became a dog with an extraordinary personality. This course is not just giving my dog a command, but also makes it possible to 'think'. Very cool. And since then, Browny and I have become partners in everything, from just jogging together, playing, to even sleeping. Because Browny becomes a submissive dog and relatively never does a 'common mistake' that other dogs usually do..
karen
4/26/2022 12:12:58 pm
Do you have advice for dogs who are not super food motivated?
Jessica
4/26/2022 01:52:43 pm
Following for a response to this! My dog is not food motivated at all, and walks away when I guide him to his bowl at meal time. I’ve tried using it as reward for training instead of treats, but he won’t take it.
Will
7/4/2022 04:41:56 am
Try training with toys if your dog enjoys them. If not, give him smaller portions, there shouldn’t be any food left in the bowl after a minute or two. Fasting for 24hrs is also very effective and has many health benefits. Just make sure to provide plenty of water!
Nour Jkayem
4/28/2022 07:52:35 am
I enjoyed reading this so much! Ever since i have followed you on Social Media, I now understand my pup's behavior more than ever! I have been benefiting from Peach's meal times to turn them into training sessions for 2 months now, she has been doing great! However, what I need help with is how to keep that same behavior outside of her meal times. When we go out for a walk for example or when she sees people (outside of the house only), she's a disaster. She just forgets her name and starts to jump on people and strangle herself on the leash 😅
m
4/28/2022 10:04:30 am
When I use a toy to feed my dog, she thinks that I have forgotten to feed her and brings me her bowl and begs for her dinner. 🤔 4/29/2022 04:27:03 pm
These ideas are great. Here's an inexpensive homemade toy to use for feeding. It's called a snuffle and occupies them for at least 10 minutes or more if you really work to push their food into the crevices of the snuffle. Often times I load it with my dog's lunch at breakfast time and sit it on the counter. At lunch I can quickly sit it down for my dog and he's busy for 10-20 minutes. It's especially nice if I have a busy schedule at lunch time planned. scheduled.https://www.animalhumanesociety.org/news/how-make-snuffle-mat
Brian
5/5/2022 04:42:37 pm
Nice; wondered about the 'excitement' level, I just love interacting with dogs better when they don't 'spaz'. The only thing I discovered about calming them (food, att'n, etc.), is to non-respond for a minute; maybe a tip for a future blog. Happy feedings! 9/15/2022 06:00:44 am
As a dog lover, I found this blog to be very informative. I learned a lot about dogs like <a href="https://lead-academy.org/how-to-train-your-dog-to-ignore-other-dogs">how to train my dog to ignore other dogs</a>, and I'm excited to put these tips into practice. Thanks for sharing this information! 9/23/2022 05:11:53 am
Mostly dogs like Calming Dog Bed which is made of super soft fur and filled with pp cotton and other material.
Ashley Brehm
5/8/2023 06:41:01 pm
What can be done with dogs that growl while eating when someone gets near them? Leave a Reply. |
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