Reducing Meals

[Mary]

I really need some advice on how to cut Lotties meals down to 2 a day :-
She is presently fed first thing in the morning, when I arrive home lunchtime and then teatime.  My aim is to feed her morning and then again at about 4ish.

My problem is when I come home lunchtime, after a lovely welcome, she then gets really excited as she is in routine of having her lunch then (she'll do anything for food and NEVER LEAVES ANY ).  So I decided the best time to cut it out was a couple of weeks ago during half-term as I don't work then so we were out of routine .  After 3 days, I am embarressed to say I started giving her it again as she was driving me MAD

Must have that inner body clock as she KNEW when 12.15 was and from then on sat in the kitchen whining by the cupboard or following my every move.  I took her out to distract her but she started immediately we got home again  The odd treat didn't work either.  

Any tips anyone?                    

[Sue H]

I am aiming to get Bramble round to the same routine as Lottie, and I have been trying to extend the gap between breakfast and lunch by taking the dogs out for their walk a bit later than before - say at about 1pm, and then feeding when I get back (the idea being that eventually lunch will become tea..). Bramble seems least keen on breakfast out of his three feeds - the only one he really gobbles down is lunch, and that is probably because Barley is fed then as well - gannets  I think that they are a bit like children really - when they get to a size where they can take on enough at one time to keep them going for longer, then you can reduce the frequency of their smaller meals..  Barley is 7 now and it all seems so long ago that I went through this with her, and spaniels are such little piggies, that I shall await any further repllies with interest                    

[ETavernor]

Mary - are you a teacher by any chance?  If so - snap!!  Scooby has always been indifferent over his food - he is a good eater but will frequently walk away from his bowl and then return for another nibble.  We have problems getting him to eat his forth meal at about half past eight as he is always so sleepy!!!  Could you work out Lottie's daily food intake and divide it equally into three servings- reducing each portion slightly?? I don't know??

Emma                    

[Gilly]

Well Mary...what can I say...I WISH I had your problem....Buttons only eats ONE meal a day most of the time.....TWO if I'm lucky, she's just not a big eater at all...and I worry about the opposite...is she getting enough                    

[Anita]

Mary

The only thing I did was to reduce the amount of food given at the meal you want to cut out.

I did this over a two week period so the middle meal got smaller and the others a bit bigger. But, Phoebe has never been a greedy guts.

She still has biscuits when she comes back from her walk but not at any set time.

It is hard though when they look at you with those spaniely eyes                    

[Mary]

Firstly Emma, no I am not a teacher but I have children and so life slots in around their school hours

I have been reducing her lunch time meal......she has more in the morning and later.  It's just getting rid of it completely that's the problem

Gilly....I think I'd like a happy medium as Lottie is the worlds biggest gannet (she is actually sat by me now wimpering, she knows it's gone 4pm ).  I have to watch her so carefully when we are out for a walk.....small bones and chewing gum being the biggest problem (she can sniff anything out)                    

[*Jay*]

I suppose ina  way Vegas still has his 3 meals. I take about a third of the portion from breakfast and tea and he gets that in a buster cube at dinner time. The reason I had to do this was because he associates me going to work with getting his buster cube so he is quite happy to be left alone. Didn't want to risk cutting it out in case boredom got the better of him                    

[Inca]

Inca is not a big eater at all. In fact this week he has reduced himself to two meals a day plus his afternoon cornflakes ( no way will he give these up ). we can put his meal out for him, but if he isn't hungry he just ignores it till later.                    

[Anonymous]

well Jessie will not eat her bowl of food lately but insead rather go and steal poppys food and then go back to hers later...  no you dont  you little lard bucket    honestly she will be the size of a horse if she carries on... dread to think what she weighs if she was 10kg at 5 months, all the other cockers seem to look smaller  :-                    

[Christine]

I think we are quite lucky, Jasper eats twice a day and thats all he will eat, sometimes when we get home from work he still has some of his food left over from breakfast!  He seems to only want to eat when we are there, the same as our cat.  Maybe he has seen her eat when we are home and has picked up on it.

Lately Jasper has been sneaking into the kitchen and eating the cats biscuits and then his later too  I hope that cat busicuits are not much different to puppy biscuits.

Mary I think the usual answer applies "perseverance"  Lottie will get there in the end.  Give her a big kiss from Jasper                    

[Allison]

Well Mary as you know Sally is a greedy guts she is forever sniffing around the kitchen hoping I drop some food on the floor. We have got Sally on 40 Grms 3 times daily at the moment, yesterday we gave her a little boiled rice with her tea, Neil said he would time her eating it ,as it just goes so quickly she devoured the lot in seconds flat the Beta is also dry.  I think we have the greediest cockers going. I am just symathising with you because god knows what I will do in 3 months time  when we try to lose the dinner time feed.                    

[Mary]

I decided today to ignore her whines at my feet lunchtime and following me around.  To keep calm I went upstairs to get out of her way for 5 minutes.

Do you know what I found when I came down?

A poo, right in the middle of the lounge  Now, if that wasn't a protest poo I'll eat my hat

She NEVER does this anymore....ooohhhh the little horror                    

[Anita]

The little horror

Defintely a protest!                    

[Anonymous]

lol..thats so funny, jessie did that once to me when I wouldn't let her have poppys chewy stick for the upteenth time   went upstairs to do important business on computer   adn came down two mins later to a poo on kitchen floor... wasn't best pleased with the little lady I can tell ya